How to replace the DVD burner inside my DVD Recorder with a new one ?

[highvolumeJP]

Hi,

After testing all the DVD recorder brands I can find in stores locally, I find that most of them have poor quality or are not as good as my old DVD recorders or don't support 3 hour recording and only 2/4/6/8.

I currently use a Toshiba DR-4 and a Toshiba DR-5, they both offer excellent picture quality. I've been using those for a year now and I notice that some discs have CRC errors when I try to copy them on my PC - it is NOT a media issue because the media I use is brand new, and will do so on anything I try. I suspect it's the internal drive going bad.

Here is my question - Can I just open the Toshiba DR5 and change the internal DVD burner ? Does this DVD recorder use the standard IDE DVD Writer ? Can I replace it when a computer DVD Writer ?

Thanks

[samijubal]

Just because the discs are new doesn't mean they are good. What brand of discs are they?

When my D-R4 went it started giving an error once in awhile when finalizing, then it started to not read blank R discs but would still work with RWs.

I don't know about the D-R5 but the D-R4 doesn't use a PC type burner. The D-R4 burner does look a lot like the Toshiba 5112 I have with a different circuit board. I haven't looked real close to see if it could be done, I stocked up on D-R4s when they could be bought on ebay for $20, but it might be possible to use a Toshiba 5112 PC burner with the circuit board swapped with the D-R4 burner board.

[highvolumeJP]

Ok this confirmed my suspicion - you cannot use a PC burner - Some clueless person said elsewhere that ALL DVD Recorders used the standard DVD Burner (IDE) that you could swap - Figured he was wrong.

I'm using the AccuCore Sony DVD-RW - they are expensive - and it's not the media - i have no problems recording, recognizing discs, or finalizing. iT's just that when I bring the disc to my PC and copy it, it will abort with a CRC error at around 50% reading the disc - on ALL readers does the same. tried on both PCs, same. So I would full reformat the disc and use it on the recorder it would work - then randomly 3 discs later do the same, so I suspect it's the internal burner in the recorder going bad (bad laser, writing errors, etc.) Toshiba now is utter CRAP - it's too bad because their DR-4 and DR-5 line of DVD recorders were top quality ! I don't know what chipsets they use, but it's very good - Their newer DR6 and DR7 are CRAP, they use another chipset (obviously a cheaper one), only supports 1, 2, 4, 6, and no 3 hours (moron - why the hell would they skip 3?) and recording looks crap. As far as buying a DR4 or DR5 on eBay that's asking for trouble..... I have tried getting a new dvd recorder (other brand) but most of what is sold now is utter crap - you only see a handful of them at Future Shop / Best Buy, they all stink. I tried the Samsung DVD R155/R160, picture was soft yet you could see artifacting (VERY visible) even in SP / XP recordings ! One thing I will miss about my Toshiba is its built-in TBC and edge sharpening which sharpens the image and removes noise without softening it!) The TBC while not like true TBCs, does a fairly good job with poor video.

[samijubal]

I always do a full erase of RWs on the PC before reusing them. I tried just reusing them in the beginning but I had problems with them. Since I started doing a full erase every time I've never had problems again.

I bought 6 D-R4s on ebay that all worked but that was back when the D-R5 had just been released. I wouldn't buy a used one now. Toshiba recorders are Funai junk now, they don't make their own recorders anymore, thus the drop in picture quality and 3 hour recording. The D-R5 may use a PC type burner, some recorders do. I haven't seen inside one of them and don't know what the burner looks like.

I scored a Toshiba XS-35 160 gig HDD recorder new on ebay a month and a half ago for $200 shipped. Once in awhile there are still new Toshiba recorders on ebay, you might have to keep a close watch for awhile to score one but they are there sometimes.

[lordsmurf]

Is Toshiba Funai, or just using Funai off-the-shelf parts? The good Philips machines apparently have some Funai guts, but it's not a Funai machine, it's still a Philips.

[highvolumeJP]

So most recorders on the market now are JUNK - it's a shame that big companies are ready to tarnish their reputation to save money. I heard Pioneers now are junk, and not using their own codecs anymore. Like I said, I went and tried all the brands out there they were all CRAP - picture was noticeably softner than original and the artifacts were extremely visible even at its highest quality. Even the higher-end more expensive recorders I tried with HDDs were garbage - if you are recording from analog TV you might get by, but don't even bother using DV, SVHS or Hi8 as a source it will really screw you over.

I wish those **********ing recorders had some custom encoder options like on a PC, where you could choose pre-filter levels, custom bitrates, CBR or VBR encoding - I know that the Toshiba DR4 and 5 uses constant quality. I am curious to know what MPEG chipset does the Toshiba DR4 and DR5 uses - and I don't feel like opening them up yet because they are still functional for now.

[samijubal]

The R410 and the Philips/Magnavox recorders are identical inside and use virtually the same remote. I can't say for sure they are Funai but the F on every circuit board is a pretty good clue who makes them. One thing is for sure, they aren't Philips. The R410 plays RAM discs, a format that Philips has never supported in any DVD recorder. Toshiba has never used Philips for any electronics as far as I know but they have used Funai for DVD recorders. Many people have reported that the D-RW2 and the Funai recorders are identical.

The only 2 ICs in the D-R4 with any distinguishing markings are NEC and Nanya.

[Bagheera]

So most recorders on the market now are JUNK - it's a shame that big companies are ready to tarnish their reputation to save money. I heard Pioneers now are junk, and not using their own codecs anymore. Like I said, I went and tried all the brands out there they were all CRAP - picture was noticeably softner than original and the artifacts were extremely visible even at its highest quality. Even the higher-end more expensive recorders I tried with HDDs were garbage - if you are recording from analog TV you might get by, but don't even bother using DV, SVHS or Hi8 as a source it will really screw you over.

This is yet another good reason for me to fix up the DVR-220 unit my father bought me once. It has always had an excellent picture quality, even at EP recording. Colors are always vibrant. When I finalise a DVD-RW it will play on my PC with no issues. When done editing or whatever, I can unfinalise the disc on the DVR-220 and re-use the disc over and over..

Repairing this unit hasn't been cheap I admit. But I strongly feel that this unit was built extremely well for what it is.

It was built in 2004-2005. I have a friend that has a newer unit made by another company. He is very unhappy with it. He says the colors are "washed out" and just not as good as my machine. Yet his machine cost a hell of a lot more than mine. Go figure. I would think his machine would blow mine away since it is newer technology and more money. Sad to say, he thinks the older ones were better in some respects. I can't say either way, I've never owned a recorder except this one. I'm no expert on recorders. (although I did stay at a Holiday-Inn last night) Just thought I would chip in my 5 cents worth. (inflation you know.)

Baggy.

[orsetto]

Current DVD/HDD Pioneers are not "junk", far from it. While its true they are co-producing these machines with Sony, the Pioneer version has its own motherboard and encoders and still retains the Pioneer operating system. Up until this year the Sonys were much cruder, but as of the new Canadian model 780 Sony now uses the complete Pioneer design lock stock and encoders. The Pioneer 460, 560, 660 and Sony 780 are among the last of their kind.

There was not and never will be again anything like the cult model genuine Toshibas, but those machines are three years dead, gone and finished. And they had their faults even when new- the perfect picture nearly always entailed the tradeoff of godawful reliability, in both VCRs and then DVD recorders. Unfortunately the market is now so dismal for these machines that all choice has disappeared: for DVD/HDD you are essentially left with just Phillips/Funai and Pioneer/Sony. Panasonic pulled the plug this summer and Toshiba is long discontinued. Three years ago, you could opt for the complicated, trouble-prone JVC and Toshiba decks if you prized the ultimate picture. Or you could opt for the less-flawless but more reliable Panasonic and Pioneer units if you didn't have the patience for a prima-dona recorder. Of whats left new in stores now, the Pioneers come as close to the old Toshibas as we'll ever see in regards to flexible recording speeds and editing. The Phillips units are pretty reliable but not as refined. Choose one of them and compromise, choose none and protest, or go look for a used or "new-old-stock" Toshiba on eBay. Given the absolutely worthless picture quality of current cable/satellite service, it doesn't matter anymore. If you're solely interested in your own DV productions, use a PC for ultimate quality: standalone recorders are not optimized for anything but TV shows.

[bevills1]

The LiteOn 5xxx models are the only ones that burner may be replaced with IDE burners as far as I know. Even those LiteOns with newer burner replacements have some issues such as no VCD recording, and some freeze on fast forward.

[handyguy]

Be sure to clean your laser first. It's a lot cheaper to do that.

[jjeff]

You didn't mention Panasonics. If I were you I'd give them a try for PQ. While they don't have a 3hr preset speed, I use FR and am able to get the same bitrate as a 3hr speed. I think Pioneers work the same way too and wouldn't hesitate to suggest those also.
I went through the same testing you did before settling on a Panny. I tried most mfgs. including Sony, LG, Ilo, Liteon, Cyberhome, Pioneer(a poor Pio not like their current lineup) and a few others. Not Toshiba or a good Pio. They all had very poor PQ, IMO. Current Pannys may have their quirks but have the same (love it or hate it) PQ. Sure wouldn't hurt to give them a try. In Canada you have a better selection of DVDRs than in the states.

[highvolumeJP]

The Panasonics are known to have very bad encoders - I have had many DVDs given to me made with a Panasonic DVD recorder, even the high-end models, and Panasonic was always under criticism for its bad encoder and visible artifacting. I might end up buying an ADS Express DX2 USB capture device, or buy a 2nd ADS Instant DVD 2.0, it produces the best picture quality out of all DVD recorders I tried, only complaint is that it loses audiO/video sync on bad footage and it overheats (poor construction). Which is why I wanted a DVD recorder equal to the Toshiba DR4 / DR5 - The problem now is that DVD recorder manufacturers are using very low-end video encoders and video decoders ! the days of using the phillips sa7115H and the cirrus logic chips are gone, now its CRAP that they use. and I've seen VISIBLE artifacts even on slow moving, non difficult scenes, even on XP ! much more on SP and under ! I have a Samsung DVD R155 and it's the biggest mistake of a DVD recorder I've ever had - poor picture quality and they LIE and MISLEAD YOU - it DOES have a flexible recording mode FR but instead of adapting bitrate, it will simply auto switch recording mode - Example if you enter that you have a 3 hour recording it will use the 4 hour recording mode instread of adjusting the bitrate - VERY misleading !!!

[tac7]

Since you are in Canada, I'd give a HDD Pioneer a try. With a good signal source, you'll end up with very good picture quality and enough adjustments to refine your picture preferences. While I find my LiteOn 5005 superior for VHS or Hi8 transfers, you should be very happy with the Pioneer for recordings from higher quality analog / digital cable or satellite.
I have bought a Pio 640, a Pio 550, and a Pio 650, and because of the uncertain future of perhaps not being able to get them any longer, I phoned around a few places and got another factory-sealed Pio 650 as a spare a couple of weeks ago at a remote Future Shop and had it shipped to a store near me. They literally almost gave it away. Maybe there are still a few of last year's models around, which you could get for an absolute bargain.
I also tried the Philips 3576 recently, but returned it for a number of reasons -- primarily very inferior picture and sound quality from its analog and QAM tuner.
With the 30-day return guarantee, you could also try the new Sony 780 HDD model available at Future Shop and Best Buy. I haven't used one myself, but functions and quality are supposed to be very close to the latest Pioneer models, and they are also cheaper than the Pioneers at this time.

[orsetto]

The new Sony 780 is a carbon copy of the Pioneer 560 but sells for about 20% less at retail. Major features are the same, and the on-screen operating system for editing and DVD creation is identical. The instruction manuals use the same illustrations.

[highvolumeJP]

I heard some negative reviews on the sony, that it doesn't have a pause button - that was for earlier models - can you confirm that this model has a pause ?

So it's possible the Sony and pioneer use the same chipsets.

What chipset does it use ?

As to LITEON, I think it uses the LSI chipset if not mistaken, but a bad video ADC (image jittering, and green tinge to the video)

Also, does the pioneer and sony use standard IDE HDDs that I can replace ?

[highvolumeJP]

*** UPDATE ***

Here's an update to this thread - I finally decided to take some time and open 3 of my DVD recorders to look inside to see if I can replace the drives. Well, the result was not surprising - There was this guy who kept posting on forums that he has opened just about every make of recorders out there and that ALL used IDE drives - it really gets to me that some people go as far as posting misleaing info on the internet.... Anyhow, contrary to what he said, DVD recorders use custom drives tha are made especially for DVD recorders - they have a special BIOS on them and they do not use an IDE interface. From what I heard the only ones allegedly using IDE drives are LITEON, but I cannot confirm this as I don't use LITEON recorders. So I guess I got an answer to my question now - also changing a drive on a DVD recorder is not as simple as swapping one out - you need to access a service menu, which is the equivalent of accessing your BIOS on your PC - and prepare the new drives - it wouldn't be a wise for companies to use IDE drives people can easily replace, how else are they going to rip us all off with high repair cost, twice the price of a new unit!

[lordsmurf]

@last post
I've opened about 40-50 recorders MINIMUM in the past 5 years, and I can tell you that most of them do use standard off-the-shelf drives. Most of them lack the "full body" covering, it's just the drive guts loose in the unit, but it's still a standard drive. I've replaced drives for several machines -- including RCA, Pioneer, Polaroid, LiteOn, Panasonic -- it's just a matter of getting the right drive. Some of them are a little more complicated, special "adjustments" made to the drive interface, but it's nothing you cannot figure out by reverse engineering the drive in the unit. I've never seen a drive with a special BIOS that locked it to a recorder, or where the motherboard locked out such non-special drives. I know a few exist, but those are the exception, not the rule. NEC and OptiArc are the most common drives I see.

@another post above, response to LiteOn comment
LiteOn can have green tint and jittering problems, but it is a unit-by-unit issue, not a mass problem that affects all units or even all models of a line. I have one 5001 that jitters, a 5104 that was perfect, and an ILO that was green. Firmware often controlled some of that too. Others with the same models had no such issues, sometimes even on same firmware.

[oldfart13]

The Dayteks can also use off the shelf computer drives like the old LG, Liteon and Sonys. Hard drive replacement is also a snap as all you have to do is drop in a new drive and the recorder will format it so as to make it compatible with the recorder! Just discovered this right now. No cloning drives needed! The only problem I've run into with those recorders is that content may or may not be off loadable to a computer via a USB or other drive adapter. Some program mpegs come up as unopenable while others can be opened, copied to the computer HDD, used as source material for a DVD Authoring program, etc. No idea why at this point...

[CrazyCanuck]

I got a good collection of Liteon and Liteon-based recorders, some Philips and an old GoVideo, all IDE. I've replaced all the drives in my Liteons (5005, 5007, HD740GX, HD760GX), also in my ILOs (ILO HD04, ILO R04) all LSI, and even my GoVideo 6530 (Cirrus). Never had any issue with green tint other than with my GoVideo but firmware corrected that. I just replaced a drive in a Liteon 5045 a couple of weeks ago for a friend.

The drives I've used are Liteon 1635, 1693, 160s, 165s, 20H1P, also used Sony 120, 190, 820. The only issue with some of the drives is that some don't fast-forward DVDr's or commercial DVDs, DVDrws are ok. I usually put a fully functionning drive in the single drive recorders and the non-fast fowarding ones in my HDD models as I only use those to burn, not for playback.

The Philips (720/17) has a proprietary right issue on the drive's chip, the only way to replace it is to cannibalize one from a comparable recorder of the day (75/17, 615, 650).

Liteon moved away from IDE connection in their later models.

[Seeker47]

The new Sony 780 is a carbon copy of the Pioneer 560 but sells for about 20% less at retail. Major features are the same, and the on-screen operating system for editing and DVD creation is identical. The instruction manuals use the same illustrations.

Did I see one of those on the shelves at some store recently -- stateside -- or am I mistaken ? Can't recall where, and I must have been in too much of a hurry to linger or even just take a closer look. (The Sony brand has become a major "Don't-Go-There" for me, so that might have been a factor.)

[highvolumeJP]

Well some people keep saying they replaced their drives - yes maybe SOME recorders DID use IDE drives - but not anymore - most of the recorders now use a proprietary drive or if they use a regular drive, it's the guts of the drive and it is connected to the board through a non IDE interface, so you cannot replace the drive! unless you are a geek and can mod your current ide drive - but it can be time consuming -!

[LCSHG]

The post by lordsmirf September 21, 2008 really stated the issue

The Green tint was corrected in the ilo 04 with firmware

To add
liteon drives after the 1635 did not FF But this was on commercial Disks, burned disks seemed to function ok. This might indicate that some info on a commercial disk could be the problem.

I think the lack of FF in later drives could be overcome with some effort but as I have 10 NEW 1673s and 1633s drives still in reserve I’ve not pursued it

IDE HDD umits may also get hard to come by But modifications could be less of a problem.

[orsetto]

The "typical" poster of this question hopes there is a cheap fast DIY fix for their dead recorder. The answer to that question can be complicated depending on how much experience you have with this stuff and whether you can recognize the signs of custom vs generic IDE drives and such.

Many units of a couple years ago, like the bargain RCA and Polaroid DVD/HDDs and some of the LiteOns, do use relatively generic IDE burners and are easily repairable. Ditto their hard drives: drop 'em in and they self format. But most of the "top four" brands of DVD/HDD machine that we're interested in use customized drives and require putting the unit into service mode. Toshiba and Panasonic can have their hard drives replaced without too much fuss but their optical drives are so hopelessly customized about all you can do is send them in for factory service. Panasonic will accept no alternatives, you can sometimes trick a Toshiba into half-assed operation with a couple of off-the-shelf burners but it won't be pretty. Sony and Pioneer have each revised their overall recorder designs more often than Panasonic and Toshiba, so they have more DIY repair leeway depending on the model. Sonys can have their hard drives swapped easilly by activating a service mode on the front panel, the burner is another story- some models yes, most no.

Pioneer requires an annoyingly expensive service remote and disc to repair any model, but with those tools many are easily repaired. Any Pioneer can be made to accept nearly any size hard drive replacement and will use the entire capacity. Pioneers prior to the 640 can have their burners replaced by similar off-the-shelf Pio burners as long as you swap the drive controller boards (the recorder burner has DRM firmware that locks to the motherboard and a custom ribbon interface). Pioneers from the 640 on use a one-off Sony-sourced burner which CANNOT be user-serviced or replaced: like Panasonic, these have to be sent in for factory service.