Hi all, I've owned this unit for over a year now, with very little problems. Sometimes it would do a weird thing or two, but usually would revert to normal after a while. I record massive amounts of movies all the time, and have recorded over 400 DVD's easily in this time frame. Suddenly the unit won't read any of the same DVD media that it read before, including DVD's that I've finalized with this unit. (Note: all my DVD's are DVD-R) It won't read blank ones, ones that have recordings on them but not finalized, and ones that I've finalized. I have always alternated between TDK, Maxell, and JVC media, with no problems in the past. The unit WILL read any DVD's which were purchased already recorded--such as off the shelf movies, etc. So I can watch those, but cannot watch any of my own library, nor burn anything from my hard drive to DVD. Very frustrating! Just says cannot read disc when I try now. The unit works fine in all other respects. Plays store-bought pre-burned DVD's. Timer works fine, will record anything from TV or VCR. I've never had the U99 error or anything like that. Once in a while it would suddenly decide to run a self-check test, but only once in a while, and when it came back up, always worked fine. Things I've tried: Powering off and unplugging for a while. No effect. Downloading and installing latest firmware for the unit--successful, but no effect. Purchased a disk unit cleaner, but the unit would NOT read the disc cleaner!!! Finally, though I was reluctant to do it, I formatted the drive. After I did this, suddenly everything worked fine again. I watched one of my finalized DVD's just fine. I put in several blank media and they all read fine. That was last night. Overnight I recorded some movies from TV. This morning, when I tried the drive again, it acted inconsistently. It wouldn't read blank media. At first, it did read media I've finalized on this unit, but I tried to fix the problem as I did last night, and so formatted the HD again. After I did that, it went back to not reading anything but store-bought pre-made DVD's again. This is VERY frustrating. I can record all the stuff I want, but can't burn any of it to DVD. Any advice would be appreciated! Thank you very much!
mondo, It may not be proper etiquette, but I suggest you post your problem over on the DMR-E85H U99 error thread. People seem to pay more attention to that thread. I have not had the problem you are experiencing, but I have not burned anywhere near as many DVD's as you have. http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/143317
I feel your pain. I've been looking everywhere in order to find a solution to the exact same problem, only with TWO Panasonics, a DMR-E20, and a DMR-E55. Because of the fact I have two Panasonics with the same problem which occurred so soon after purchasing each of them (I actually bought the E55 to replace the E20 when it became useless with anything except factory pre-recorded discs), it lead me to believe it was a common problem. Did you have any luck with it?
