Panasonic DMR-BCT74ENK - cannot copy XP recorded footage to external HDD

[guy24s]

Hello,

I purchased a Panasonic DMR-BCT74ENK DVD/Bluray recorder a while back, and have been recording alot of XP footage onto its internal hdd. I now wanted to transfer some of this footage off the internal hdd onto my computer for further basic editing in Womble MPEG Video Wizard which does not require any re-encoding and eventually reauthor it to DVDs with better menues than the Panasonic recorder generates. On past DVD recorders, I have used DVD-RW discs to get the footage off the internal hdd's and onto my computer, but since I didn't have any DVD-RW discs at the moment and this new recorder claimed I can copy recorded footage directly to an external hdd, I tried to do that. However, it won't let me. What I did was go to "Copy", chose "HDD" under 'Source', and "USB HDD" under 'Destination'. When I attempt to execute, the following message is displayed: "Cannot copy to or from USB HDD."
I contacted Panasonic customer service of my country, and they told me to push the FUNCTION MENU button on the remote, select "Video" under "Contents on HDD" and push OK, then choose the footage I wish to copy and push the yellow button, then the blue button (so basically they told me to do the same that I had already done, except a different route of executing the action). Next step, I get two options: "Copy to Disc" (which is selectable), and "Move to USB HDD" (which is greyed out and not selectable).
Of course the USB HDD (a Western Digital passport) is 100% working. I am even able to navigate to it on this Panasonic recorder, using the FUNCTIONS MENU and I am able view/play material already on the USB HDD. I have also tried multiple other WD passport drives, and even a Toshiba USB hdd, I get the same results with all of them.
What could be wrong? Is the recorder not able to record XP / SP footage directly to a USB HDD, or what? Is XP / SP footage strictly reserved for DVD-R / DVD-RW discs? If yes, I don't see why that would be? I haven't tried to record anything in HD or other formats and copy that to any USB HDD's, so that might work, I just don't know, but I figured I would ask here first in case someone can clear this up for me easily.
I also wrote Panasonic back but they are extremely slow in corresponding (approximately 1 week to get a reply), and I am very impatient and frustrated as I paid alot of money for this product and I have 0% use for it if I can't get the material off the internal drive.

[DB83]

Just a hunch.

Since your intermal HDD must be formatted to record to, I wonder if that external HDD must also be formatted to be able to receive the recording in the same way. Of course any formatting will result in the loss of any data already on the external drive.

[hech54]

This thing probably acts like a television with a record function....the (TV) recordings must stay on the device.

[october262]

Hello,

I purchased a Panasonic DMR-BCT74ENK DVD/Bluray recorder a while back, and have been recording alot of XP footage onto its internal hdd. I now wanted to transfer some of this footage off the internal hdd onto my computer for further basic editing in Womble MPEG Video Wizard which does not require any re-encoding and eventually reauthor it to DVDs with better menues than the Panasonic recorder generates. On past DVD recorders, I have used DVD-RW discs to get the footage off the internal hdd's and onto my computer, but since I didn't have any DVD-RW discs at the moment and this new recorder claimed I can copy recorded footage directly to an external hdd, I tried to do that. However, it won't let me. What I did was go to "Copy", chose "HDD" under 'Source', and "USB HDD" under 'Destination'. When I attempt to execute, the following message is displayed: "Cannot copy to or from USB HDD."
I contacted Panasonic customer service of my country, and they told me to push the FUNCTION MENU button on the remote, select "Video" under "Contents on HDD" and push OK, then choose the footage I wish to copy and push the yellow button, then the blue button (so basically they told me to do the same that I had already done, except a different route of executing the action). Next step, I get two options: "Copy to Disc" (which is selectable), and "Move to USB HDD" (which is greyed out and not selectable).
Of course the USB HDD (a Western Digital passport) is 100% working. I am even able to navigate to it on this Panasonic recorder, using the FUNCTIONS MENU and I am able view/play material already on the USB HDD. I have also tried multiple other WD passport drives, and even a Toshiba USB hdd, I get the same results with all of them.
What could be wrong? Is the recorder not able to record XP / SP footage directly to a USB HDD, or what? Is XP / SP footage strictly reserved for DVD-R / DVD-RW discs? If yes, I don't see why that would be? I haven't tried to record anything in HD or other formats and copy that to any USB HDD's, so that might work, I just don't know, but I figured I would ask here first in case someone can clear this up for me easily.
I also wrote Panasonic back but they are extremely slow in corresponding (approximately 1 week to get a reply), and I am very impatient and frustrated as I paid alot of money for this product and I have 0% use for it if I can't get the material off the internal drive.

what format is the external HDD formatted as ?? NTFS or FAT32 ?? try formatting the external drive as NTFS and try again.
also turn off your dvd recorder then plug in your external HDD into the USB port and see if your dvd recorder will recognize the external HDD.

[guy24s]

Thanks for your replies!
The recorded footage is not TV programs, they are old family home videos from VHS tapes. So there wouldn't be any copyright issues.
The external HDD is NTFS-formatted already. About needing to be formatted to receive the recordings, you mean I need to let the Panasonic device format the drive? Haven't tried that yet, but seems a bit odd since it's able to recognize, navigate and even play material already on the external. Wouldn't it have trouble even accessing the external if it was formatted wrongly? Also, the manual doesn't mention anything about this, seems like a lot of people would run into the same problem if each external harddrive needed to be formatted by the Panasonic recorder in order to receive recordings.
Just generally speaking, do Panasonic's DVD/Bluray recorders normally let you copy XP/SP recorded footage over to an external HDD? Can someone confirm? I just want to rule out that it's simply not due to the footage being in XP/SP that the device is refusing to put it onto an external HDD. Also, if it's supposed to be able to do that, what would I end up with on the external? Would it be like 1 large VOB or MPG file per recording?

[october262]

Thanks for your replies!
The recorded footage is not TV programs, they are old family home videos from VHS tapes. So there wouldn't be any copyright issues.
The external HDD is NTFS-formatted already. About needing to be formatted to receive the recordings, you mean I need to let the Panasonic device format the drive? Haven't tried that yet, but seems a bit odd since it's able to recognize, navigate and even play material already on the external. Wouldn't it have trouble even accessing the external if it was formatted wrongly? Also, the manual doesn't mention anything about this, seems like a lot of people would run into the same problem if each external harddrive needed to be formatted by the Panasonic recorder in order to receive recordings.
Just generally speaking, do Panasonic's DVD/Bluray recorders normally let you copy XP/SP recorded footage over to an external HDD? Can someone confirm? I just want to rule out that it's simply not due to the footage being in XP/SP that the device is refusing to put it onto an external HDD. Also, if it's supposed to be able to do that, what would I end up with on the external? Would it be like 1 large VOB or MPG file per recording?

let your Panasonic recorder format the HDD and see how that goes.
also try formatting the USB HDD to FAT32
look in your instruction manual to see what the USB devices must be formatted as.
some require them to be a certain format in order to work properly.

[DB83]

Page 77 of the manual describes the process.

Not an exact quote. "Before recordings can be copied to an external HDD, the external device must be 'registered'. Registering a USB HDD will format the drive so all current contents will be deleted"

More so, since the copied recording could now be proprietory do not expect to be able to read that USB directly in Windows.

In other words the external drive simply becomes an extension of the main internal drive and can only be read by the recorder.

Better to stick with DVD-RWs

[hech54]

I was ridiculed and mocked for my beliefs!!!!!

[guy24s]

Damn... I see. Well, I guess DVD-RW's it is, then. Thanks for clearing it up for me. I wish Panasonic customer service could have just told me that right away (still waiting for them to even reply back).

[RedByte]

Hi folks,

I know I'm a little late but I've got the solution ^^.
About me: I'm a (nearly finished) software dev trainee and student and I've written a tool that can take care of your video syncing.
To be honest it is even possible without my tool, but it takes some time, due to the bandwidth limitation of (at least) my panasonic device and various other tasks that come along doing this by hand.

If you wish I can even tell you how to do it by hand, but well there is a reason why I've put 2-3 weeks of work into this project in order to get it automated...
It may be that my tool can be incompatible to your device since I can only test it with my "DMR-BST740/745", but thats a case I would like to discuss if it would actually happen.

So what does my tool?
It compares all movies of the panasonic devices with a "local" (in my case NAS fileserver) folder of movies and looks up differences or near hits (by filename).
It does support a blacklist for movie names that you would never like to sync.
It does handle all annoying panasonic hardware restrictions.
It converts the files to "proper" .mp4 format.
It transfers the files to your set storage.

In case someone should be still interested in this topic feel free to reply

Yours
RedByte

[alfaalfa]

Hi folks,

I know I'm a little late but I've got the solution ^^.
About me: I'm a (nearly finished) software dev trainee and student and I've written a tool that can take care of your video syncing.
To be honest it is even possible without my tool, but it takes some time, due to the bandwidth limitation of (at least) my panasonic device and various other tasks that come along doing this by hand.

If you wish I can even tell you how to do it by hand, but well there is a reason why I've put 2-3 weeks of work into this project in order to get it automated...
It may be that my tool can be incompatible to your device since I can only test it with my "DMR-BST740/745", but thats a case I would like to discuss if it would actually happen.

So what does my tool?
It compares all movies of the panasonic devices with a "local" (in my case NAS fileserver) folder of movies and looks up differences or near hits (by filename).
It does support a blacklist for movie names that you would never like to sync.
It does handle all annoying panasonic hardware restrictions.
It converts the files to "proper" .mp4 format.
It transfers the files to your set storage.

In case someone should be still interested in this topic feel free to reply

Yours
RedByte

I've the same problem with a DMR-EX773. Anyone can help me?

[rgr]

Hi folks,

I know I'm a little late but I've got the solution ^^.
About me: I'm a (nearly finished) software dev trainee and student and I've written a tool that can take care of your video syncing.
To be honest it is even possible without my tool, but it takes some time, due to the bandwidth limitation of (at least) my panasonic device and various other tasks that come along doing this by hand.

If you wish I can even tell you how to do it by hand, but well there is a reason why I've put 2-3 weeks of work into this project in order to get it automated...
It may be that my tool can be incompatible to your device since I can only test it with my "DMR-BST740/745", but thats a case I would like to discuss if it would actually happen.

So what does my tool?
It compares all movies of the panasonic devices with a "local" (in my case NAS fileserver) folder of movies and looks up differences or near hits (by filename).
It does support a blacklist for movie names that you would never like to sync.
It does handle all annoying panasonic hardware restrictions.
It converts the files to "proper" .mp4 format.
It transfers the files to your set storage.

In case someone should be still interested in this topic feel free to reply

Yours
RedByte

Hi. Is this program still available?

[alfaalfa]

Hi folks,

I know I'm a little late but I've got the solution ^^.
About me: I'm a (nearly finished) software dev trainee and student and I've written a tool that can take care of your video syncing.
To be honest it is even possible without my tool, but it takes some time, due to the bandwidth limitation of (at least) my panasonic device and various other tasks that come along doing this by hand.

If you wish I can even tell you how to do it by hand, but well there is a reason why I've put 2-3 weeks of work into this project in order to get it automated...
It may be that my tool can be incompatible to your device since I can only test it with my "DMR-BST740/745", but thats a case I would like to discuss if it would actually happen.

So what does my tool?
It compares all movies of the panasonic devices with a "local" (in my case NAS fileserver) folder of movies and looks up differences or near hits (by filename).
It does support a blacklist for movie names that you would never like to sync.
It does handle all annoying panasonic hardware restrictions.
It converts the files to "proper" .mp4 format.
It transfers the files to your set storage.

In case someone should be still interested in this topic feel free to reply

Yours
RedByte

Hi. Is this program still available?

It's on github

[aramkolt]

What's the name of the program on Github? Apparently IsoBuster (which isn't free) can read all types of internal DVR HDD formats that usually aren't visible to windows. It's discussed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9I8PWe2GpyY&t=327s

[alfaalfa]

https://github.com/R3dByt3/PanasonicSync
but I was not able to compile it, Visualstudio give me some errors..
Let me know if you succeed.
You can also try with testdisk