Tape ruined camcorder. Camcorder ruined tapes. Tapes only play static.

[camcorder problem]

Hello everyone! Hope y'all are having a nice day.

I have a big problem. I found my old Samsung scl906 8mm camcorder and Hi8 video tapes and I watched most of them. They were from 2005-2007. I had watched most of them and they worked fine. Rewind and fast forward worked perfectly. After I had put most of the cassetes I put another cassete in the camcorder i hadnt watched and didnt know what it contained. The cassete got stuck in the camcorder and when i put it out of the camcorder, it had taken the tape out of the cassette and ruined it a bit. I rewinded it by finger and put it again in the cassette and it only showed static (if you dont know what static is, you know when there was no signal on the tvs and only black and white dots moving with an annoying sound would show? Thats static.) i thoguht it was a broken casettee So i put one of the cassetes i had watched earlier. Suddenly, it showed static on the working casette too. I put another one i had watched before, and another, and another.... Same thing everytime! Some of them were also caught in the camcorder like the first one and the tape had went out. Im really scared because i think i infected all of the tapes and now they only show static. they had such good memories on them i really dont wanna loose. I have been so sad the whole day. I wont buy an used camcorder from amazon etc... I just want to fix the one Samsung scl906 camcorder i have. Even if i cant fix it i really really really dont wanna loose the footage as its so valuable to me.

If you are seeing this and you had had the same situation before (or a similar one) and know a thing or two about camcorders, please i beg you help me please id be so thankful

Thanks for reading

Video so you can understand the situation better

[Attachment 72600 - Click to enlarge]

[Alwyn]

I very much doubt that you have ruined your tapes. It sounds like the camcorder got messed up with that last tape. It could be dirty video heads, or a misaligned mechanism. Camcorder heads are in a tight space and difficult to clean manually.

As I see it, your options are to get the camcorder repaired (as it is now eating tapes); it may be very difficult to find someone who can/will do the job that won't cost you a lot, or get another camcorder. As you have Hi8 tapes, certain Digital8 camcorders are also an option. Just make sure (from the manual) that a particular model will play them (some D8 models won't).

Others may have different suggestions.

And of course, you should capture them onto your PC; continually playing tapes that you want to keep is taking a huge risk theses days with old gear that's getting older.

[camcorder problem]

Thank you so much for your reply! I really hope what youre saying is true: only the camcorder has broken and the tapes should be fine. I really hope it's my camcorders problem and the tapes won't play static in svery camcorder. I dont think i can find someone who can fix the camcorder because its 2023 not 2003 but i hope i can find another camcorder from people i know and if i do, I hope i find someone who can convert them to digital videos so i dont have to worry about the tapes breaking anymore! Thank you again!

Other opinions are welcome

[Subtitles]

Hopefully when you get to the stage of conversion, you don't really need someone to do it for you and pay for it. There are a lot of posts about capturing cards and video conversion. If you have a good PC (not laptop), look for PCI Express internal capture cards.

[camcorder problem]

Thank you for replying! I have a good laptop with quite some storage left and that'll probably work for me. But i I haven't arrived in that part yet since I basically have no working camcorder now. I live in a place where most people havent even heard once about camcorders, so it might be hard finding another one. The only thing i want for now is that I just want the clips not to be lost, whether or not i can see them right now.

[Subtitles]

You can search eBay for your exact model. I saw one for $80+shipment but I think any other model that can play your cassette size should be OK.