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Bought a VCR/DVD combo about a month ago to transfer old home videos to DVD. Have ran through about 20 hours of tapes and now only get snow for the video on the VCR. The sound is fine and the picture is fine if I use fast forward or rewind while in play. I have tried to adjust tracking without any luck. Can this be dirty heads or because the picture is clear in fast forward and rewind, there is more likely a mechanical issue with the VCR. I have tried newer tapes as well as tapes that I have already transferred with the same symptoms.
Thanks for any suggestions.
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How about the first 20 hours of video that did work? Do you still have those tapes? If so, can you put them in and play them successfully?
If the old tapes play fine but the new ones are bad, then there is your clue.
Also, do you still have in your possession the VCR which made these problem recordings? If so, can you successfully play the tapes in question on that machine? If so, then perhaps you could use the RCA outputs from the old machine to connect to the RCA inputs on your new machine.
TCMy Dell PC system info.....3.4 Ghz Quad Core i7 processor....... 12 gigs of ram DDR3...... Windows 7 ultimate 64 bit.......video card Nvidia GTX 650 -
The tapes that I already transferred have the same issue now, nothing but snow on play but good picture in fast forward or rewind mode.
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Looks like your player has a problem.
Only a technician who actually looks at it can tell for sure. -
Remove the cover plate and then use a cotton bud soaked in methylated spirits to thoroughly clean the heads,tracking posts and any other component which comes in contact with the tape.When tapes are stored for a time,then played,a residue is deposited on all the mechanism,which is sufficient to lift the tape off the head and cause problems.When all tapes are similarly affected,then dirt and debris is quite often the major cause.
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If possible, use Isopropyl alcohol, not methylated spirits.
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Thanks for the help. I did call the manufacturer help line yesterday and after running through their questions they said to try a cleaning tape and if that doesn't help that it most likely would be a mechanical failure. Found a place that had a cleaning tape and it did the trick. Up and running again. Was really surprised that it went from a clean picture to snow with no degradation in the picture that I was able to tell. Would have thought I would have started to see some streaking. Suppose I might have hit a very dirty old tape and muddied it up while rewinding.
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