Playback on DVD recorder

[Obee]

I have a sony rdr gx210 dvd recorder and cannot playback certain discs I recorded on it. I put some home videos on disc from a video camera and the first time they played back fine. Now I cannot play the discs (message is cannot play disc). Other discs from the same batch are fine. It was only in the space of an hour or so that they decided not to play back after recording on them. Cannot see anything wrong with discs and I handled them carefully.
Can anyone help? Is there any way of retrieving the video footage?

[Steve]

Obee,

Welcome to ukexpert. Tis up to you if you want to sign off messages here with a first name, if you do we can write to you in a more friendly way using your name etc.

If disks won't work I tend to look for fingerprints on them.. but I'm sure you've done the simple stuff like that.

Looking at info on your actual machine I see talk of the settings used for finishing off disks when you've written to them... have a read of this support message on the Sony systems somewhere in the World for instance:
http://www.css.ap.sony.com/consumer/...ory=Home+Video

...perhaps you could try putting one of these disks in the machine and instead of trying to play it see if you can finalize it instead or similar...

If that thought doesn't work for you then I would look around the online support on that site linked to above and try to see if they have tips for the exact error messages you are seeing etc.

The actual Sony support site/page for your product seems to be here:
http://support.sony-europe.com/hav/d...RG&m=RDR-GX210

If you click the 'compatibility' tag there you can see all sorts of info on what may or may not work on your player, and again finalizing a recording sometimes being needed in some cases so it will play is mentioned at one point.

If all else fails there is a 'contact' option on that page linked to above, and you may need to talk to Sony about what may be going wrong.

Hope some of the thoughts are helpful..

Steve

[Obee]

Thank you Steve.
Tried most of these ideas already and know the finalisation pitfalls but problem seems to be the 2 discs which suddenly for no reason I can see have decided they don't want to be played when an hour before they did! Any thoughts about cleaning them more thoroughly?
Julia

[Steve]

Julia,

No, no thoughts about cleaning them more. I'm sure you have watched zillions of DVDs and know how to get them clean enough to run.

The clue re the non playing seemed to be in your description.. that they worked fine when first made and played back fine in the machine that made them... then later on returning to them they inexplicably would not play... sounds very like them not being closed up/finalised properly doesn't it..

You talk as if you know every variant of the problems that can come up with your machine and needing to close up some types of save/disk etc etc... if so you know much more than me about your machine.. and there seem to be a mass of variants on how that machine works just from the advice/info I pointed to on the Sony site.

So.. my guess is that it is something to do with the disk/filetype and how you saved and closed the recording etc... but as I said, if that and your own ideas does not get you to a solution then calling the maker on their tech support line would seem to be the obvious next step. If you do that I'd have all the info to hand, the type of file you saved, what format, size of file, what type of disk you saved to, how you finalised things, etc etc...the answer must be in there somewhere unless you simply have a couple of duff disks for no reason.

Making the same disks over again using the original video may be another thing to try..

Steve

[easternherp]

Julia,

Have you tried playing them on a PC or Mac?

[Obee]

Thank you.
I've tried playing them back on a PC but as I hadn't got round to finalising them (was about to add a bit more footage) they wouldn't have played anyway. It is very odd, have done more recording and the other discs are fine. Must be the two discs somehow got scratched but I really don't think I was that silly. Must say I'm not impressed at ease of use of this Sony recorder - are they all as slow and complicated?
Julia

[dave_b9000]

I too am having similar problems with a Sony rdr gx210. I can record a disc, finalise it, play it back in the machine, but as soon as I remove the disc from the player (it will play on another machine) and put it back in the recorder, the machine spits it back out with the error "Cannot play disc"?! It played it fine before ejecting it?

I had problems with the machine when I got it (very tempremental about discs) but it went back to Sony who gave it a clean bill of health and it is fine now, other than the finalisation problem.

[Steve]

Dave,

Welcome to ukexpert.

My thoughts are in the second message in this thread.. and if they don't cover the problem then as I say there calling Sony and discussing it with their Tech Help Dept seems the obvious thing to do.

I suspect they hear this one all the time and will know the cause. Someone may have more ideas to add to this thread.. but while you are waiting to see I guess it couldn't hurt to talk to Sony and get direct support from them.

Steve