Panasonic AG-4700 weird intermittent picture issue?
 

Hi there,
First time post - hope this is the right thread for this.
I have just purchased a Panasonic AG-4700 SVHS player.
It has a weird issue in that the sound is always great but the picture is really bad. (I am using VHS tapes)
However if you keep swapping tapes around, occasionally it seems like it "resets" itself and then the picture and sound is absolutely fine for that tape and a random X number of tapes after that. It has nothing to do with which tapes you use it just is random.
The picture never sorts itself out during playback - it's always either really good or really bad, no in-between from when you put the tape in.
I've cleaned the heads but that made no difference at all. It's good for about 2 tapes in a row, then bad for 20. Previously tapes that play bad could now play good, and vice versa.

Any ideas why sometimes it is ok and sometimes not, and if this is a repairable issue?, otherwise I am likely to return the unit to the seller.
thanks
Peter

Sample picture needed.
But it's probably bad caps. It almost always is these days. Panasonic + problems = caps

http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/imag...1/nzjcox-1.jpg

Here is a snapshot. Thanks for the quick reply - much appreciated.

Not overly useful. Let's try a sample clip instead.
BTW: You need to attach it to the forum post, not link elsewhere.

Clip attached. My capturing software wouldn't activate recording as the picture was so bad, so this is taken with a cell phone (but it looks consistent with what I was seeing on the screen)
thanks
Peter

Hmmm.... not thinking caps anymore. Head damage now looking more likely.

Many Thanks for your help. I will get a refund from the seller, as I guess there is no easy / affordable recovery from this?

The Panasonic NV-HS1000 (basically the prosumer version of this deck) we got here acted a bit like this for a while. It seems to have solved itself though. Thorougly cleaning the guides, static brush, and getting rid of any residual dust may or may not have helped, I don't know. It's still very sensitive to clogging the heads on bad tapes.

When doing a still or paused picture it is always a good picture - just the picture during playback is like there is some sort of interference.

Dry joints on K-mechanism lower drum PCB
 

Problems like this are common with these machines, and are caused by dry joints on the PCB underneath the lower drum. I've done a couple of YouTube videos about this subject.