Corrupt HDD Camcorder recordings ? Need content, ideas appreciated

[PushPull]

I just bought a brand new JVC Everio GZ-MG575E 40gb HDD Camcorder. Made a recording this weekend which is _extremely_ important to me, but while trying to backup the files to my computer the problems started occuring.

First of all, while I was recording I got two or three times "Video Management File is broken. To record/playback video, recovery is required. Recover?" - which only gave me "OK" as an option. I did so, and started recording after these messages (had no time to troubleshoot whatever was causing it right then).

Now, when trying to backup the files to my computer, I am not able to manually copy the files through windows (error copying file/folder, parameter is incorrect). When I try to backup through "powerlink cinema NE for Everio" which came with the camera it crashes. While trying to play back the files from the camcorder through Windows Media Player they all play fine, up until certain points in the videos. Then audio/video goes blank. If I skip a few seconds it will play fine again. From what I can see the crashes while trying to backup also occur at the same points where the videos are stopping.

I'm skilled with computers in general, but not cameras etc. If I would be able to treat it as a normal HDD I would try to run a diskcheck - however, the camera has locked down write access to the HDD, and I cannot find any option to remove the lock.

Again, I would really, really hate loosing the content after all the work we put down, so any ideas, tips, anything is VERY much appreciated. I believe there has to be a way to get most of the content off the camera, since I'm able to play 99% of the videofiles from the camcorder. Maybe the HDD is fucked, even though the camera is brand new - but I'll still very interested in trying to obtain as much as possible of the videofiles.

In advance, thank you.
Best regards,
P

[oldandinthe way]

And what does JVC tech support suggest?

Are there software updates for the supplied software?

Have you tried another cable to connect to your PC?

[TBoneit]

Since it sounds as if you can play the videos from the camera that makes it seem that the drive in the camera is appearing in My Computer (Windows)

The drive being in write protected will not prevent data recovery software from being able to read from it. If you had been able to run chkdsk that may have totally trashed the drive and contents. Be happy they are protecting your recordings that way.

If that is the case easiest thing if it has a drive letter is open a command prompt and use Xcopy. open the command prompt, type xcopy /? for the commands. a sample would be for example
xcopy e:\ c:\copied /s /e /c /h /r /f
that means copy from e:\ to c:\copied (answer D if you didn't create that directory first) copy subdirs, ccontiue copying if an error, copy hidden and read only files. /f = show files being copied.

If that fails you could try data recovery software. There are some threads here with various recoomendations. a recent one being by FulciLives @ https://forum.videohelp.com/topic331102.html
There are a lot of suggestions there to try.

BTW once you get your video back send teh camera back for exchange or warranty service, It sounds like drive has either taken a hard impact and beome damaged or is just a bad drive.

Good Luck

[johnbull]

What ever became of this matter? I have one of these very cameras with the same error and I'm fearing losing the footage. I'm dying to know the end result.

Cheers ...........

[PushPull]

Hi, kinda slow reply, cause the JVC techs early concluded with this being a HDD error.. afterwards I didn't spend much time researching. Being a HDD error they didn't really have any good suggestions on how to save all/parts of my content.

Regardless, I was able to play back the files, up until a certain point in the files - which obviously was when I reached the corrupt part of the disks. Whenever I tried to copy it also started copying fine, then crashed on a certain point (probably same place it would stop during playback). I tried all kinds of copy-tools (i.e. xcopy), but as long as part of a file is unreadable, the whole file would hang while copying, regardless. It's a different matter if I was to copy lots of smaller files. In this case xcopy might have helped, and skipped the files being on a corrupt part of the HDD. _All_ my videofiles would hang during playback/while copying.

Basicly what I did was to (literally) spend 2 days on figuring out the exact place the videoclips stopped, then copying out whatever I could get before/after the point where it stopped. This took forever, and naturally I got lots of cuts in my footage..but at least I didn't loose all of it.

I did what I could to save the footage _before_ I turned the camera in to JVC. Around 1 week later they called me, saying they were so sorry, but "there was no way they could save any content". The only thing they suggested was that they'd replace the HDD, then give me the broken one. Afterwards I could send it into one of the companies which specialices in saving content on crashed HDD's... however, I know already the start-price for this kind of companies to even look at a disk is like 5 times what I payed for the camera.

Bottom line...while waiting to get the HDD camcorder back in bought a new minidv-based camera instead. And I doubt I'll ever go for a _HDD_ camcorder again. I like the idea of being able to access the videofiles directly from my computer - however, I'll wait for flash-memorybased cameras to hit the market instead. There's already laptops being sold with 64 gb solidstate disks, and I know 128 gb solidstate disks have been produced.. So I'm sure they eventually will use solidstate disks on camcorders as well. With this experience, plus HDD-errors on laptops, ipods etc, I just don't trust the technology for my camcorder.

[PushPull]

Oh, a few more notes + thanks for several good advices:
I actually tried all of these things before reading your replies
-No difference trying to access the content from another computer (conclusion: problem is on camcorder)
-Tried xcopy + several other copytools (conclusion: No help, since all these tools needs to be able to copy the _entire file_, and will eventually just hang if they can't)
-Tried to copy with lots of different datarescue software (conclusion: Some of them managed to save most of the content, but this ended up NOT being a sollution as this kind of software would eventually **** up the entire videofiles. The files were readable, but the recoverytools made different problems through the entire file. Audio/video got out of sync and/or I would get other issues with missing frames here and there throughout playback)

I'd say I'm quite skilled when it comes to computers, and I've experienced lots of differeny HDD problems throughout the years. In the end I did not find any better sollution than what I described above.

Best regards.

[verdy]

Hi pushpull. I'm having the exact same problem now!!!
I'd like to know how you copy parts of the movie out. What software do you use?

[dun4cheap]

If you can play the footage back via analog, you could attempt to capture the footage with another capture devices. You may lose quality but if the footage is that important then maybe this will suffice. This is another reason why I still use MiniDV.

[PushPull]

Hi,

what I did first was to play back the videofile, and make notes of where it stopped. Then I'm sure whatever software which comes with your camcorder lets you select an area of the videofile you'd like to copy to your computer. Let's say the videofile stopped on 05:07:30, then I'd select start > 05:07:20, and save it. Then I'd give it another go and playback from 05:07:40 or something, and wait for it to hit another corrupt area of the HDD.... and then this goes on and on and on and on and on pinpointing...

I'm a technical engineer, and I work with software- and hardware problems on a daily basis. I'd love to have a camcorder I could extract the files this easily from. However, I've also had miniDV camcorders since 2000, several different ones. Never had a single problem. Then this happens the first time I use my HDD-camcorder... let's just say it didn't seem very promising.

Take care guys, good luck solving your problems. If you have sick amounts of cash most HDD-problems can be solved by companies specializing on the matter - unless the HDD is extremely damaged. However, this is usually done on business-critical data due to the costs.