Playback problems on Sony TRV110E Video8 camera?

[gcovo]

Need help please to see if someone can tell me what the issue is with the Sony TRV110E we bought second hand a few years ago to digitise our old analogue Video 8 tapes. (Some actually have me walking and talking now I have MND!!!)

It was working fine about a year ago when I last digitised some of our old analogue video 8 tapes but due to circumstances was only just brought back out and charged again. Charged up fine but won't play back.

See https://vimeo.com/345292222 and https://vimeo.com/345292238

It won't play back any tapes, yet when I fast forward I can see the film is all still there i.e. the tape itself does not appear to be corrupted. See the description accompanying each video.

If your volume is up you can hear it trying to start playing on each video, but it doesn't seem to be able to engage properly so just keeps trying.

On the first video I have no idea what the constantly cycling display on the LCD screen shows and the manual is no help.

On the second video the display at the back of the LCD viewer at one point shows SP (which is correct, not LP Long Play) and reads 1 sec, 2 secs but then goes through the whole process again.

Anybody with knowledge of these know what the problem may be please and a (hopefully) easy fix?

[lordsmurf]

Charged? Never use the battery for playback.

Are you sure these are Video8 tapes, not Hi8 or Digital8? Remember that the tape labels are worthless, you can use the tapes interchangeably. So you must know how it was recorded.

Gravity is the enemy of video decks. Alignment tends to be fragile, and even a tiny offset can cause major problems.

The tapes could also be damaged, not the camera, but it would require another camera to test that hypothesis.

[gcovo]

Was charged but playback was done with the power lead still plugged in.

Definitely video 8 tapes as they were recorded in 1994 on our old Sony CCD F555E analogue camera which has since died. In all honesty being a digital camera the TRV110E can play all those formats which is why I'm using it to digitise my old analogue tapes.

Alignment problem sounds quite feasible. Is that something I can check and hopefully rectify myself?

[hodgey]

Alignment is fixable yea. i you have a blank tape, or a tape you can record over, you can do a test by recording a short bit to the tape and see if the tape you recorded plays back. If that works fine, and other tapes don't, it's very likely an alignment issue, though picture only in ffwd/rewind is already a good indication.

I could probably make a short guide to alignment on these if needed. You have to disassemble the camera and adjust the two guides holding the tape up to the drum with a screwdriver or similar.

[gcovo]

Thanks hodgey! Unfortunately we don't have any blank tapes or ones we can afford to sacrifice so I'm waiting on a new blank tape to arrive from eBay.

In the meantime I've Googled cleaning the heads "properly? " and am quite prepared to pull it apart as shown in https://youtu.be/1KCz59TCy8E so I can hopefully then see the guides you mentioned and try adjusting until it hopefully improves/perfects.

It sounds as though it should be fairly intuitive but if there are any pitfalls I need to be aware of I'd greatly appreciate finding out about them please.

Thanks,
Gary

Quote:

Originally Posted by hodgey

Alignment is fixable yea.

I could probably make a short guide to alignment on these if needed. You have to disassemble the camera and adjust the two guides holding the tape up to the drum with a screwdriver or similar.

Hi hodgey. I would greatly appreciate it if you could make a brief guide please.

Pic of internals is at https://i122.photobucket.com/albums/...vo/TRV110E.jpg

[hodgey]

Right, so first, you should go into the camera menu (with the camera in VTR mode) and set PB Mode to Hi8/8. Since we're aligning to analog tapes here we want to avoid the camera trying to to determine tape type when adjusting things.

You then want to connect it up to something you can view the image clearly on. A TV may be preferable to a capture card, ideally with any overscan disabled if possible, as it's on the top/bottom image edges misalignment is most noticeable.

Insert one of the tapes you are having issues with. Preferably the one you care the least about since there will always be a risk risk of adjusting when playing, e.g screwdriver/tool slipping of the tape guide and hitting the tape. You may have to disassemble the camera a bit more, as when loading the tape guides (two while plastic rollers with the metal things on top) will move up next to the video head drum (big round spinning thing). Be VERY careful with the orange ribbon cables as they can easily tear.

Now repair engineer back in the day would use a special alignment cassette, oscilloscope, a special service remote control and a special tape adjuster tool but we don't have that luxury. Eyeballing it using the video output should normally be fine though. You can use a screwdriver, though you have to be a bit careful as it's easy to slip. Recently, I found a set like this at my local Biltema store (not sure what the equivalent would be in the US, radioshack maybe?), where one of the tools fit the guides nicely. People also use cut screwdrivers etc.

Start the tape, somewhere where there is video (even if you can only see it when ffwd/rwd?). When a tape inserted, the guides will move up to the video drum. Try to note approximately how the guides are set before adjusting. You can start with the left one. Slowly turn it clockwise and see if the image starts appearing. If you start getting an image, keep adjusting until the image is as stable as possible and has minimal noise at the bottom. If this doesn't help, return it to start, and try the other way, and afterwards the same with the other one. It's usually the left one that goes out of wack from what I've encountered on tapes.

Be careful and don't adjust the guides too much, maybe a whole turn each way most. If they are turned too far off the tape edge can start hitting the edge of the guides or drum and get wrinkled. Don't go too fast either as the camera needs a little time to track the signal.

One extra challenge with the newer sony 8mm cameras is that the image becomes blue if the signal is too bad, so you may have to try adjusting a bit before something appears.

Good luck, and let us know if you have further questions.

[NJRoadfan]

Try cleaning the heads first before touching any alignment. Are the tapes Sony branded from the early 90s? Its a good chance they clogged the heads.

[gcovo]

Done already.

[lordsmurf]

Quote:

Originally Posted by gcovo

It won't play back any tapes, yet when I fast forward I can see the film is all still there i.e. the tape itself does not appear to be corrupted. See the description accompanying each video.

This just happened to my favorite Hi8 camera.

I had been using it daily for a few weeks. Set it to capture overnight, close LCD, turned off computer monitor, let a tape transfer. Came back the next morning, put in the next tape, and nothing. Put in yesterday's tape that had transferred fine, and again nothing. Overnight it just stopped.

FF shows image, but with dark color and a tracking line in the middle of the screen. Play is just blue screen, meaning snow.

The same tape, different camera, still plays fine.

At first I thought it may have been due to the next tapes put in that morning, as it has some crinkling from a previous mishap. But new other camera had no such issues. And the crinkling wasn't that bad. The came camera has handled worse crinkled tapes in the past.

This sucks.

I got this camera new 15 years ago, babied it, never used it for shooting more than a couple times. Mostly used for transferring Hi8/Video8 to lossless or DVD. I see no reason why it happened. I really did expect this thing to last for many more years.

Head cleaning was the first thing I tried, but only because it did look dirty. That did nothing.

[NJRoadfan]

I was able to clear similar head clogging from those 20+ year old Sony tapes by aggressively FF and rewinding "good" tapes thru it. While not normally suggested, a cleaning tape might actually be worth a shot. Its rare for these cameras to fail in this manner. Usually its a mechanical problem like loose pinch rollers (Bic pen fix) or guides (this usually throws an error, what the "whack-a-Sony" repair usually solves!)

[gcovo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lordsmurf

This just happened to my favorite Hi8 camera.

I had been using it daily for a few weeks. Set it to capture overnight, close LCD, turned off computer monitor, let a tape transfer. Came back the next morning, put in the next tape, and nothing. Put in yesterday's tape that had transferred fine, and again nothing. Overnight it just stopped.

FF shows image, but with dark color and a tracking line in the middle of the screen. Play is just blue screen, meaning snow.

The same tape, different camera, still plays fine.

At first I thought it may have been due to the next tapes put in that morning, as it has some crinkling from a previous mishap. But new other camera had no such issues. And the crinkling wasn't that bad. The came camera has handled worse crinkled tapes in the past.

This sucks.

I got this camera new 15 years ago, babied it, never used it for shooting more than a couple times. Mostly used for transferring Hi8/Video8 to lossless or DVD. I see no reason why it happened. I really did expect this thing to last for many more years.

Head cleaning was the first thing I tried, but only because it did look dirty. That did nothing.

Bugger!!! In the end I was recommended a repairer by a place that only repaired pro equipment and he was both easy to drop the camera off to given my disabilities and his quoted prices were reasonable. Expect to get it back this Tuesday so will let you know what his verdict was.

[lordsmurf]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NJRoadfan

clear similar head clogging from those 20+ year old Sony tapes by aggressively FF and rewinding "good" tapes thru it.

I bow to your knowledge on Sony Hi8 cameras.

You have again proven your kungfu is stronger than mine, on this specific topic.

This worked.

Thank you!

[gcovo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NJRoadfan

I was able to clear similar head clogging from those 20+ year old Sony tapes by aggressively FF and rewinding "good" tapes thru it. While not normally suggested, a cleaning tape might actually be worth a shot. Its rare for these cameras to fail in this manner. Usually its a mechanical problem like loose pinch rollers (Bic pen fix) or guides (this usually throws an error, what the "whack-a-Sony" repair usually solves!)

This, indirectly or inadvertently at least, seems to have played a part in the solution even though I didn't specifically do it. However, along the way I had been doing a bit of FF/RW so maybe that did the trick?

Took the videocam to the guy I was recommended with a different video in it for him to try digitising if he got it working correctly. Got an email reply that he had actually not had to do anything but it was working fine. He kept it for a while testing it and I was also unable to get back for a while due to various issues but when I picked it up he charged me nothing and said see how it goes for you.

Unfortunately I can't remember now which tape of the 20 or so I have I was having problems with to try again (the one I thought it was played and converted perfectly so I am not sure now that was it) but it is playing so well now that I just went back and redigitised a tape I did at least 12 months ago now and the result was dramatically improved!!

Thank you to all those who contributed!

[LightWorker01]

I find Hi8 decks to be so temperamental at the best of times. I never had the same reliability issues with VHS machines. I am wondering if it is because the 8mm format packed information much tighter thus had tighter tolerances required? As i find VHS in its LP / EP modes to be funky wheras in SP with less tolerances it was generally ok for me.

Sounds like the camera is out of alignment.

[gcovo]

Working better than ever now! I suspect probably dirty heads rather than alignment but I really have no idea.