"Please re-operate after pushing reset button"

[Mr Chris]

My ancient Panasonic NV-GS50B is playing up. It's always worked perfectly for me as both a Mini-DV camcorder and a capture device, but now having not used it since the back end of last year, all of a sudden it won't accept a tape (used or brand new). The main error message I'm getting is "Please re-operate after pushing reset button" (which I've done), and occasionally "To service".

Basically, whenever I try to insert a tape, I get a load of whirring noises. Generally it spits it straight back out, but a handful of times I've managed to get one in. On those happy occasions one of two things happens:

1) It churns away and sounds rather like it's chewing up the tape.

or

2) I can fast forward and rewind without issue, but when I press play, it's just black silence (no, it's not blank). The 'time remaining' counter seems to tick down accurately, but the timecode itself is frozen at 0:00:00:00.

Has anyone else experienced something similar? Can anyone help at all?

Many thanks.

[Cornucopia]

If it sounds like it is chewing up the tape, IT IS. Stop using that deck right now, until you repair/replace it. Then check, clean & re-align & repack your tapes.

Scott

[Mr Chris]

Well, yes - I'm certainly not using any tapes I can't afford to lose to test it! But the thing is that 90%+ of the time the tapes are rejected without the mechanism even descending fully, so that's most likely where the problem lies. Has anyone else experienced anything similar, and did you ever find a solution? Or is this something only a professional can fix?

[Cornucopia]

That's a common problem, which requires pro tools and pro skills.

Scott

[JVRaines]

Has anyone else experienced anything similar, and did you ever find a solution? Or is this something only a professional can fix?

The problem is almost certainly a worn or misaligned part, or loss of lubrication that prevents the tape from loading. If you are very mechanical, know your way around electronics, own the right tools and have oodles of spare time, you can obtain the service manual and try to fix it yourself. But be advised that repair people will charge you more for a unit you tried to repair yourself — if they take the job at all.

[Mr Chris]

Hmmm. I was afraid of that. Oh well, can't be helped - thanks very much for the advice.