Since it was all working fine until you opened it, I'm still leaning towards a cable coming loose, bent connector pin, or something similar.

Well, I checked and rechecked.......unplugged and replugged......both the HDD and DVD drive have their power and ribbon cables plugged in....looked at both of them for bent pins (hoping and praying for one....although not tooooo bent), they were all fine. The ribbon cables are plugged in to the board where they should be.

I still get 7061 and still can't use the unit once the code is displayed even though I've put the original DVD burner back in.

I don't know what else to check. Is it a false assumption to think that if I burned out a circuit board, I would have seen some sort of spark or smelled some burning or heard a loud bang or something like that? I've not worked inside a device like this before, I assumed it would be quite similar to a computer.....so in that respect, it seems like I need some sort of reset (like on a PDA, for example) that would reinitialize all the settings and make it "reconnect" with the installed drives.

Any chance there's some way of doing that reset or some other method of reinitializing the whole kit-and-kaboodle?

PC boards can definitely become non-functional without the special effects routine, but it's the least likely possibility in this case, unless you broke off a capacitor, smelled smoke, etc. Think of your car, if it overheats, it's probably not a cracked block (unless you ran it without water/oil). Start with the simple - coolant, belt, thermostat, etc.

I get a 7071 error when the burner is disconnected, and, so far, 7061 errors only directly related to the HDD - when the HDD power or IDE cables are disconnected or with a bad HDD. So, I think it's most likely an HDD or HDD cable problem.

You have a bunch of options. Triple check the HDD cables/connector/pins (sorry I'm saying it again, but it's easy to miss a tiny cable break). The HDD jumper is still on master? Try the HDD in a pc (if you have an IDE to USB adapter it's easy). Get another 80GB or 160GB HDD ($35-$50), but be sure to get a compatible model HDD.

I haven't had any reset procedure work when I have a 70xx error, but you can try holding down the power button for ~10 seconds. Or, zoom - 701 - zoom resets the unit to factory defaults on some Toshibas, but I couldn't get it to work on an XS32.

Hi folks.....

I've got an RD-XS32SU unit that I've had close to 3 years now. Just the last couple of months the DVD drive started failing when I tried to burn DVD-R's. Mostly I'd get it to go all the way through the burn process and then when it would try to load the disc I'd see "The disc may by physically damaged or require cleaning" and then it wouldn't play.

Found another forum which seems to be mostly in Europe and found a couple of threads where folks had talked about replacing their DVD drives with an LG or LiteOn model....models which I can't seem to find available in the US.

At any rate, last night I decided to try taking the DVD burner out of my computer that I had purchased a year or so ago and see if that would work in the xs32. Got everything apart, put the NEC from my computer in, plugged in the xs32 and got "ER 7061" on the display.

The user manual says error codes in the 7000's are related to the hard drive but no more detail. I didn't touch the hard drive.

Took the computer drive out and put the xs32's DVD drive back in thinking that things would at least go back to normal........power on, still get ER 7061!!!

It begins the boot up process with the "RD Style" screen on the TV, then beeps and shows the first TV channel from the cable and the error on the unit's display. It won't respond to the remote or to any button on the unit, all I can do is unplug it.

Does anyone have any ideas as to why I now have a large doorstop? At least before it was recording and playing back of the HDD fine. Is there some sort of reset button I haven't found yet or an initialization disc of some sort I can download or something???

I was very careful not to kink or otherwise damage the rather fragile ribbon cables inside the unit........HELP!

Thanks,
Matt

I had the exact same thing happen to me with my XS54. I thought I toasted it. The error code I got was ERR-16 which is a HDD access error so it is not identical but try this:

Power on the XS32. When you get the error press the eject button on the machine. This should open the tray and the machine will continue the boot process. In my case this was all it took.

Well, I got excited yesterday after reading about 2 or 3 or 4 reset scenarios that might or might not work on an xs32.

Holding down the power button for ~10 secs did manage to power down the unit after the ER7061 is displayed.....but when I turn it back on I just go to the error code again rather than resetting anything.

I tried the DVD-Top Menu-Menu-something-something button sequence but that didn't work. I think if I remember right, it said that was for after the unit completely boots up, which mine doesn't do.

Also tried the zoom-701-zoom.......no dice.

I'll try the DVD drive eject button tonight when I get home. I've pushed all of the btns but maybe not in the sequence necessary....so I'll try it.

Anyway......yesterday I ordered a replacement HDD for ~$34 (incl shipping). Got the same Seagate 80G model that it came with so as to alleviate any other potential hiccups when it's time to put it in. Hopefully that will get me past the 7061. It's supposed to arrive Thursday.

I'm hoping that somehow there's a way for me to get some of the recordings off the original HDD that probably have already recorded over in the camcorder.

Then I'll need to get a DVD replacement so I can burn DVD's again and I'll peruse the thread about that for a good model.

Power on the XS32. When you get the error press the eject button on the machine. This should open the tray and the machine will continue the boot process. In my case this was all it took.


Oh well..........that didn't work. Either these things just don't work on an xs32 or my HDD really IS hosed......

Well, I got excited yesterday after reading about 2 or 3 or 4 reset scenarios that might or might not work on an xs32.

Holding down the power button for ~10 secs did manage to power down the unit after the ER7061 is displayed.....but when I turn it back on I just go to the error code again rather than resetting anything.

I tried the DVD-Top Menu-Menu-something-something button sequence but that didn't work. I think if I remember right, it said that was for after the unit completely boots up, which mine doesn't do.

Also tried the zoom-701-zoom.......no dice.

I'll try the DVD drive eject button tonight when I get home. I've pushed all of the btns but maybe not in the sequence necessary....so I'll try it.

Anyway......yesterday I ordered a replacement HDD for ~$34 (incl shipping). Got the same Seagate 80G model that it came with so as to alleviate any other potential hiccups when it's time to put it in. Hopefully that will get me past the 7061. It's supposed to arrive Thursday.

I'm hoping that somehow there's a way for me to get some of the recordings off the original HDD that probably have already recorded over in the camcorder.

Then I'll need to get a DVD replacement so I can burn DVD's again and I'll peruse the thread about that for a good model.Oh well..........that didn't work. Either these things just don't work on an xs32 or my HDD really IS hosed......Hopefully the new HDD will work. It's strange that it picked now to go bad, that's why I was thinking it was a cable or such. You might be able to recover your data. Someone posted in this forum about using manufacturer's disk utilities to find and mark a bad sector on an HDD, and it worked again in the unit. Or, you could try cloning or ghosting your HDD to a new one. I'm going to try that with mine as soon as I have time. I have a bad XS32 HDD, so I should try the Seatools route, too.

I couldn't get any response from zoom-701-zoom either, but some folks have, so maybe it depends on the firmware version.

Be sure to check out the HDD swap thread for a couple of pointers - as along as you don't get a 70xx error with the new HDD, it's okay to get an HDD problem message on the screen (not on the XS32 display). Press enter on the remote and go to Setup--HDD Format.

In my opinion, the LG 4167B and H42 drives seem to have the best overall success rate. Yeah, check the burner thread for more info.

Ok Rick, et al......here's where I am with my xs32.

I got a new HDD, same model as the original, Seagate ST380012ACE.
I got a new DVD drive, LG GSA-H42L.
I've run the SeaTools on the original HDD, no problems found.

I've tried every combination of the HDD/DVD (old/old, old/new...new/old, new/new) and am pretty sure I've tried with the jumpers set on Master and CS.

I've checked all the cables 14 gazillion times.....they're all plugged in correctly.

All I get is the 7061 error code.

I have two theories....

1) Somehow I messed up one of the fragile little ribbon cables but I'm really sure I didn't.
2) The unit is remembering the error that was probably caused when I tried to put the NEC DVD burner from my computer in and won't let it go. I wonder if the battery is holding on to the error somehow and not allowing it to get "cleared" regardless of what hardware I put in.

Does anyone know how to pull the battery out? It seems to be soldered or otherwise attached to the contacts it sits between. The service manual I got from a link earlier in this or the HDD thread doesn't say. I don't want to just yank on it, things like that never turn out good for me! :)

I'm at a loss.

I don't think it's remembering the error. I've never had that happen in the probably 100+ errors that I've had. Does the error come up instantly or after a few seconds, do you hear hard drive activity (other than the drive simply powering up)? Does the same error come up at the same time if you have neither the HDD nor burner connected?

I've thought about removing the backup battery power as a reset procedure, but haven't tried it yet. Since it's soldered to the contacts, what you can do instead is carefully unplug all the cables from the power supply board, and leave them disconnected for a couple of minutes. You might only need to unplug one, but I'm not sure which. I don't think this will fix your problem, but I sure hope it does!

Seatools found no problems with the original drive, so at least now you have two good HDDs for when you get the XS32 working again. :)

You've checked all the HDD and burner cables on the device side and pc board side, and the cable to the little pc board with the HDD connector. How about the other cables, like the silver cable running from the front panel, over the burner, and then to the board?

Rick,

The error comes up after a few seconds. If I have the video shown on the TV, I see the "RD Style" screen come up briefly, then the picture goes to snow (or would show the first cable channel if that were hooked up), then the beeps and the error is displayed. About a 10-15 second process.

There is definitely activity on the HDD, it spins up....I can hear and feel it. The DVD stirs to life initially too.

You were right about the battery not keeping the error in memory. I unplugged everything I could unplug off the power board...the only thing left was the "bridge" between the two that must unplug but doesn't look like it does and I wasn't about to force it. I tried leaving all that unplugged for 10 minutes....then probably 20....then I just left it overnight. No change except that the clock isn't set anymore, so I was successful in wiping out at least that part of the memory.

I have unplugged and re-plugged every cable that plugs into any board. I have not torn the face apart to unplug and re-plug the cables that go there, since they're taped or otherwise held in place and I hadn't pulled the face off, I figured that end had to still be ok. ;)

I do get the same error with the devices unplugged as well. With the DVD unplugged but the HDD connected, I get the error in the 10-15 second range. Oddly enough, with the HDD unplugged and the DVD connected, it took more like 45 seconds before the error came up (which gave me a false sense of hope initially!). There is nothing new displayed on the TV during that 45 secs, it just takes longer to put the error up for some reason.

I have both the HDD and DVD jumpers set at Master. I think that would be correct.

Doesn't seem like it should be this hard, does it? :confused:

go to toshiba and throw it through there window, This cursed machine was a rip off from day one. Never never never will I buy another toshiba products no matter how good it is rated.
There service was really really dispicable!

Toshiba XS32 have a bad dvd drive but the user interface is the best of all the companies. It certainly has the most powerful editing capabilities by far.

Rick,

The error comes up after a few seconds. If I have the video shown on the TV, I see the "RD Style" screen come up briefly, then the picture goes to snow (or would show the first cable channel if that were hooked up), then the beeps and the error is displayed. About a 10-15 second process.

There is definitely activity on the HDD, it spins up....I can hear and feel it. The DVD stirs to life initially too.

You were right about the battery not keeping the error in memory. I unplugged everything I could unplug off the power board...the only thing left was the "bridge" between the two that must unplug but doesn't look like it does and I wasn't about to force it. I tried leaving all that unplugged for 10 minutes....then probably 20....then I just left it overnight. No change except that the clock isn't set anymore, so I was successful in wiping out at least that part of the memory.

I have unplugged and re-plugged every cable that plugs into any board. I have not torn the face apart to unplug and re-plug the cables that go there, since they're taped or otherwise held in place and I hadn't pulled the face off, I figured that end had to still be ok. ;)

I do get the same error with the devices unplugged as well. With the DVD unplugged but the HDD connected, I get the error in the 10-15 second range. Oddly enough, with the HDD unplugged and the DVD connected, it took more like 45 seconds before the error came up (which gave me a false sense of hope initially!). There is nothing new displayed on the TV during that 45 secs, it just takes longer to put the error up for some reason.

I have both the HDD and DVD jumpers set at Master. I think that would be correct.

Doesn't seem like it should be this hard, does it? :confused:

No, it doesn't seem to be the hard drive. Since it was working fine, it seems to be related to opening it. I'm not saying you did something wrong, I just mean that's the defining event. As I've said, in the 100+ times I've swapped various drives and opened XS machines, I haven't had a single problem with anything other the burners or HDDs. And all of those were due to the original burner being bad, or odd-sized HDDs that didn't work, etc. I had the top off my XS54 for a couple of months with the new LG burner sitting on top of the old burner, and it's still working great (I eventually finished the install).

Since you've swapped the HDD (and run Seatools on the original), triple checked every cable, and looked for loose screws, etc., I think your best bet at this point might be to look for a used XS32. You have the remote and cables, so all you really need is the basic unit. Then, you can put your HDD in that one and burn your saved content. Also, you'll have 3 good HDDs, and an extra parts unit should anything else fail. If your digital board went bad, that's cost prohibitive to replace, and with a slim chance it might be some undetected cable problem, why waste money and time on cables that may not be a problem. It's doubtful that any of the front panel cables would be the problem, so yeah, don't bother with them. Good luck!

I found someone on eBay selling 4 xs32su's with various errors on them. I tried to get the one with "ERR 14" flashing but someone else was bidding on it and I didn't want to go too high. So I picked one that displays "Hard drive cannot be authenticated" on the TV screen.

I figured if it's displaying that on the TV screen, it gets further than my unit and I know I have two good HDD's I can use.....so maybe between the two I can make one good one.

Anyway, that's where I am with it at this point. I'll keep you posted and thanks for the help.

Howdy.....time for an update.

The xs32 that I bought on eBay arrived on Friday. I powered it up and the HDD made horrific noises (it was the Maxtor 80Gb) and the message "Hard drive cannot be authenticated" was displayed on the TV screen. Which is as it was 'advertised' and also is much further than my xs32 was going.

So I popped the HDD from my xs32 (the SeaGate HDD) in the 'new' unit, powered it up, and everything was fine! All my content was there, the unit initialized wonderfully. So I tried burning a DVD-R. That went through just wonderfully.

I put it back together and installed it in the TV stand. Saturday I tried to burn a couple more DVD-R's. I first had to record from the VCR onto the xs32's HDD. Then I tried to burn the DVD and it went all the way through to the end and couldn't load the disc. Tried another one, same thing. Two coasters.

So I pulled it out of the stand and noticed that the VCR had made the xs32 quite warm which I read either here or in another forum is the main downfall of the xs32's original DVD burner (easily overheated). Popped that out, put in the LG GSA-H42L I had bought and VIOLA! Burned three DVD's back-to-back-to-back....did two more Sunday.

Beats me what I did on the first unit. Someone in another forum I was looking at theorized that when I tried the NEC burner from my computer, the interface/specs/whatever were incorrect for the xs32 and it fried some of the circuitry when I powered up. I don't know if that's a real possibility or not. The only 2 things I did differently in swapping into the 'new' unit are:

1) I didn't try the NEC burner out of my computer first...only the LG GSA-H42L
2) Instead of the permanently magnetized screwdriver I had been using that kept sticking to the brackets as I'd go toward the screws, I found something at Sears that temporarily magnetizes a screwdriver. The magnetism is much weaker, just enough to hold the screw on, so there wasn't any struggling to keep it away from brackets or anything else. Maybe the other screwdriver did something to some circuitry or some other apparently important part.

At any rate, I'm now back in business. I'll keep the original one in case something else goes bad and maybe it won't be whatever's bad in the original. Part of me would like to try and fix it (I've got an extra good HDD now) but since I don't know how to diagnose the 7061 error, I'm pretty sure my wife isn't going to be happy about buying random parts to try!! (Although, Toshiba told me I could sent it to Mass. with a check for $139.99 and they'd fix/replace whatever is wrong including replacing the DVD burner but NOT including the HDD.)

Thanks for all the help and encouragement. This is a very useful and informative thread as are the other xs32 threads. If anyone every finds out what a 7061 means (Toshiba service couldn't tell me) or knows of a way to trouble shoot the circuit boards/cables/etc, I'd love to know!

Matt

Glad that you're up and running again! I seriously doubt that any working IDE/ATAPI burner would have caused the problem. If the NEC still works in a pc, it had to be something else - short, trace/cable/component break, etc. I've used magnetized screwdrivers many times without a problem.

If you feel adventurous, you could take the H42L burner, HDD and both data cables from the working XS32, and try them in the other one. If you still get a 7061 error, then I'd say it's 99.99% the board. That might be better than buying replacement cables or other parts. For $140 I'd be tempted to send it to Toshiba with the original bad burner.

I don't think every individual 70xx error code is tied to a single cause. I've had the same error code with a few different problems.

(Although, Toshiba told me I could sent it to Mass. with a check for $139.99 and they'd fix/replace whatever is wrong including replacing the DVD burner but NOT including the HDD.)

I wonder how long that would be warrantied for.. Interesting.. I didn't even bother trying to contact them because of the ridiculous price (including from the parts list) others have mentioned.

I ordered at H42L for the KX-50, I received an "upgrade" to a H54L (http://www.cdw.com/shop/products/specs.aspx?EDC=1226238) . Will this unit work as a burner replacement in the KX-50?

[QUOTE=rickc5]If you feel adventurous, you could take the H42L burner, HDD and both data cables from the working XS32, and try them in the other one. If you still get a 7061 error, then I'd say it's 99.99% the board. That might be better than buying replacement cables or other parts. For $140 I'd be tempted to send it to Toshiba with the original bad burner. /QUOTE]

Hey Rick.....yea I'm very tempted to send it to Toshiba with the original burner, I guess I could send the Maxtor HDD too. But I don't think I'll do that any time soon. I have to say, I was quite surprised at that flat charge for the same reason mattack mentioned....the service manual or something had shown $300 to replace the burner!! I guess that was for when it was new perhaps.....

Anyway, I like your suggestion though for taking what I know is good and sticking it in the 'old' unit to see if it clears up the error or not. I'll put that on my list to get to after vacation next week. :)

I didn't mention before that the eBay unit has software level ZL10 rather than the ZL11 that my original one has. Do you or anyone else know if that's a concern and something I should see about upgrading? It works as it is so it doesn't seem like a BIG concern. I haven't found any where that describes the software levels, what's different from level to level, or where to get it.

I don't think that you are able to change hard drives with new ones on this machine. This topic has been discussed several times on this forum & to my knowledge (please correct me if I am wrong) no one has successfully replaced the Hard drive with a new one . Hence the one from the old machine working with the ebay replacement machine.

Also I don't think that the NEC DVD is compatible either. I tried using my computer one & that did not work in my machine.

I wish some teckie could come up with a solution for the hard drive replacement problem one using a larger drive would be great but I would be happy to just be able to replace it with the same size. Hard drives do not last forever.
How do Toshiba address this problem when they get machines in for repair with faulty hard drives ??????????????

Check the thread where they discuss the HDD replacements for ALL Toshiba RD-XS DVD recorders! You can put a 160gig in the 32!

Hi 6volt

Any chance of a link to that thread as i am having problems finding it

thanks


keith

Hi 6volt

Any chance of a link to that thread as i am having problems finding it

thanks
keith
Here's the link:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=840132

So far, we've been able to replace the HDD in every XS model (including the KX50) with the same model HDD. The XS32 can be doubled to 160GB. The XS54 and XS55 have been able to use every model 250GB drive that we've tried, but most other models seem to be very picky about which HDDs they'll accept. I'm keeping the first post in that thread updated, so you can always check there for the latest HDD swap info.

I have been looking for a replacement DVD burner for my xs 32 but all of the usual sources are out of stock for the drives that members have reported replacing. I have been looking for the following:
LG-GSA-H10N DVD
LG 4167B
LG GSA-4163B

sgm26,

Try the LG GSA-H54N burner.

I picked up an xs32 off ebay last week, and put the H54N in it. The stock burner was dodgy. The H54N read a dvd ram disc I had that had a tv program recorded on it. I formated the same ram disc on the 32 and dubbed a program from the hdd > ram. That worked, also.

The only thing I did not try was to dub from the ram > hdd. I'll do that next.

Am I correct that you do not have to load any software or drivers? Once installed the system recognizes the new drive?

That's correct.

Just make sure the jumpers on the new burner are set the same as the jumpers on your old burner.

The old burner on my xs32 was set to CS (cable select). I set the jumpers on the new burner to the same before connecting it to the the machine. When the jumper was set to Master, the unit showed a 7071 error code on its display.

I did not attach the drive to my pc to install drivers, load software or set the region.

Am I correct that you do not have to load any software or drivers? Once installed the system recognizes the new drive?

But since you're using a combination of hardware and software that wasn't designed to work that way, there may be problems.

For example, on mine, I can now never see unfinalized DVD-Rs.. The other combinations seem to *mostly* work. (I have a few dud DVD-RWs, but they might have been created by the old burner as it was going bad.)

The party's over.... just started getting ERR-14 (machine is about 3 years old and about 240 burns thru it.

Did the firmware upgrade a few weeks ago.

Hadn't burned anything in a couple weeks.

Start burning, and get ERR-14 after about 15% done.
Try new disc, got to about 20%, then ERR-14.

Cleaned lens with brush type disc cleaner.

Was able to burn a complete disc then, however, just looking at the recorded surface indicates there is mucho wrong with burning process - can see distinct bands, burned surface looks like it has ripples in it, one "band" is 1/2 (about 180 deg) dark and the other half light.

Disc plays but image freezes in seconds, you can skip forward if you are quick but if you wait a few more seconds get the error with the disc message.

So what just happened?

Did the optical drive just die? (It is interesting I had an optical drive fail to read in my laptop, only after it hadn't been used for months. I swear, there is something about letting optical drives just sit there unused...)

....oh what to do.... what to do...

Did the firmware upgrade a few weeks ago.

Firmware upgrade? I vaguely remember something about an XS32 firmware upgrade from Toshiba Canada, but I've only seen a firmware upgrade disc for an XS34 clock fix.

Actually, Toshiba now has an official firmware upgrade for the 32. In fact, I got it from Toshiba - they sent me a CD for free with instructions.

The upgrade disc they are sending you is the DVD drive firmware, not the operating system firmware. You'll get either version 1314 or 1416, depending on which DVD drive version you have. Check the Toshiba Canada website for DIY download of 1314 & 1416.

http://209.167.114.38/support/ceg/downloads/index.asp

Actually, version 1417 and 1315 drive firmware has been released, but I have yet to find it available for download.

Version ZL12 is the latest system firmware release.

My suspicion is that the Toshiba drive was also sold for PC under another manufacturer's name and/or model number. Obviously it used with a different firmware for PC ATAPI commands or the like. The 64 dollar question is what was the precise model that Toshiba used. If that exact model could be bought from say, LG or Samsung, then you could flash the Toshiba firmware on that drive and I would bet it would work perfectly including handling CDs.

The upgrade disc they are sending you is the DVD drive firmware, not the operating system firmware.while I agree with you that Toshiba's official policy is that the Xs32's system firmware is not upgradable -- and they've told me that when I've talked to cust serv -- there seems to be some ambiguity to whether the Xs32's system firmware is actually locked.

version 1417 and 1315 drive firmware has been released, but I have yet to find it available for download. I have a copy of 1315 and 1417. I got them from this thread: http://www.avforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=312999
the download link is no longer working but it was when I originally found the thread.

but, they're from the Jp Toshiba site and I never tried one, even tho person(s) on that thread have had success using them.

so, if the system firmware is not upgradable then why (according to that thread) did Toshiba Jp offer a ZL ISO on their site!? one explanation I can think of is maybe it's only applicable to the Jp Xs32 being open to system firmware upgrades.

btw, the "ZL1500J_S.iso" referenced in his message was not in the archive I downloaded. I had given a thought of trying it just for laughs, back when my Xs32 was dead (hdd), but I emailed the author and he said he never downloaded that particular file.

I dont know the forum rules about attaching Firmwares but I assume its not allowable. unless a Mod says not to, I'll post some links here to the files as soon as I get them uploaded to a file hosting site.

The Japan ZL15 system firmware will probably be refused by your US version RD-XS32. I suspect it will error out as "this version-up not compatible" or something like that.

ok, here are the files.

as I said, I found these files at this thread:
http://www.avforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=312999

credit to Escape75 for finding and publicizing them.

once again, these are from the Japan Toshiba site, and altho they are reported to work with non-Jp machines, your experience might be otherwise. use at your own risk.

I've combined both Firmwares into one Zip. of course, any Xs32 machine will use only one. the correct one to use on your machine depends on which series of Firmware is already in use.

there's more info at the forum thread linked above.

download link:
http://rapidshare.com/files/42043992/Toshiba_Rd-Xs32_DvdDrive_Firmwares_1315_1417_JP_ISO.zip.html

download link (mirror):
http://mihd.net/w90lq8

I have been looking for a replacement DVD burner for my xs 32 and came accross a Toshiba d-r5 for sale at Sears for $50.00. Even though it has an analogue tuner, I bought a couple because of the RAM drive. I was hopeing that I could swap out the drive with the one in my xs 32. Has anyone tried this? Since they are both Toshiba, I thought it would be a better bet than the LG (which it probably is anyway), and it's almost the same price as odering one on-line.

Bingolong, I read your thread and it caught my interest because I have also had a bad SD-W3002 drive. I like the unit and hate to toss it.

Have you tested the replacement LG H54 drive any more? This unit is a DVD (no hard drive) only and I burn DVD-RWs only.

Please let me know, if you have had good luck, I'll order one!

THANK YOU!

I posted in the Tosh XS32 DVD Burner (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=653912)

Its sort of confusing with 3 threads for the Toshiba XS32 (Current Owners, Burner, and HDD Swap)

Frankly, I don't know where we should post for Burner issues.

Any thoughts? Should I put the post in this thread?

Thanks in advance,
Tom

Err -14 is unable to finalize. It doesn't like the discs-- I see it occasionally on my XS32 with LG22 burner.

Try another disc, and/or a different brand. In my experience the XS32/LG H22 combination is a bit pickier than expected-- Sony media was about 40% ERR -14ing, Verbatim's been pretty good (maybe 20% ERR -14 on a pretty bad spindle).. I've had 2 ERR -14s on about 75 Taiyo Yuden. I think there is something about the drive replacement that makes it sometimes mess up at the very, very end of finalizing. (I.e., I don't think the discs are as bad as the combination shows)

I just "gave up" and bought 200 Premium 8x TYs dedicated for my XS32. :)

I was thinking it might be nice to have a summary of ERR codes encountered by users here and what they eventually found the problem to be.

I'll put mine here:

ERR-14: DVD disc access error detected.
WHEN: Trying to burn.
CAUSE: Unknown, replaced DVD drive with LG GSA-H42N and problem is worse.

I don't think it is the discs, I'm using Maxel 4x TY of which I bought 360 of them a couple of years ago when Office Depot clearanced the jewel cases. Historically, I produced maybe 1 coaster per 100 burns.

With the Toshiba drive, I produced 5 ERR-14's in a row - one finalized, but if you simply looked at the burned surface, you could tell there were terrible issues with the burn. With the GSA-H42N, I did 2 burns and got 2 ERR-14's.

I'm starting to think the LG 22 and 42 are NOT good replacement drives for the XS32, however, my particular XS32 may have other issues.
_________________

Looking at what XS32's are bringing on eBay (less than $100), it makes sending the unit for repair is not practical.

Of course, I can still use the unit as a HDD time shifter and just forget about burning discs.

I have been following this thread for awhile and based on what I had been reading, I ordered the LG/GSA-H54NK Ram drive and installed it.

At first it looked good-plays commercial DVDs fine, nice and quiet. It plays DVDs recorded on DVD-R disks fine, although very loud. (as though the unit is spinning faster)

However.....it will not record! It loads and indicates the DVD-r disk OK, but fails upon starting record with the message "recording failed. DVD disk might be dirty". I tried three different brands of disks, all of which work on my other (newer) Toshiba burner.

The DVD-Ram formatted OK, but same error message.

I'm stumped...any ideas? Maybe the electronics in the unit apart from the drive?)

This is model D-R2SU.

Thanks in advance....

The LG H54 did not work for me.....but it is most likely the unit's electronics that are at fault. I plugged in the LG H54 and it determined the type of disk properly, but would not record. I plugged in another DVD -R drive, and it would also load, but not record.

Plugged in the original disk and it will record, but not read disks it created.

I am going to get rid of the unit-drive is probably OK? but I have two like-new remotes....probably to ebay with it and move along!

There are so many types of DVD-RAMs out there AND combined with the finickyness of the XS32, what discs work?

I know there are 2 Version:

Version 1) "half" density: 2.58GB per side.
Version 2) full density: 4.7GB per side.

There are side variations for both versions:

Single sided, and
Double sided

And then there are the cartridge DVD-RAMS which leads to the first series of questions:

QUESTION 1: Do all burners accept non-cartridge RAMS?
QUESTION 2: Do all burners accept cartridge RAMS?

If No to either 1 or 2 then:

QUESTION 3: How do I tell if my burners requires cartridges? or cannot burn cartridges?

QUESTION 4: Can I remove the disc from the cartridge and use it in a no cartridges allowed burner?
______________________

My XS32 manual says:

Version 2.0 or 2.1 which is 2x or 3x.
Sounds like cartridges are fine (Type 1 removable, Types 2/4 non-removable)
Sounds like you can remove the disc from the cartridge but this is frowned upon.
______________________

Looking at my XS32 OE drive tray, it looks a lot different than my other DVD drives. There is clearly a place to put something about the size of a cartridge (I've never seen a RAM cartridge.) So maybe you just look at the tray to see if it takes cartridges?
______________________

I also just got the LG GSA-H42N which is a RAM drive and while it is not here for me to inspect along side the XS32, I wonder if it can do cartridges and what read speeds?
______________________

XS32 manual says: Panasonic LM-AD240U or AB120U and that is all. Is that still true today or can other 2.0 and 2.1 RAMs be used? (NOTE: My XS32 is acting haywire and is having bizarre burning problems with the OE and LG drives - like NOT burning properly on 4x maxells but burning properly on MCC Playos that info says Verbatim is the manu (?) so I'm wondering if RAMs might be a better way to get stuff off my HDD)
_______________________

Reading about RAM discs is really interesting and the fact that they behave like floppies or hard drives is really attractive - and especially when they can offload protected content from the HDD that -R and -RW cannot.
________________________

Any particular suggestions to get good prices on some RAMs?
________________________

And of course apologies for these pathetic noobee questions!

Regards,
Tom

If I get a used XS-32 how can I tell if it has the black level bug? Also can it be fixed with a firmware update?

There has never been conclusive proof that ANY XS32s are any different... Some say their unit doesn't exhibit the behavior but there are so many variables involved it seems much more likely that something in their setup is masking the black level issues than Toshiba fixed a few towards the very end of manufacturing.

I would assume any XS32 has the black level bug. But depending on your uses (and your other equipment) it may or may not be noticeable.

There has never been conclusive proof that ANY XS32s are any different... Some say their unit doesn't exhibit the behavior but there are so many variables involved it seems much more likely that something in their setup is masking the black level issues than Toshiba fixed a few towards the very end of manufacturing.

I would assume any XS32 has the black level bug. But depending on your uses (and your other equipment) it may or may not be noticeable.

I made hundreds of DVD's with mine and gave some out to others. No one complained about the BLB. I asked a Toshiba tech in Vancoucer one and he never heard about it! Once in a while the dvd recording would stall at a certain point and you have to skip that small part to continue.

Since XS-32's are rare and I have a chance to get a refurbished one, I may do so. The guy only has one at about $175 with no refund or guarantees though.

I picked up an older RD-XS32 used for $90 with only a non-DOA guarantee. It was not DOA. But sure enough, it has its problems:

About half the time, on power-up it shows the "HDD cannot be authenticated" error. If I then format the hard drive, everything seems fine until I turn it off again, and then it will come back up with the same error. I have tried multiple reformats but after a while the HDD error comes back.
At odd times, it turns itself on -- this even without any timer programs set.
But if you leave it on and never turn it off, it seems to work fine.


So I have a few questions:

1. Does this sound like something a hard drive replacement would cure?

2. Does this sound like something a firmware update would help? It currently has ZL10 and 1314. (I have ZL11 and 1415 on another one of these; working great; but I don't have an upgrade disk . . . it was a refurb and it shipped with ZL11 and 1415.)

3. Should I just leave it on forever and leave well enough alone?

I wouldn't leave it on forever as the dvd drive's laser is always on. I talked the guy into giving me a 90 day warranty so I guess I could buy one.

Where do you get the info that the DVD drive's laser is always on? that sounds highly doubtful.. especially since it does turn off the DVD drive.. (I see that on my replaced drive since it's not put back together yet, and I see the access light.. it still seems to access it for a few mins even after I stop using the DVD player..then shuts it down)

Where do you get the info that the DVD drive's laser is always on? that sounds highly doubtful.. especially since it does turn off the DVD drive.. (I see that on my replaced drive since it's not put back together yet, and I see the access light.. it still seems to access it for a few mins even after I stop using the DVD player..then shuts it down)
That's part of the "standby" power load. The laser is held at a "bias" level so it can be ready to read/write quickly, as explained in this article (search for "bias") and the power level chart (http://www.maxim-ic.com/appnotes.cfm/appnote_number/2947). Zero power level is unplugged. Either in this article or another I read, a laser mfgr explained how important the heat-sink design was for CD/DVD lasers since they were "always on" (generating some heat even in standby) and heat was the primary cause of laser diode failure over time.

I think I'm going to try another replacement drive, a GSA-H10L.

I really didn't like the GSA-H42N which had trouble with yellow TYG02 Maxells

I picked up an older RD-XS32 used for $90 with only a non-DOA guarantee. It was not DOA. But sure enough, it has its problems:

About half the time, on power-up it shows the "HDD cannot be authenticated" error. If I then format the hard drive, everything seems fine until I turn it off again, and then it will come back up with the same error. I have tried multiple reformats but after a while the HDD error comes back.
At odd times, it turns itself on -- this even without any timer programs set.
But if you leave it on and never turn it off, it seems to work fine.


So I have a few questions:

1. Does this sound like something a hard drive replacement would cure?

2. Does this sound like something a firmware update would help? It currently has ZL10 and 1314. (I have ZL11 and 1415 on another one of these; working great; but I don't have an upgrade disk . . . it was a refurb and it shipped with ZL11 and 1415.)

3. Should I just leave it on forever and leave well enough alone?

OK, if I rule out "leaving it on forever," how about the other two questions -- is a new hard drive likely to help, and is new firmware likely to help? (I realize there's no certainty in this . . . wasn't going for certainty when I bought a used unit for $90. :) )

Firmware will not help. The firmware is only for the stock Toshiba DVD burner in the unit-- not the unit itself.

A hard drive replacement MIGHT help depending on what is causing the authentication errors. If you like to tinker and realise it might not fix it, it's worth a try.

I don't know if any of this would help the random turn ons-- the unit might have some other electrical fault causing the other problems entirely. Maybe a bad power supply?

The upgrade disc they are sending you is the DVD drive firmware, not the operating system firmware. You'll get either version 1314 or 1416, depending on which DVD drive version you have. Check the Toshiba Canada website for DIY download of 1314 & 1416.

http://209.167.114.38/support/ceg/downloads/index.asp

Actually, version 1417 and 1315 drive firmware has been released, but I have yet to find it available for download.

Version ZL12 is the latest system firmware release.

Hi,

I solved my dvd burner problem by buying a used XS-32. I noticed the dvd software version is 1414. I downloaded the 1416 version but the link to create an ISO file on dvd is gone. Can anyone tell me how to do this? Do I have to right firmware update since there is a 1417 version?

What advantage is it to upgrade anyway?

I saw some DVD-RW at Wal*Mart and was thinking I might buy some if they work in the RD-XS32. They are:

Vertatim 4x, and (5+1 for $7.77)
Maxell 2x made in Taiwan (yellow disc) (15 for $12.77)

Any experience?

Thanks in advance,
Tom

4X will not work in a XS32 with the DVD burner it came with.

It MAY work with a replacement DVD burner. There were changes in how DVD-RWs worked from 2x up to 4x, and they need new firmware.

I did the latest firmware for the stock burner - is that still no good for 4X dvd-rw?

Thanks
Tom

Recently purchased a second RD-XS32 for the kids TV room and connected it to their SOVA 32" LCD TV using the Component input. I wanted to use the Toshiba remote to control the SOVA but it was not listed in the Brand code table in the installation manual. I tried some of the more popular codes listed in the table and on the second attempt found that code 0201 worked great ! It is one of the most popular codes as it is also used on Carver, Citizen, Goldstar, Marantz, MGA, Mitsubishi, MTC, Optonica, Philco, Proton, Radio Shack, Realistic, Sanyo, Sears, Sharp, Soundesign, Teknika, TMK, Vidtech, and Wards. This may also help you if you are trying to use a universal remote with the SOVA, try the codes for those listed above, especially the Proton or MGA that only use that code. Second choice would be the Citizen, Marantz, MTC, Soundesign and TMK that only use one other code.

Has anybody seen the current recording quality setting change on them?

I could swear this has started happening in the past few months.. I can't figure out what's causing it.

e.g. I change the recording quality to my setting #4 (1.4, audio setting 1)
at some point later, the recording quality has changed to one of the others, e.g. 2.0, LPCM. I notice this usually when I'm using the disk space button to see how much space I have left.

This sure seems to have started lately.

Yesterday I had an interesting thing happen that I've never seen before as far as I can remember.

I came home and the NBC news hadn't been recorded on my XS32. (one other half hour show set to record during the day DID record).

I expected the machine to be completely full since I had a repeating recording for the biggest loser set up, and I had only about 1 hour 15 min free when I left.

Other shows had recorded on my Tivos when the news was on, so it wasn't a power outage.

Later I tried to start recording manually (record button) on my XS32 and got an interesting error dialog. It said something like:

Unable to start recording because there is not enough free space or data complexity.

Data complexity?? Maybe that is a sign that the people who have been talking about fragmenting issues all along aren't wrong.

I'm not sure.. but I was able to delete a few things (after dubbing off an 'er' to make space and in case the machine was about to go 'corrupted').. and then recorded a few times successfully. (Sometimes when I record things natively on my Tivos, I will dub them to the XS32 so that I can watch at 1.5x with sound.. to essentially watch more stuff in less time.. not sitcoms/dramas.. only things like news shows and talk shows.)

I set up the recordings to record on my Tivo today just in case I miss 'em.

mattack, I've never seen a "data complexity" error, but I rarely let my XS32 HDD get close to full. The limited free space message popped up only a few times over the past 3 years, and I've always offloaded enough to get it below 50%.

I'm sure fragmentation can be an issue on consumer dvrs, especially with repeated operation in the mostly full range, or if your editing techniques favor deleting multiple smaller segments, etc. The UDF file system theoretically has fewer fragmentation problems than FAT and NTFS, but I really don't expect Toshiba's HDD routines to be as robust as those written for a pc. I also wouldn't be too confident in the XS firmware's ability to properly recover all fragments, so they might build up over time even if you get it away from full.

Page 86 of the XS32 manual has a few fragmentation warnings. If I want to edit out parts of a title, I never delete segments. I always create a playlist and do an HDD--HDD hi speed dub, or simply hi speed dub individual chapters. If you do that, and keep, I don't know, maybe at least 15% free space, I think you're much safer.

I'd recommend that you burn everything you can, or at least, the things you'd really hate to lose. Of course, the safest would be to format the HDD, even if you have to put everything on -RW and then dub back. I'd be very uncomfortable after the data complexity error.

I'm not 100% positive, but after running into the error again, I have another idea.

I think there's probably a limited number of titles possible. This is going to sound nuts, but remember that most of my recordings are ~5 minute musical performances from shows. I have 66 pages of recordings. It *seems* like I get this error when I try to record with 66 full pages of recordings.. i.e. they hit the maximum number of files.

I'm not 100% positive, but after running into the error again, I have another idea.

I think there's probably a limited number of titles possible. This is going to sound nuts, but remember that most of my recordings are ~5 minute musical performances from shows. I have 66 pages of recordings. It *seems* like I get this error when I try to record with 66 full pages of recordings.. i.e. they hit the maximum number of files.

Not nuts at all. I remember reading that the XS32 limits DVD titles to 99, and HDD titles to something like 399. 66 pages x 6 = 396. Hmm, coincidence?

I know Toshiba error messages can be somewhat cryptic, but I thought you'd get a "Maximum number of titles" kind of message, rather than a non-helpful one about data complexity. And, I didn't think you actually had 66 pages of thumbnails!

Wow, I thought I was a bit out of control with 12-15 pages of programs.. ;)

mattack - was this the message you got:

"Recording cannot be performed due to complexity of data. Try eliminating non-essential data on the HDD."


The XS34 manual lists a maximum of 396 titles on the HDD, so I think that confirms your XS32 limit, as it probably applies to most/all XS models. The XS54 manual says this about DVD writes, "Also, even if the number of titles and chapters is within the limit, you may not be able to write if you have a large number of menu items." That may also apply to the HDD. Moral of the story - stay away from extraordinarily large numbers of titles/chapters on the HDD or DVDs.

Oh, and thanks for being the first to confirm the 396 title limit.;)

mattack - was this the message you got:

"Recording cannot be performed due to complexity of data. Try eliminating non-essential data on the HDD."

Nope. It really did say something about (paraphrase) "lack of disk space or data complexity". That is, it mentioned both of those as possibilities.

I really would have hoped for a less lame error message.

Hopefully I'll have far fewer than 66 pages when I get off my butt to (1) get Tivo->Mac transfers working (using freeware software, without having to buy Toast), (2) edit the recordings similar to the XS32 -- i.e. simple 'keep even or odd chapters' kind of thing...
then after that, find a way to rip my XS32-created DVDs (some just DVD-RWs to get stuff off of XS32 on to computer) and do the same kind of thing..

i.e. some way I can *organize* all of my musical performances (one folder for U2, for example), and hopefully have double-clickable files that I could then theoretically re-burn onto DVD later if I wanted to. But even though I got an XS32 to avoid the at-the-time more painful computer editing (i.e. through a digitizer), now that we can transfer faster than realtime between Tivos & a computer... now I'm leaning towards a computer and just a big external hard drive...

Okay, how about this one:

It is not possible to record additional content to this disc due to lack of remaining space or complexity of data.

Sorry to be persistent, but I've been looking thru the firmware on another model, and I'm trying to get a handle on how much code was reutilized.

I'm kind of thinking about a MediaGate type server with external hard drive(s). That way I could still use the Toshiba for all my recording, easy edits and burning to dvd, then copy/rip the dvd to the hard drive and play the VOB/ISO files with the server. It may sound like an extra step, but since I'd want to backup video stored on any hard drive to dvds anyway, it's just doing the backup first. And I'd still have the dvds to play and dub as I do now.

Okay, how about this one:

It is not possible to record additional content to this disc due to lack of remaining space or complexity of data.

Yeah that sounds right. I don't really want to purposely fill up 66 pages again, but might.. (I think I'm 1 or 2 titles short as of tonight.)

If you can actually figure out anything about the DISK FORMAT used, that would be awesome.. I'd love to recover stuff on my previously hosed XS32 drive. 99% of it I probably don't care about, but it'd still be good.

Has anybody seen the current recording quality setting change on them?

I could swear this has started happening in the past few months.. I can't figure out what's causing it.

e.g. I change the recording quality to my setting #4 (1.4, audio setting 1)
at some point later, the recording quality has changed to one of the others, e.g. 2.0, LPCM. I notice this usually when I'm using the disk space button to see how much space I have left.

This sure seems to have started lately.

In a word, yes. I have a Toshiba RD-XS34 and have noticed the same thing on multiple occasions. I always use the SP (level 2) setting and it seems to randomly change to other lowers (worse quality) settings on its own. Like you I have no idea why it does this. I try to make it a point to try to go into setup and verify the setting before recording/burning new material.

In a word, yes. I have a Toshiba RD-XS34 and have noticed the same thing on multiple occasions. I always use the SP (level 2) setting and it seems to randomly change to other lowers (worse quality) settings on its own. Like you I have no idea why it does this. I try to make it a point to try to go into setup and verify the setting before recording/burning new material.

I think later I noticed something relevant. I haven't proven this, but I *think* that this happens when you delete a recording.

It *SEEMS* like when you delete a recording, the current recording format is now set to the recording right BEFORE the one you deleted. Just like that is the one that is set to 'currently play'.

In other words, most of my recordings are at two different quality levels (with relatively few different than those two). i.e. I use the absolute bare minimum for my time shifting.. and 2.0/LPCM for most recordings I care about the audio.

So if my theory above is correct, it will seem random since which recording I 'land' on is either the same or not the same as my current recording quality, making it seem inconsistent.

I just joined this forum. I am unsure how to do this. Could someone help me as to how to start a new post about my rd-xs32su? My question is as follows, can I hook this up to my new Samsung Plasma 4254 to record TV shows like I did on my old 4:3 analog tv? If so, how do I do it, what cables where?Thanks in advance Lenny

Sprint777, here are two posts that might help, combined w/any specific Toshiba advice you might get. They're in a Philips 3575 thread but should apply to many other DVDRs, if you ignore any specific comments on the 3575 (substitute "Tosh" for "3575"):

Using the RF/coax passthru. (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=12298409&postcount=10)

Cables and Connections. (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=12298425&postcount=11)

OK I have s video from cable box to s video on recorder. I have tried the red and white rca plugs on almost everything and no audio. I also have composite from the recorder to plasma tv and also rw audio cables from the recorder output to plasma and have sound when I play dvd just fine. I turn volume down on tv and use surround sound into plasma. I can't figure out why no audio when I am on L1 with tv on. It records ok but no audio. I hope someone can figure this out. I definetly need a diagram or instuctions on cable hookup. Also how do I hookup up the ir cable? Thanks in advance

I definetly need a diagram or instuctions on cable hookup.

Here's a link to Toshiba's downloadable pdf owner's manuals and installation guides. The 11th model down the list is the XS32. The connection diagrams start on page 13 of the installation guide:

http://tacpservice.toshiba.com/ConsumerProductSupport/Manuals/dvdr.asp

Good luck!

I admit this is a tangent to this thread, but the readers of this thread have tried a lot of other burners in this machine to replace the original burner.

Has anybody been able to find firmware upgrades on LG's site? I have the LG HSA-42N, and the only vaguely related thing I can even find is the manual for the HSA-42LI, which is a different drive altogether.

Do they even have firmware upgrades for these drives? If so, does someone have a bookmark to the specific firmware page on their site? The 'support' seems to just be manuals, and again, I couldn't even find mine.

I was hoping there might be a firmware upgrade that might help me be able to read unfinalized discs from the orig drive.

I own an RD-XS35 that use I for copying movies that I have recorded on my DirecTV HR 20-700. I recently had to send my unit back to Toshiba to have the hard drive replaced, and yesterday, I tried to make a DVD for the first time since getting the unit back, and I experienced an error that I have never seen before. I attempted to high speed dub the recorded content and when I hit copy, I get a message thagt says, "It is not possible to dub additional content to this disk". I called Toshiba, and the guy told me the recorded content was too big for the disk, and that I needed to rate conversion dub it...

I swear I have high speed dubbed HD movies to DVD in the past....is it a settings issue or something?

mattack, I never could find firmware downloads on LG's site, either. I've run across a couple of other sites with LG firmware, but I've never tried them and can't vouch for their reliability. Here's one for the H42L: http://www.techspot.com/drivers/driver/file/information/8943/

You know, some of the Memorex drives are basically LGs inside, so there's a possibility that the right Memorex firmware might work in the right LG, and Memorex has firmware downloads on their site. Of course, I would never try this unless I did more research and didn't mind frying my LG drive...

I own an RD-XS35 that use I for copying movies that I have recorded on my DirecTV HR 20-700. I recently had to send my unit back to Toshiba to have the hard drive replaced, and yesterday, I tried to make a DVD for the first time since getting the unit back, and I experienced an error that I have never seen before. I attempted to high speed dub the recorded content and when I hit copy, I get a message thagt says, "It is not possible to dub additional content to this disk". I called Toshiba, and the guy told me the recorded content was too big for the disk, and that I needed to rate conversion dub it...

I swear I have high speed dubbed HD movies to DVD in the past....is it a settings issue or something?

You possibly recorded it at slightly too high a setting and it's just barely too big for the DVD. I've had this issue when I've miscalculated the true length of a show after editing out the commercials and it ends up being just a minute or two too long.

Just for kicks try to make a new playlist using just the first 1/2 hour or hour or something and try to burn it and see if it works.

Well I have one of these boxes and I believe ever since I got my HDTV cable box I can't get the IR Receiver to work anymore.

Is it because of a new Scientific Atlanta code that this Tosh is not compatible with? Is there any way to fix this?

Also, when powering the unit on, sometimes (very random) it just turns on and the "loading" icon flashes for a few minutes as the hard drive is supposed to be prepped. But nothing happens. I end up having to hard shut it down and try again. One time the DVD drive made very loud and weird noises when I closed the tray with no disk inside... There seems to be a lot of problems with it now (old, much?).

You possibly recorded it at slightly too high a setting and it's just barely too big for the DVD. I've had this issue when I've miscalculated the true length of a show after editing out the commercials and it ends up being just a minute or two too long.

Just for kicks try to make a new playlist using just the first 1/2 hour or hour or something and try to burn it and see if it works.

I did try that--and yes, you can high speed dub...so does that tell me I need to record at a lower bit rate?

I did try that--and yes, you can high speed dub...so does that tell me I need to record at a lower bit rate?

Sounds like it-- it's probably just a tiny bit too big. You can always try to edit out a minute or two here or there and see if it helps. If you still have the original, just drop the bit rate down a step or two from your original recording and it should be ok.

Well I have one of these boxes and I believe ever since I got my HDTV cable box I can't get the IR Receiver to work anymore.

Is it because of a new Scientific Atlanta code that this Tosh is not compatible with? Is there any way to fix this?

xtremesniper,

Just to cover the bases...you have checked in Setup under Set Top Box Settings?
CableBox/DBS -> C.Box
Select Input -> (your choice)
IR Control -> On
Brand type -> 008

I don't know which SA box you have but The SA 8300HD and other SA boxes use the remote code 008.

I did have a similar problem with the IR Receiver not working. Turns out the wire got jerked and slightly bent the plug. Check the little mono style jack and see if its bent. They damage easily. I just grabbed another IR Receiver from a Mitsubishi DVHS deck that I never use and that one works perfectly. Some IR Receivers use stereo style jacks. Make sure you get one with the mono style jack.

Sorry but I can't help you with your other problems. It may be time to open it up and make sure all the jacks and plugs are tightly connected....or start swapping out the HDD and burner to see if you can find the problem.

Later, Conrad

xtremesniper,

Just to cover the bases...you have checked in Setup under Set Top Box Settings?
CableBox/DBS -> C.Box
Select Input -> (your choice)
IR Control -> On
Brand type -> 008

I don't know which SA box you have but The SA 8300HD and other SA boxes use the remote code 008.

I did have a similar problem with the IR Receiver not working. Turns out the wire got jerked and slightly bent the plug. Check the little mono style jack and see if its bent. They damage easily. I just grabbed another IR Receiver from a Mitsubishi DVHS deck that I never use and that one works perfectly. Some IR Receivers use stereo style jacks. Make sure you get one with the mono style jack.

Sorry but I can't help you with your other problems. It may be time to open it up and make sure all the jacks and plugs are tightly connected....or start swapping out the HDD and burner to see if you can find the problem.

Later, Conrad

Hey thanks for the advice, all my settings seem to match the ones you specified. I will go through again to make sure I am using 008 because I do think that I'm using the same box. I called Toshiba once and they mentioned that a firmware update might help, and that they would send me a cd. They never sent it.

But if you say that yours works with the SA hd box, then maybe it's something wrong with the IR receiver... when I plug it into the box and I press channel buttons, nothing seems to be emitted. I check that by pointing a video camera at the IR, because usually cameras pick up on those pulses.

Also, when powering the unit on, sometimes (very random) it just turns on and the "loading" icon flashes for a few minutes as the hard drive is supposed to be prepped. But nothing happens. I end up having to hard shut it down and try again. One time the DVD drive made very loud and weird noises when I closed the tray with no disk inside... There seems to be a lot of problems with it now (old, much?).

This sounds more like a DVD drive problem than a hard drive problem. See if it only happens when you have a disc in the drive. If so, does it happen with all brands, finalized, unfinalized, store-bought, etc? You could also try a dvd lens cleaning disc. The Toshiba XS32 burner thread has lots of burner related info.

Well the problem is I barely even use the dvd drive. I'm fairly certain the "loading" issue happened when there was no dvd in the drive, and the mode was on HDD.

It hasn't done it for a little while now (as far as I know) so I guess I'll just keep an eye on it for now.

Toshiba dvd drives are prone to premature failure. The general consensus is that it may be due to overheating. So, it may not be based on the amount you've actually used the burner.

I've done a lot of experimenting with a bunch of different XS units, and I'm pretty darn sure that the loading icon (on power up) is solely related to the burner, regardless of whether the unit is set to HDD or DVD. On power up, the loading icon appears about when the light on a replacement burner lights up, indicating that the unit is addressing the burner, which is well after the hard drive has spun up.

Edit: I should clarify that the loading icon does appear at other times, but my above comment was related to it appearing during power up.

Well that's interesting... I wouldn't be at much of a loss if the dvd drive was broken, but I just wouldn't want it affecting the rest of the box.

Yesterday I had an interesting thing happen that I've never seen before as far as I can remember.

I came home and the NBC news hadn't been recorded on my XS32. (one other half hour show set to record during the day DID record).

I expected the machine to be completely full since I had a repeating recording for the biggest loser set up, and I had only about 1 hour 15 min free when I left.

Other shows had recorded on my Tivos when the news was on, so it wasn't a power outage.

Later I tried to start recording manually (record button) on my XS32 and got an interesting error dialog. It said something like:

Unable to start recording because there is not enough free space or data complexity.

Data complexity?? Maybe that is a sign that the people who have been talking about fragmenting issues all along aren't wrong.

I'm not sure.. but I was able to delete a few things (after dubbing off an 'er' to make space and in case the machine was about to go 'corrupted').. and then recorded a few times successfully. (Sometimes when I record things natively on my Tivos, I will dub them to the XS32 so that I can watch at 1.5x with sound.. to essentially watch more stuff in less time.. not sitcoms/dramas.. only things like news shows and talk shows.)

I set up the recordings to record on my Tivo today just in case I miss 'em.

:eek: I've recently been getting the data complexity problem as well with my XS34! There is 14 1/2 hours of space remaining even though it cannot record anymore. There is about 390 recorded titles on it and maybe it's too much. After the data problem cropped up I just delete a previously recorded show and the recorder worked fine. I've had this unit for 3 1/2 years now and am getting around all of it's idiosyncrasies. I've managed to get this thing through an entire year without any foul ups until now! Learning to delete properly is key! I could format the drive and it would work fine but I am not going to lose all of the content. You're not the only one with this dilemma.

mattack - was this the message you got:

"Recording cannot be performed due to complexity of data. Try eliminating non-essential data on the HDD."


The XS34 manual lists a maximum of 396 titles on the HDD, so I think that confirms your XS32 limit, as it probably applies to most/all XS models. The XS54 manual says this about DVD writes, "Also, even if the number of titles and chapters is within the limit, you may not be able to write if you have a large number of menu items." That may also apply to the HDD. Moral of the story - stay away from extraordinarily large numbers of titles/chapters on the HDD or DVDs.

Oh, and thanks for being the first to confirm the 396 title limit.;)

Yep Rick you're right. The XS34's manual states on page 42 "The number of titles cannot exceed 99 for a DVD-RAM/R/RW disc or 396 for the HDD." I must be there now! Now's the time to do the arduous task of weeding through all of the videos! :eek: "ugh!"

Here's another strange problem that I've had repeatedly, but I can't get it to happen on demand -- I lose audio.

This *seems* to happen if hit the skip back button several times in a row, possibly especially in chase play mode, but I'm not sure.

When this happens, even if I switch to DVD, I won't get audio. But most of the time, even the DVD won't be able to play. It will *think* it can't read the DVD..

The system then pauses for a VERY long time (a minute or two.. especially bad if I have hit the remote several times which can then cause it to go into a few pause loops).

There have been times when I could get the audio back by 'playing around' a bit.
Usually I have to stop the current recording.. then the audio will usually come back (and the audio was recording all during the time, so when I go back and play the recording, it's fine).

Once in a while, I will get a really loud 'screech' out of the audio when playing around in the previously-silent section. (I think that was followed by the audio working, but it may have been after more playing around.)

The funny thing is, as much of a weird bug this is, and the fact that my XS32 corrupted the hard drive (partially due to me force rebooting when it was 'hung') and the DVD drive crapped out... I now actually think that the XS32 will usually "come out" of problems if you wait long enough.

So if I had waited a lot longer when I had the corruption incident instead of rebooting it, it *probably* would have either run out of space (I was trying to dub something since I was recording a show and came home and it was really low on space) or the DVD drive would have finally 'come back to life'.

It's still a very buggy machine, but as I said, it sort of "fixes" itself.. so in a weird way, it's robust even though it's buggy.

My Toshiba has been unable to read through DVDs (rented or purchased) for the last two weeks. The DVD freezes, then I get the error note "the disk may be dirty or damaged" ,then it stops playing. I have to go back through the chapters and play again. It has gotten worse. Now it hardly plays at all.

Is it time to purchase a new DVD player/recorder?

Any way to region free this dvd player?

My Toshiba has been unable to read through DVDs (rented or purchased) for the last two weeks. The DVD freezes, then I get the error note "the disk may be dirty or damaged" ,then it stops playing. I have to go back through the chapters and play again. It has gotten worse. Now it hardly plays at all.
Is it time to purchase a new DVD player/recorder? You could try a DVD cleaning disc (Walmart, BB, Radio Shack, etc.). I haven't used one, but some folks say they work. Check the Toshiba XS32 Burner thread for more info. If it is the burner going bad, you can either call Toshiba and see if they'll quote you a reasonable repair, change the burner yourself (mixed results, not a 100% functional replacement) or, yeah, buy a new DVD recorder.

I searched through the existing posts to see if this issue had come up yet, and hadn't seen anything. I've come across all the space issues before, relating to too much time on the HDD or too many total titles, so I'm used to that. I bought the xs32 in Dec. 2004, and have slowly learned to use it for new things. My obsession the past year and a half or so, is recording highlights from games that I'm watching, and then creating my own highlight DVDs are the end of each season of each of my favorite teams. Hence, I often have a ton of titles there at one time (I probably average 35 or more pages being full).

Last night I got a new error that concerns me, which happened while I was eliminating commercials from a tennis match that I wanted to save. It says "HDD structure became complex. Create backup of required contents and delete HDD title for awhile." I tried turning it off overnight. I tried unplugging it for a few hours, but it is still giving me this message after each thing that I attempt to do with it.

Any ideas for what exactly this might mean or what exactly I should do with it? Is it referring to one specific title, or all the titles, and what the heck does "awhile" technically mean? I've become dependent on this machine since I've learned to put all these highlight videos together, so the thought of losing everything that I have on there now is very depressing.

I am not very technologically wise. I figure out how to make things work, but big technical terms generally scare me. : ) So I'm hoping people are still checking this thread and might be able to help me out here. Thanks!

Here's some info that might help even tho it's not Toshiba-specific. (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=12798560&postcount=243)

I'd essentially go along with wajo here. I would guess your HDD has become fragmented. In its charming broken English, your Tosh is trying to tell you to burn everything you want to keep to DVD, then defrag the HDD. How? You could start by deleting some titles from your HDD to see if the message goes away. But eventually, I'm guessing you'll have to format the HDD to begin with a clean unfragmented drive. In the XS35, it's under Setup, Disc Management, Format HDD. There's probably something similar in your model.

I'd essentially go along with wajo here. I would guess your HDD has become fragmented. In its charming broken English, your Tosh is trying to tell you to burn everything you want to keep to DVD, then defrag the HDD. How? You could start by deleting some titles from your HDD to see if the message goes away. But eventually, I'm guessing you'll have to format the HDD to begin with a clean unfragmented drive. In the XS35, it's under Setup, Disc Management, Format HDD. There's probably something similar in your model.

Thank you to both of you. I appreciate the info. I was afraid the answer might involve getting rid of everything, and putting things on DVD before the sports seasons are done, but I suppose that's better than if it just crashed and disappeared completely! It may take me awhile to do this, but once I get that done, I'll post back if it seemed to do that trick! Thank you again.

Last night I got a new error that concerns me, which happened while I was eliminating commercials from a tennis match that I wanted to save. It says "HDD structure became complex. Create backup of required contents and delete HDD title for awhile." I tried turning it off overnight. I tried unplugging it for a few hours, but it is still giving me this message after each thing that I attempt to do with it.

I know you put quotes there, so it should be an exact quote.. but just to be absolutely clear.. You don't have 66 full pages of recordings, do you?

That's what I ran into at the top of this page and the last page in this discussion. It too was an error message about the 'complexity'.

While this is my first post to the forum, I've been reading many of the great posts on how to overcome some of my Tosh XS32's qwerks.

I receive OTA (HD) broadcasts now and have just recently purchased a Samsung DTB-H260F tuner to integrate NTSC tuning for my Tosh XS32 via Component cable to Input 1. I've connected the Channel Change IR transmitter on the Tosh and adjusted the "Set Top Box settings" to Cable box, Input 1, IR control "on" and tried all three IR codes (042, 006, 032) but non seem to work. I can watch and record TV, but can't get the Tosh to change the channel of the Samsung tuner per its recording schedule.

Since the Tosh was built 2 years before the Samsung tuner was released, I'm assuming there might be a new IR control code needed. Has anyone got this combination to work or perhaps knows the "secret" code?

I could never find a code that would work the Samsung tuner, so good luck there.

Hy can any one guide me I have Toshiba Rd-sx32 HDD DVD recorder but its Bios is in japneese language can the language be changed to English

I don't know if the Japanese models can be changed to English, but the way to change the disc menu language is via the remote. Press Setup, and in the DVD player settings menu, the first item is DVD disc menu language. US models show English, French, Spanish and Others. When I select Others, I get a submenu showing E and N, but it defaults back to English if I select either of those.

Look for "OSD Language" which is the language the menus and other stuff will be displayed. In my Philips 3575's, that setting is in the Display menu.

I just got back in front of my XS32, so here's a bit more info. My above post was only for the DVD language setting (that's the only one I could describe without looking). Of course, I'm referring to a US XS32, but the user interface may be similar. What kind of remote do you have?

Setup on the remote gets you to a screen with seven round icons across the top. Pressing the left or right arrow keys highlights each icon, and a relevant sub menu will appear below them. On a US XS32, the Initial Settings menu is on the far right, has the fewest number of items, and the first item is Language. See if you can navigate there, and hopefully, there will be other choices in the Language sub menu.

Does anyone have the link or info on how to replace the stock dvd burner in a 32?

Read the other messages in this thread..

Does anyone have the link or info on how to replace the stock dvd burner in a 32?

I ordered the LG Electronics GSAH10NI model drive and installed it, has worked very well no problems. It is very simple to install just about like replacing one in a computer.

I ordered the LG Electronics GSAH10NI model drive and installed it, has worked very well no problems. It is very simple to install just about like replacing one in a computer.

Where did you buy it from and does it work with RAM disks.

When I used to use Fast Foward Playback the arrows (2-5) and the timebar used to appear across the bottom of the screen. I don't know what I did, but the display is now blank...no arrows or time bar. I can make the timebar appear with the timebar button, but it is not how it was originally. I have looked through the owners manual, but I can find or figure out an answer. Any help out there?

Thanks

I am thinking there are 2 possibilities--

1. I may be thinking of something else, but when you have the time bar up, you can use the up/down arrows to raise/lower it on the screen. Try using the up arrow when you're fast forwarding?

2. Other times I've had time bar issues I've turned off the unit and unplugged it for 5-10 minutes, and plugged it back in... seems to help reset the unit. (Note: be SURE it is fully turned off, lights red, making no noise, before unplugging! Don't just yank the plug when it's on!)

No, not lights red -- lights red means it's recording, and you'll hose the hard drive.

When I used to use Fast Foward Playback the arrows (2-5) and the timebar used to appear across the bottom of the screen. I don't know what I did, but the display is now blank...no arrows or time bar. I can make the timebar appear with the timebar button, but it is not how it was originally. I have looked through the owners manual, but I can find or figure out an answer. Any help out there?

Thanks
I've had that happen, and if I remember correctly, they reappeared after one of the times I did a power button 10 second hold reset.

As mattack said, and to clarify jmscott42's post, only unplug the XS32 when the power led is red, meaning the unit is turned off, not when the recording led is red!

Hi, Is there a quick summary of the fixes in Toshiba RD-XS model ROM upgrades? Specifically, in XS32 and KX50, would a ROM upgrade be available to allow its IR blaster to tune 3-digit cable boxes? For XS34 and XS54, would a ROM upgrade be available to permit turning off of TVGOS or disabling its auto-seek or otherwise keeping it from ordering pay-per-view pornos on my comcast cable account? Any answers appreciated (especially if you can shoot me an email to glgehman@magic-bullet.com). Thanks!

Oh man, if I could get my IR blaster to work with my digital cable box, I'd be set... Would a firmware upgrade actually do that?

From what I've seen, XS firmware upgrades have not added any functionality. They've been more along the lines of bug fixes, like the clock/DST problem on the XS34.

From what I've seen, XS firmware upgrades have not added any functionality. They've been more along the lines of bug fixes, like the clock/DST problem on the XS34.

What's the latest firmware update for the XS34?

I despise that in order to reset/change the clock the scheduled times get wiped clean! Poor design! :mad:

That's not true on the XS32, BTW.

I replaced my DVD drive and in my clumsiness, I scraped the data cable that goes to the hard drive. There is actually a hole in it that overlaps 2 or 3 leads.

Does anyone know of a source for this? I have been scouring the net and the only places that seem to have it, have a $250 (0r more) minimum order.

I have posted here before and got help with my Toshiba RD-XS32 issues. Now I have more problems, and I think I'm screwed. Perhaps someone on here might have good advice for me though. The following is what I sent to Toshiba technical support customer service, but if anyone here has a good answer, I'd love to know it, keeping in mind that I don't know anything about taking out hard drives or anything like that. Thanks!!

I have owned an RD-XS-32 since late fall 2004 (Software ZL10, DVD drive software 1314), and for the most part, I have loved it. I like making my own highlight DVDs of my favorite sports, and the format of the HDD has been perfect for this. I've had a few problems the least few months with the DVD burner sounding like it might be grinding the disc rather than writing on it, but I keep cleaning it out and probably get it to burn 1 out of every 3 times. I can live with that, if it eventually works.

Now, though, I have a problem I can't live with. I had just returned home from a 2 week vacation, and was trying to play my Olympics highlights off my Tivo & record them to the HDD, as I always do with sporting events. Then when I was trying to turn a few titles into a DVD, I suddenly got an error message that it wasn't possible (I don't remember that message specifically) and after turning it for awhile, and turning it back on, I received the message "There is a problem with HDD. Playback is the only option. Contact Service Center."

My next step was to try to burn to DVD some of the titles, just to see if it would work, but I got the message "This disk is write protected."

When I went back to the content menu, suddenly the last few pages of content came up with no thumbnail images, and a message that said "Playback failed. Previously recorded data may have been corrupted." I have 394 titles on there now (yes, I know this is 2 below the maximum, which is why I was trying to burn a bunch of them now). This issue applies from title numbers 352 to 394. Title 352 was recorded on 8/10, but this issue did not happen until yesterday, 8/30. (This includes all the Michael Phelps swimming races that I wanted to save, so I'm a bit distraught about that right now!)

Considering I knew the drive was close to full on titles, and possibly on time as well, I decided I would just start to delete the titles I had created yesterday, as I still had the original footage on the Tivo. Each time I tried to delete them off the HDD though, I got the message "This disk is write protected." I went in and checked the HDD settings, and it has "Disc Status: Protected" and Disc Lock: Lock Off" but it would not allow me to change any of the settings. I used the buttons that were supposed to allow me to select different things, but its like the screen was locked, and wouldn't let me do anything. Then I tried to delete an earlier title that worked fine in playback mode, but still received the "This disk is write protected" message on those titles as well.

So now I have a full HDD, with lots of great sports highlights that I wanted to save for my personal collection, and absolutely no way to access them. I'm hoping you can tell me what is wrong, or how I might be able to fix it, not including re-formatting the drive, since my first goal would be to get the video files off there that I'd like to keep. I tried leaving it unplugged overnight, to see if that helped, since it often does the trick for issues on my laptop, but no luck with that. I updated the firmware software from 1309 to 1314 using the ISO image off the Toshiba site, but that didn't help either. I've tried going through and changing any settings that I can, but nothing is helping. I even went through a bunch of the manual looking for anything that would help

Please help me. I have a very full Tivo with lots of fun Olympic highlights that I want to record on the HDD & then burn to DVD, as well as tons of my favorite sports teams highlights dating back to January of this year that are on the HDD that I do not want to lose. What options do I have?

Wow, that's tough... I wish I had a good suggestion for you, but I really don't-- although have you tried to delete some of the EARLIEST programs? Maybe something you've been saving forever but never got around to watching?

I'm wondering if this might move the window of "workable" recordings...

That said, be careful mucking around too much. Your best bet, as strange as it may sound, would be to either dub these off to VHS, or maybe get to the nearest Walmart ASAP and get a new recorder to dub the units off to. (or you could get a DVD-only recorder from any store)-- if you're worried about losing them, the less you mess with the playable titles, the better chance you have to "rescue" the recordings.. you'll lose quality, but that's better than losing them entirely.

(and ps, please don't use colored text in your messages, at least not that much-- I use the darker background on the board and it's basically impossible to read your message, so if I missed something you wrote, sorry about that...!)

(Sorry about the colored text - I was trying to differentiate what was just in the post, and what I sent in the email to Toshiba - I'll stick with quote marks next time!)

I have tried deleting some of the earliest recordings too, and still got the "write protected" message.

This response actually made me laugh though, in a good way. After googling everything I could think of, and realizing that it would be virtually impossible to actually transfer the files anywhere, a lightbulb suddenly went off that if I could make the first 351 titles play, that I could copy them the long way, and roughly 8 minutes ago, after not finding any HDD/DVRs at my normal shopping locations, I completed my order on Walmart.com for some expedited shipping on a Magnavox H2160 to do just that. My brain had been so wrapped around finding a "technological" way to retrieve the files, that the traditional play & record idea hadn't occured to me. But thank you very much for the idea and the quick response, because if I hadn't thought of it just an hour or so ago, I would be hugging the computer screen right now! As time consuming as it may be, that is the perfect plan, and it will let me quickly clear off all the things saved on my tivo from the olympics during my vacation, so I have room on the Tivo again too.

And I've definitely learned my lesson...make the dvds sooner & don't store things so long. Reformat or completely clear the HDD from time to time so it can defrag. Don't wait until its basically full to try complex editing, because that may kill it off. All things I wish I had learned earlier (or paid attention to this spring when it started giving me issues), but better late than never!

Thank you very much for the response. I'll be curious to see if once I have saved all those titles on another HDD, if the Toshiba one will allow me to reformat it so it will work again, because I think the Toshiba has more interesting editing options than the Magnavox, but I'll find out after I play around with the new one.

Good advice and let us know how it turns out.

BTW, I also use a black forum style and the blue font barely shows up on it. In a pinch, you can highlight the text and it shows up in a very readable fluorescent green. It's a technique that's sometimes used to... hide spoilers.

I received my Magnavox H2160 from Walmart (I've worked at Best Buy for almost 15 years, and I was somewhat horrified that my company no longer carries any HDD/DVD burners, at least online, and Walmart does...but I digress), and started clearing out my Tivo first, and then am slowly, but surely, going to transfer from the Toshiba.

I had an interesting Error on the Magnavox though, which concerned me, when I hit play on the Toshiba & then record on the Magnavox, it told me the content could not be recorded...its the message given when trying to copy write protected content, which the Toshiba thinks it has now, even though it doesn't. I just hit record a 2nd time though, and the error goes away, it it records to the HDD. However, I figured I wasn't out of the clear yet, as the manual says it will record things like that to HDD, but not burn to DVD. When I did a test of just putting some of the copied videos on DVD though, it worked perfectly with no error, so thank heavens for that! It may take me forever to do this, but I will at least be able to save things.

I do hope once I'm done though, that reformatting the Toshiba makes it work again. While I am grateful to have the Magnavox to salvage my videos, the editing options are somewhat pathetic compared to what I'm used to on the RD-XS32. Since I like to paste things together & make highlights, its rather annoying that there is no "combine titles" option on the H2160, and the process of naming titles is very cumbersome compared to the RD-XS32.

So having said that, does anyone know a good way to get ahold of new, or basically new XS32, XS35, XS52 or XS55, in case mine is not fixable? I've seen used ones on eBay, and some over $500 XS55 ones too, but I'm not quite willing to commit that much cash to it, when I just had to spend $250 on the Magnavox, and I don't want a used one that hasn't been fully tested. I just know now that for what I like to do with the HDD, I want the editing options available on the Toshiba, and I've noticed it doesn't seem like they are putting anything new out now.

Read earlier messages in the thread. Supposedly you can send the Toshiba back to Toshiba and for a fixed fee, get it fixed/replaced with a refurbished one.

Actually, they can "fix" a bad optical drive one by putting a used OE one it. Talk about a ticking time bomb! They can also do any of the drive replacements discussed on this forum as per the service agreement Toshiba offers.

At any rate, at some point, Tops won't have stuff to replace bad drives. Then they can replace with newer, used units, and finally, if they don't have anything to replace it with, refund money according to sales receipt.

Its sort of irrelevant... like a lifetime warranty on a Pentium 60 (haha), however, with the abandonment of these HDD units in the USA, it may not be so irrelevant.

Actually, they can "fix" a bad optical drive one by putting a used OE one it. Talk about a ticking time bomb! They can also do any of the drive replacements discussed on this forum as per the service agreement Toshiba offers.

What do you mean "replacements discussed on this forum"?

You don't mean they would put in a third party DVD burner, right?
If you DO, that would imply that there *is* one that offers *full* functionality.. and from what I've read and experienced, none have full functionality (including with old unfinalized discs).

Plus, at least in California, I believe (I do not think this is an urban legend) that there is a law that REQUIRES a company to provide parts for some period of time. I have 7 years in my head. So when did the XS32 stop being sold? Way less than 7 years ago.

Yes, I mean they are using 3rd party DVD drives - the same models people have discussed in this forum. With the reduced operability! (frankly, I don't know how they do this - probably if the customer doesn't complain. I think they offer this instead of giving them a "refurbished" OE drive which would really be crappy.

They probably have a lot of bad 32's sitting around with lots of old OE drives (ugh)

Well, if they did that to me, I would definitely complain and presumably at least get my money back.

I scraped the data cable that goes to the hard drive.
Does anyone know of a source for this? I have been scouring the net and the only places that seem to have it, have a $250 (0r more) minimum order.

I've done something similar. I accidentally punctured the HDD cable. Several leads have been damaged.

Were you able to find these cables any cheaper than $250?

I did some searching and was unable to find anything cheaper.

(One source (who didn't have the part themselves) sourced another distributor who had the part. They would have had to past all the cost onto me, and the minimum would have been $250 (for five pieces at $50 per part)

Is there a way of removing the DVD-RAM disk from the cartridge without wrecking the case?

Oiler,

Yes. I assume you are speaking generally and not of a particular disk that is jammed somehow. Every cartridge-style Ram should come with a small instruction with diagrams pointing to where to press, etc. Lacking one of these labels --- turn the cartridge over to the back with the sliding disc access panel at the bottom. Then simply press in the side cutout of the corner of the cartridge that has the Red (or other colored) sliding button, usually on the top left from this perspective. Press in with a pen and simultaneously lift the slim end piece at that corner. The entire interior plastic assembly on that end of the cartridge will swivel out. Pull it back as far as it will go and the disc will just clear.

Hi there,

I just discovered this forum and I have a question. I have an RD-SX32 that has served me faithfully for several years now. Lately i have been having a burning problem. Unfortunately, this burning problem does not manifest itself until the very end of the process.

Basically, when I am trying to burn a DVD of something on my hard drive, I am able to go through the entire process through the writing process. The disk burns and finalizes, and then one of the following two things happens:

1. The disk says it's loading and takes an exceptionally long time to do so, then tells me that the disk is damaged or requires cleaning and I cannot play it on any DVD player in my house, not just this Toshiba.

2. The disk loads and when I press play to play the new DVD it gives me a "this disk cannot be played" error.

There are slight variations on the above but this is basically what happens.

Here are some additional notes:

1. I have tried various DVD media brands, from the cheapest to more exponsive ones. Some that I have tried recently (which have all worked in the past - Maxell, Verbatim, Sony)

2. Before I attempt to record, I make sure I get the "A blank DVD-R is loaded" message.

3. The system WILL burn directly to DVD and will sometimes burn a DVD if I use the HDD Dubbing feature rather than the DVD-Video create feature. However, since I want menus I always use the latter.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.
____________________________________________________________ ____

Ok, aside from the above, I also have a second Toshiba - an RD-SX52, which is burning fine. I am wondering how to fit 3 hour programs on a standard DVD when burning from the HDD to the DVD using the DVD-Video Create function.

I know that if I use the dubbing function I can downgrade the bitrate and fit programs, but as mentioned, I want menus, so I don't use that function.

I currently have a few programs that run about 2 hours and 30 minutes and I'd like to fit them onto a standard DVD - is there any way to go about this? I have tried everything I can think of and nothing seems to work. Any info would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Bryan

I currently have a few programs that run about 2 hours and 30 minutes and I'd like to fit them onto a standard DVD - is there any way to go about this?

For your main question, your burner seems to be going bad. See the rest of this thread for other burners that may offer *partial* functionality. (of course this is completely unsupported by Toshiba, may blow up your house, etc..)

For this particular question, you can just do a real time dub at a lower resolution so that it will fit.

Oiler,

Yes. I assume you are speaking generally and not of a particular disk that is jammed somehow. Every cartridge-style Ram should come with a small instruction with diagrams pointing to where to press, etc. Lacking one of these labels --- turn the cartridge over to the back with the sliding disc access panel at the bottom. Then simply press in the side cutout of the corner of the cartridge that has the Red (or other colored) sliding button, usually on the top left from this perspective. Press in with a pen and simultaneously lift the slim end piece at that corner. The entire interior plastic assembly on that end of the cartridge will swivel out. Pull it back as far as it will go and the disc will just clear.

I have a Toshiba cartridge. I will try to remove it.

Hey Guys,

Can anyone tell me what the most likely problem source is with the following?

Through the years I have switched out the HDD twice and the last is a compatible Maxtor 160GB which has been working fine until very recently. The burner has been replaced twice as well and the latest is the LG H54L.

Last night I started getting data corruption messages after recording with about 23 hours remaining on the HDD. No matter what I tried to record then to the HDD it just said Playback failed-data corrupted. Sometimes it would fail after a few seconds...other times it would record for an hour or more then either stop recording on its own or simply fail to playback when checked. I could still playback the previous recordings but...

when I tried to record straight to DVD-RAM to save them it wouldn't format a new one and would not record to DVD-R either (Check disc...you know the rest).

Both drives have been perfectly fine until this weirdness last night. Actually got a green screen flash during the episode and when I checked the content menu all the recording thumbnails were green and none would play---machine unresponsive. I reset the Tosh and now have the previous contents back but can't seem to off-load the good stuff to reformat the HDD.

Sounds to me like the internals are screwed. I can always reformat the drive and lose the contents to see if that will help but it sure looks to me like if both methods of recording are flakey with very new drives that could indicate perhaps the board internals.

I'm wondering if I should slip back in one of the Seagates and see if that clears things up?

So I went to do just that and left this unposted message up...

Just now tried another trial recording off my DVR and it worked this time. Only thing I did this morning was try to format DVD-RAMs without success and then started a recording attempt while on the DVD side. Got the usual contents recorded on HDD message and when I checked the HDD contents it played back normally.

Freaking weird!!!!!!

Will have to see if the test recording (about a 100 minutes) will behave all the way through. Then see about the burner issues.

Having bought my 52XS several years ago before I had an HDTV, I now have an issue when I hook the HDMI cable to my Panasonic 42PZ80U: It locks up as soon as the power is turned on; it won't accept any control inputs from the pannel or the remote. If I use the S-Video or component cables it works fine.
Has anyone had a similar issue or can recomend a fix?

My XS34 decided to not play any DVD discs (pre recorded and burnt dvd-rw's). It also wouldn't display any on screen graphics. A hard reset (pressing in power button for more than 10 seconds) fixed all of that! So anyone facing similiar problems try that and it should all come back! :)

[QUOTE=TimRogers;15134479]Having bought my 52XS several years ago before I had an HDTV, I now have an issue when I hook the HDMI cable to my Panasonic 42PZ80U: It locks up as soon as the power is turned on; it won't accept any control inputs from the pannel or the remote. If I use the S-Video or component cables it works fine.
QUOTE]

Your RD-XS52 needs a firmware update to version YA12. This fixes HDMI incompatibility with HDMI V1.3 (1080P). Contact Toshiba for the update.

Change of gears here....

Can anyone shed light on the benefits of setting the XS32 Audio Input Level to any value other than zero as the default?

The XS32 is the only unit in the Toshiba XS series which offers an Audio Input Level setting in Setup/DVD Recorder Operation. The value can be set in increments of 0.5 up to 6dB and decremented by 1.0 at a time down to -76dB.

The manual gives no explanation on the merits of this capability, simply that this feature "Sets the audio input level of recorded sound."

Boosting the sound by a few dB might be a good idea if the source is a camcorder recording which includes conversation captured from several feet away.

That would be a specific instance, yet this is a default mode of operation, and why the huge range from -76dB to +6dB is puzzling.

Your RD-XS52 needs a firmware update to version YA12. This fixes HDMI incompatibility with HDMI V1.3 (1080P). Contact Toshiba for the update.

Cool, I'll get to work on this right now.
Thanks eleventy billion!

I think I had a power surge and it killed my RD-XS32. It worked fine until I believe my house had a power surge--other electronics also went out at same time. I can smell the acid odor or a resistor or something when I plug it in and I get 7061 error and nothing works and it smells bad so I unplug it. I am no expert on elevtronics like a lot of guys here are it seems But I do know some things about electronics-- I want to buy a used one on Ebay and replace what is burned out--is this dumb or a good idea? I can see a resistor that clearly appears to be burned out. Is that likely the problem--or the tip of the iceberg? I paid near $400 for this and I don't want to thow it away--ALSO a reason I don't want to throw it away is--I recorded probably 50 DVDs from TV on the RD-XS32 and I have tried to play them on many other DVD platers and none of them will let me play them---can I ONLY play the DVDs on the SAME machine --in other words if I don't get this unit working are all my DVDs junk and unplayable on any other machine?:confused::mad:Thank you! I can send a pic of what I can see is burned(resistor) if it will help.

If you haven't *finalized* the DVDs, then they'll only play on that player.

Also, VERY old DVD players (i.e. late 1990s) won't play burned DVD-Rs, even if they're finalized.

My advice is to get a decent one off of Fleabay rather than a clearly intended for parts machine. Depending on auction they are going for anywhere from $100 to $200 plus S/H. You may find it is preferable to simply switch it out than to repair the old one. At least you will have a parts machine either way.

Does anybody have an extra XS32 remote control? My remote seems to be dying. (Yes I changed batteries.)

Last night, only a couple of buttons would work.. then strangely most if not all came back.. but now most of the buttons on the bottom section have stopped working. (Even when the buttons on the bottom section started working again, I noticed that the little button that presses in to show that the top flap is 'closed' was flaky so I'd have to often push on the lower right of the remote to make sure it knew it was closed.)

Not having the quick menu button really makes a lot of things very tedious to do.. (Though it seems like _most_ things can be worked around via using the yellow EASI NAVI button, which I never had used before except to play with when I first got the recorder.)

I've seen some available ona popular auction site (http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=m38.l1313&_nkw=XS32+remote+control&_sacat=See-All-Categories).

Yeah, I've searched ebay.. but I thought some here might actually have an extra one after buying a replacement recorder. The remote seems to have stayed mostly working today. Those are around $50 with shipping.

I've done something similar. I accidentally punctured the HDD cable. Several leads have been damaged.

Were you able to find these cables any cheaper than $250?

I did some searching and was unable to find anything cheaper.

(One source (who didn't have the part themselves) sourced another distributor who had the part. They would have had to past all the cost onto me, and the minimum would have been $250 (for five pieces at $50 per part)

Boy, I haven't been here in a while.

I never did find a source for the cable that was at all resonable. I keep checking for old units on auction sites and the like, but they just don't appear.

OK, I admit that apparently I *did* know this at one point based upon some of my comments in this thread:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=840132

but I was momentarily 'surprised' by seeing mention of a 160 gig XS32 on eBay.
(I was searching for remotes, since this time it apparently really died.. Darn, if there were JUST the quick menu & arrow keys & enter on the unit, it would be almost fully usable without a remote.... the rest of the things have buttons on the front.)

I have two remotes if you're interested....

$20 each or two for $35 plus $6 shipping/handling to Continental USA.

Both work fine and are like new.

Argh, I already ordered one for about $30 total including shipping.. My remote seems to have *completely* died, and so I'm not able to use my XS32 (hard drive is full.. I can watch the LAST recording by hitting play.. but can't got to other recordings).

[QUOTE=TimRogers;15134479]Having bought my 52XS several years ago before I had an HDTV, I now have an issue when I hook the HDMI cable to my Panasonic 42PZ80U: It locks up as soon as the power is turned on; it won't accept any control inputs from the pannel or the remote. If I use the S-Video or component cables it works fine.
QUOTE]

Your RD-XS52 needs a firmware update to version YA12. This fixes HDMI incompatibility with HDMI V1.3 (1080P). Contact Toshiba for the update.

Well, after calling Toshiba for the firmware upgrade, being placed on back order for 3 months and then being told that the upgrade was no longer being produced, I'm a little miffed.

Does anyone here have a copy they could send to me? I'm willing to shell out a little bit in compensation...

[QUOTE=booji;15142640]

Well, after calling Toshiba for the firmware upgrade, being placed on back order for 3 months and then being told that the upgrade was no longer being produced, I'm a little miffed.

Does anyone here have a copy they could send to me? I'm willing to shell out a little bit in compensation...

DO NOT - ABSOLUTELY DO NOT - upgrade the firmware on an RD-XS52 or RD-KX50 with any file previously posted on the web by Toshiba! The firmware file is hosed or there is some issue with upgrading the firmware on these units. The firmware upgrade positively ruined my RD-XS52 which was a workhorse for three years, crippling it with random lockups of video and loss of audio and chronic corruption of playback when dubbing from DVD-RAM to HDD. I know of two other people on the web with the same problem and Toshiba refuses to accept responsibility for the damage.

DO NOT - ABSOLUTELY DO NOT - upgrade the firmware on an RD-XS52 or RD-KX50 with any file previously posted on the web by Toshiba! The firmware file is hosed or there is some issue with upgrading the firmware on these units. The firmware upgrade positively ruined my RD-XS52 which was a workhorse for three years, crippling it with random lockups of video and loss of audio and chronic corruption of playback when dubbing from DVD-RAM to HDD. I know of two other people on the web with the same problem and Toshiba refuses to accept responsibility for the damage.

There hasn't been a firmware update on Toshiba's website for the RD-XS52 in at least 6 months.

Who out there has had success with a disk sent to them by Toshiba?

I replaced my DVD drive and in my clumsiness, I scraped the data cable that goes to the hard drive. There is actually a hole in it that overlaps 2 or 3 leads. Does anyone know of a source for this? I have been scouring the net and the only places that seem to have it, have a $250 (0r more) minimum order.

I don't think this is the exact cable, this one replaces the cable in a Pioneer, but the seller may have exactly the cable you do need if you ask them and email a photo. Check the ebay.co.uk site for item number 29026517068 (completed sale). The eBay store name is "kalea-informatique" located in France. They sell these cables for $20. You could also try more local parts vendors or eBay USA dealers by searching the part name "FPC ZIF RIBBON CABLE AWM 20624 - TOSHIBA 1.8 - 250mm #A" (or whatever size/name is printed on your cable).

The Toshiba XS series is notoriously fragile: half the people who report in to AVS never have a problem and their units last for years, the other half have become so disgusted they switched to home theater PCs. Repairs are a bitch depending on model, and the third-party burner substitutes only get you so far. The most practical solution is simply buying a backup recorder. As you you can see from the length of the Toshiba threads here, there is a devoted "cult" behind these recorders, so it is unrealistic to expect you'll find a "mint" or "new old stock" Toshiba XS for under $400. Its supply and demand: a great many of these machines break down, so thats the majority up for sale, truly flawless examples command high prices. They are magical, but costly, recorders. (We may see prices drop slightly on the XS models with TVGOS after the national ATSC switchover in June: the analog TVGOS signal largely disappears then and reduces the appeal of those models to TVGOS fanatics.)

The California (and other) state consumer protection laws are completely toothless- forget it. Especially when it comes to products that consumers have totally shunned, like DVD/HDD recorders, mfrs pretty much do whatever they want. Sony USA ran out of parts for their "cult" GX-series dvd recorders last year, barely two years after the machines were discontinued, if you ask Sony about service options they laugh and tell you "go buy a new recorder, or better yet a Vaio with DVD drive because we know you're only going to return the damn recorder anyway". If Toshiba service wants to swap your recorder for someone else's headache, that's all they're gonna offer. Its unfortunate Toshiba, Pioneer and Sony find it unfeasible to mimic Panasonic's exceptional $130 flat-fee recorder repair program (although it could be argued Panasonic shrouds that program in Masonic secrecy- if you don't follow AVS, you'd never know about it).

There hasn't been a firmware update on Toshiba's website for the RD-XS52 in at least 6 months.

Who out there has had success with a disk sent to them by Toshiba?

I think that's more like over a year for all the models. The firmware updates were supposedly to improve compatibility with various brands of DVD-RAM but I have several different models of RD-XS units and nope, the latest firmware hasn't improved compatibility at all. They all pretty much need Taiyo Yuden DVD-RAM. I've tried TDK and Panasonic and the success rate may be as low as 50% so throw 5 out of 10 disks away. As far as I can tell, the firmware 'updates' merely program an automatic 3' shutdown time whenever you pull the plug on the units. This seems to be the universal mantra to get these units back on track whenever (which is often) they start to misbehave. On the RD-XS52 with original firmware, just do this manually.

Even though the original burner works more-or-less OK, I am currently testing a $19 refurbished LG GSA-4167B on my RD-XS32. It's pretty good at recognizing other than TY DVD-RAM. However it won't recognize unfinalized DVD-Rs, even it's own! In addition, if there is any bit of corruption in a file you are dubbing to DVD-R, it will lock the dubbing process, which turns the disk into a coaster since you have to pull the plug to regain control of the recorder.

Interestingly enough, I just tested one of latest burners which you can get off Newegg (the HSL20 or something). It's all over the Liteon forum. It works fine with DVD-R, both finalized and unfinalized on the RD-XS32, but it won't work properly with DVD-RAM. Any disc you put in the burner is ruined. Apparently the programming to recognize/work with DVD-RAM in these RD-XS units back in 2004-2006 won't work with current burners.

Another problem with the later burners is it will playback titles on finalized DVD-R, but you can't see them on the disc as thumbnails to dub to HDD. I've tried all the tricks like playing back a title and trying to access the menu then, but no go. No problem on the LG GSA-4167B.

It goes beyond saying that the OEM burners works the absolute best on these Toshibas. While it only likes TY, it will read unfinalized DVD-Rs and content on DVD-RAM from other machines. I've never seen the dubbing process lock up even if there is corruption in a title here or there. It will simply dub the file replete with distortion.

Well, after calling Toshiba for the firmware upgrade, being placed on back order for 3 months and then being told that the upgrade was no longer being produced, I'm a little miffed.

Does anyone here have a copy they could send to me? I'm willing to shell out a little bit in compensation...

The YA12 firmware upgrade is corrupt and was removed from Toshiba's website. I believe that the only way to upgrade now is to send your RD-XS52 to Toshiba factory repair. They will most likely change the digital PCB or flash eproms with upgraded versions.

The YA12 firmware upgrade is corrupt and was removed from Toshiba's website. I believe that the only way to upgrade now is to send your RD-XS52 to Toshiba factory repair. They will most likely change the digital PCB or flash eproms with upgraded versions.

I might add there is a YA1200CA file on the web but it's for the Canadian units. Yup I tried, but the U.S. RD-XS52s won't proceed with the upgrade.

I then asked Toshiba for the original firmware YA1100 so I could try to flash back to that and fix the unit on my own, but they told me they no longer have it :confused:. Very hard to believe they no longer have the original firmware but it could be they knew it wouldn't do any good, or the RD-XS units won't backflash to an older firmware anyway.

This might be what Citibear is talking about, but there are laws that *require* companies to keep parts available for a specific number of years. I believe it is either 7 or 10.. go look it up. But basically, saying they don't have it anymore is not legally allowable. (They might try to charge you the ridiculous price that the replacement stock DVD burner goes for, though..)

Anyway, I had a different reason to come here for the first time in a while to mention something else I figured out.

Long ago, I mentioned that I had some recordings that would not high speed dub to DVD -- the XS32 would hang.

I can't believe I didn't figure this out before, but I tried dubbing off some of the oldest recordings I have on my XS32 last night, and realized that the 2 or 3 (I think 3) that wouldn't dub were all 2.4 LPCM quality. I usually use 2.0 LPCM for things I care about the audio quality of (e.g. music programs, music segments from talk shows). But long ago I guess I used 2.4 LPCM for some.

So I had to 'rate conversion dub' them to 2.0 LPCM and that worked fine. So presumably there's a bug where 2.4 LPCM won't dub successfully. (I remember in the past, if I tried with a DVD-RAM, it wouldn't hang, it would just end up with an 'empty' recording on the destination. DVD-RW hangs.)

I don't think this is the exact cable, this one replaces the cable in a Pioneer, but the seller may have exactly the cable you do need if you ask them and email a photo. Check the ebay.co.uk site for item number 29026517068 (completed sale). The eBay store name is "kalea-informatique" located in France. They sell these cables for $20. You could also try more local parts vendors or eBay USA dealers by searching the part name "FPC ZIF RIBBON CABLE AWM 20624 - TOSHIBA 1.8 - 250mm #A" (or whatever size/name is printed on your cable).

Thanks CitiBear! :)

As per your suggestion, I bought one of these cables from the French eBay seller you spoke of and got it recently. Aside from the text printed on the cable, its a perfect match (well, I noticed nothing different) to the original factory installed cable.

Before your post I didn't know this cable's generic name, much less where to buy a single part.

I replaced the damaged HDD cable and my XS32 is now working again. :D

I was a bit weary of buying from an overseas seller but his eBay reputation was so good I thought I had to give it a shot. I'm glad I did. $20 was a small price to pay to get my XS32 working again.

Thanks CitiBear! :)

As per your suggestion, I bought one of these cables from the French eBay seller you spoke of and got it recently. Aside from the text printed on the cable, its a perfect match (well, I noticed nothing different) to the original factory installed cable.
I will check it out as well (since I'm the one that broached the subject). Thanks for the posts. This just continues to show why this community is so valuable.

--
Kind of ironic that my name is Chuck Bear and the two posters above are ChuckVCR and CitiBear. Fate ??

Hey folks... noob here. Had our RD-XS32 for several years, but honestly haven't used it much in the past few years. After moving into a new house a couple years ago I've finally hooked up everything to my stereo and was trying to use the XS32 to play a new audio cd - not a burned copy, it was a store purchased copy of U2's latest, and well.... I guess it didn't like it, because it locked up.

I can't eject the disc at all, and can't even power down without unplugging it. Can't change into HDD mode either - even when plugging back in, hitting power and immediately hitting the HDD button. This has happened before with store bought DVD actually. The previous time, after a couple tries of unplugging and replugging then powering on, I must have timed it perfectly to cause the it to eject the disc for me.

Absolutely no luck this time. Not really knowing too much about the unit, I decided to crack it open, to see if maybe I could get to the disc (the DVD door was obviously locked). Got the door to open and peeking in the DVD drive looks like the disc is on the spinning mechanism or whatever (don't know much about these things)... anyways, I can't just "pull it out", that's impossible.

Anyone got any ideas? I found the instructions about DVD drive replacement, and figure that might be a given (unless I just decide to fleabay it), but anyone have ideas on getting my disc back, or anything else to try?

Thanks ahead of time

I did read about your 'the previous time'. You mean you're powering on and hitting eject immediately, right? Hmm, I thought that has worked for me.

If you want to get rid of it, I could take it off your hands.. heh.. I'd like it just for the orig DVD burner (to finalize my ancient DVDs). I bet there's a way to get it open with enough work.

My how I wish I'd have found this forum earlier. I have FOUR RD-XS32's that I use for my swim camp. We record above and underwater footage on 60-80 kids each week and send them home with individual DVD's of all four strokes.

I got four so that we could turn the discs over quickly and also so that we could label each of the titles quickly (we set all four up together, stand back and use one remote to control all four to save even more time).

Everything has worked flawlessly for the past five summers until this week when one of the units ceased recording to the DVD's. From what I read here you can send them back to Toshiba for service, and I have in the past for a different issue with one. My question is - is there anywhere to get a new/used/refurbished XS-32? For efficiency, I don't want to have three of one unit and one of the other. At the same time, I don't want to find myself purchasing four new DVR's (which seem to be impossible to find anyhow).

Any suggestions?

Any suggestions?

Check eBay and pray, is about all anyone can suggest. The units are uncommon (compared to Panasonics and Pioneers), and absolutely mint, fully-functional XS models are the holy grail for a lot of people. You are extraordinarily fortunate to have experienced zero failure rate on a group of four vintage Toshibas during steady use over a five year period: thats unprecedented for any brand and unheard of for a Toshiba XS, so you're already way ahead of the game.

When searching eBay, don't look specifically for your model, because the eBay search engine almost always comes up with nothing when you do that. Instead, run a search for "Toshiba DVD recorder" and then carefully sift thru the results until you find the model you want, hopefully in the condition you want. Many many people here are addicted to the XS recorders and refuse to use anything else: being "cult" machines they get snapped up quickly so it may take you a couple weeks to find exactly what you want.

You are extraordinarily fortunate to have experienced zero failure rate on a group of four vintage Toshibas during steady use over a five year period: thats unprecedented for any brand and unheard of for a Toshiba XS, so you're already way ahead of the game.
5 summers = 15 months = ~"normal"???

Gosh a thread I don't have a black dot in(never posted in before), and I'm not a current nor have I ever been a owner:o
Anyway I just wanted to point out if you can't get your Tosh fixed or it's to expensive, you may want to look into one-by-one as your Toshibas fail, replacing them with something like a international Panasonic.
They're available new and of probably similar build quality to your vintage Toshibas.
They don't have a US tuner, but from your description you probably don't use the tuner anyway. They're available from Here (http://www.world-import.com/dmr-eh67.htm) as well as other specialty shops.

Note I'm not sure if you make or need thumbnails for each chapter, but with Pannys you can make thumbnails for each title from any frame in the title and also easily name the title anything you want.
No standalone DVDR (other than the vintage Toshibas) let you make thumbnails for chapters:(

edit: rereading your post it looks like you control all 4 with one remote, of course this wouldn't work with anything other than a Toshiba of similar age to yours. But again when it comes time to replace all 4 I'd suggest one of the international Pannys, I wouldn't suggest any of the current US Panasonics (EZ and EA series) or really any current US DVDR for a commercial use like yours, they're really more for home use.

5 summers = 15 months = ~"normal"???

We actually use them year-round with our team, just not as heavily as we do for the summers. After seeing a couple of comments, I'm feeling fortunate especially considering they are used in a pool environment with lots of humidity, chlorine, etc. We've even taken them on the road to meets - of course the one that goes down is the one I had been using at home during the season - so it had all of my footage from last year's Olympics on it.

I'll keep an eye open for another on eBay etc, otherwise I might look at replacing all at once and have three good and one defective "Holy Grails" up for sale.

> You are extraordinarily fortunate to have experienced zero failure rate
> on a group of four vintage Toshibas during steady use over a five year period:
> thats unprecedented for any brand and unheard of for a Toshiba XS, so you're
> already way ahead of the game.

And here's me thinking that Toshiba builds reliable DVRs...

Four XS32s and one XS35 with only a single complaint: one of the XS32s does not respond to channel changing by remote. Channels change fine with the buttons and all the other remote functions work so it is set up for VCR conversion and editing.

"....of course the one that goes down is the one I had been using at home during the season - so it had all of my footage from last year's Olympics on it."

If the titles still play, then swap the HDD into one of your working units and then you can burn DVDs of what you want to keep.

I will update this thread when I encounter the exact error again (which is reproducible I'm almost positive), but in the past few days, I've gotten an error I hadn't seen before.. something along the lines of "The video can't be converted" when trying to dub to a DVD-RW. (I'm starting to finalize DVD-RWs and copy the VIDEO_TS folder to a 1.5 TB external drive to get old musical performances off of DVD-RWs and hopefully eventually all off of my XS32... and eventually hopefully convert the audio into individual songs to go on my ipod..)

After getting this error, I *thought* my replacement drive and/or a specific DVD-RW was going bad, because I couldn't finalize it since I would get some error finalizing.

After turning off and turning on the XS32, I was able to finalize the disc.. so I think it's just that getting this error gets the XS32 into some confused state (several other issues do that).

Last night I had another recording causing this problem. IIRC, it is just at the regular rate I use for music stuff -- 2.0 video, LPCM. *Maybe* 1.4 video, LPCM.

I have two remotes if you're interested....

$20 each or two for $35 plus $6 shipping/handling to Continental USA.

Both work fine and are like new.

If they are remotes for XS52 then I would to have one. Please reply to eftom@yahoo.com

Thanks

I bought a used RD-XS32 at goodwill for $5.00 without a remote. I should have read this forum first, because I changed the ir code from DR1 to DR2. Now my Harmony remote will not work. Every time I hit a key on the remote, the unit says DR-2. Did anyone ever find a solution for this problem? I called Toshiba and they did not know of a way to reset the unit without the factory remote.

How did you change the code the first time? With the Harmony remote, right? Do you remember the sequence you entered? Could you try that, but to change it back to DR1?

It was in the setup menu on screen. As soon as I moved the cursor down to IR-2, the remote stopped working. The remote is still using DR-1, while the Toshiba is using DR-2.

Perhaps working through the instructions here might help you find some remote button sequences that can help you back out of your pickle. They're for my RD-XS35 but I think it's the same for your machine. Good luck!

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=15431180#post15431180

Thanks, I tried that, but you need the original remote. It seems that there has to be a way to tell the Harmony remote to use ir channel 2?

First, you say you changed the ir code from DR1 to DR2. Do you remember exactly how you did that?

Using my Harmony remote, I was in the setup menu. As soon as I changed the IR from DR-1 to DR-2, the Harmony stopped working. Every time I push a button on the remote, the front of the DVD unit shows DR-2. Does anyone know if there is a jumper on the motherboard that will reset the unit?

Hey gearhart...I have a little used 32 unit to offer you at a firesale price. PM me if interested.

Cheers

EDIT: My unit is the 80 gig 52. Sorry

Edit: Duh!! It is an XS52 which you know very well is a 160 HDD.

Hi Citibear. I have a 32 unit that if not mint condition, is damn close. PM me if you can offer a price line reference. I do not need money just need to avoid foolishly underpricing.

Thanks

EDIT: Sorry---the unit is a 52 (80 gig)
DUH!! You well know this is a 160 model

OK, if there's a button on your Harmony remote that corresponds to the Easy Navi button on the Toshiba remote, hold that down while you press 2.

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y45/p_l/ToshibaRD-XS35DR2p51.jpg

Otherwise, you may have to start looking at the option of purchasing a remote, or you might want to get a whole unit with a remote for cheap, as you can see you're being offered. That's what I would do if I were you.

I finally found a code that worked with a Phillips Universal remote. I was able to change the setting back to DR-1 and now the Harmony works.

Great! How about posting details of your success? What model Philips, what code and what buttons?

The remote I used was a Phillips Icon remote SRU4105WM/17 DVD code 1013. I actually found the original remote at the Goodwill store for $1. So for $6 total I have a working RD-XS32.

First of all thanks to all the posters who have discussed this topic before. Your posts gave me hope!!
I have had a RD-XS32SB for many years now , maybe 10 - I can’t remember, bought in the UK where I lived. It never gave me any trouble at all.
In 2006 we moved to the Philippines where I am now. The machine was set up here in July 2007 and everything worked. I made a couple of off-satellite recordings, the satellite box I had then had a PAL output, and also recorded from some VHS tapes onto the HD and then onto DVD. No problems.
Because the time it was showing was 6 minutes slow, 3 days ago I finally decided to amend the time. I went into Setup and found, nit very surprising it was set to get the time from BBC1, so it was out of luck here! I set the time manually and switched it off.
Next day I wanted to watch some DVDs on the machine as my regular DVD player was having problems. Two were DVDs I had burnt on my PC the third a commercial Region 2 disc. During the first DVD I heard a horrible clicking noise, I thought it was the DVD, so stopped it, took out the DVD, started again. No noise. A little later it began again. I ignored it, until I had finished watching and then realised that the noise was coming from where the HD was.
I looked at the content menu, it showed the titles but without the thumbnails. I tried to delete one title. It did delete but took much longer than normal. I powered down and then powered up again and got the dreaded 7061. Nothing I did worked after that.
After reading this forum I have tried all the suggestions, Zoom 701 Zoom, DVD-Top Menu-etc, pressing the eject button when the error message appears, nothing works.
I have opened the case, looked at the cables, nothing obvious.
So I am guessing it is the HD. Next trip to Manila I shall buy a new one but it is not easy to get IDE disks anymore, even here, least of all one with a specific Manufacturer code, so I shall do my best. I will update the forum if I get any results, positive or negative.
Meanwhile if anyone has any other good ideas, I should be pleased to read them!!

Hi,

I own a RDXS-32 that I bought in 2006 and have started using it seriously only now.

I updated the DVD Drive Software to 1417. Presently, it has the original DVD Writer SD-W3002 and Software Version ZL 12.

I am trying to remove SD-W3002 and install LG, GH22NP20. I have done a piggy-back install of this drive, without removing SD-W3002, only disconneting it and placing the GH22 on top and connecting it to the power and IDE connectors. It works okay and I have tested it for read of the earlier DVD's done in the original SD-3002 and GH22NP is able to read them. I have also done a write test of the GH22 and it works.

But I am surprised to the RDXS-32 show under 'Setup' , DVD Drive Software as 1.04 and DVD drive software as ZL 12.

I tried installing the DVD Software 1417 and it would not do it. Do I need to install 1417 for GH22 ?

Does anyone have a suggestion ?

I would also appreciate some advise on changing the main board battery.

TIA,
mpm

Hi,

I own a RDXS-32 that I bought in 2006 and have started using it seriously only now.

I updated the DVD Drive Software to 1417. Presently, it has the original DVD Writer SD-W3002 and Software Version ZL 12.

I am trying to remove SD-W3002 and install LG, GH22NP20. I have done a piggy-back install of this drive, without removing SD-W3002, only disconneting it and placing the GH22 on top and connecting it to the power and IDE connectors. It works okay and I have tested it for read of the earlier DVD's done in the original SD-3002 and GH22NP is able to read them. I have also done a write test of the GH22 and it works.

But I am surprised to the RDXS-32 show under 'Setup' , DVD Drive Software as 1.04 and DVD drive software as ZL 12.

I tried installing the DVD Software 1417 and it would not do it. Do I need to install 1417 for GH22 ?

Does anyone have a suggestion ?

I would also appreciate some advise on changing the main board battery.

TIA,
mpm

What you are doing interests me, as I have not tried it yet. I am using an LGA H-4167B. I still have the original firmware for the RD-XS32 and was afraid to try the firmware upgrade for fear of hosing the aftermarket burner (tho' it's only a $19 refurb).

Are you saying with an aftermarket burner hooked up the firmware update for the RD-XS32 won't proceed? I suppose that's expected. I would just connect up the stock burner, do the firmware update, and swap burners. I've done this before and it works fine. I don't think you can update an aftermarker burner with the Toshiba burner software.

I guess you are using one of the latest burners off Newegg. I found that they will recognize unfinalized DVD-R fine, however they won't work with DVD-RAM, which may not be important for you. I believe another problem I had was if you inserted DVD-R which was previously finalized on the RD-XS32, it would only play back titles and I couldn't get to a thumbnail menu, so you couldn't dub the stuff back to HDD.

I prefer using an LGA H-4167B, which works fine with DVD-RAM and will work normally with finalized DVD-R, it just won't recognize unfinalized disks, but I can always finalize that on my other RD-XS unit. Or fill up a disk weekly rather than incrementally. This burner will also recognize finalized DVD-R from a Maggie 2160A or Pioneer -460H.

I am not aware of a battery for the mainboard; you must be confusing this with a computer motherboard; if they do, I have yet to have a battery go dead and I've been using RD-XS units going on 4-5 years now!

Thanks for responding to this old thread.


Just to clarify:

1. When the original DVD drive is connected, Set-up shows the DVD Drive Software as 1417 and software as ZL 12.

2. When I connect the new drive, it does not show 1417 but drive software as 1.04..

3. When I re-connect the old drive, it goes back to 1417.

4. I have read somewhere that the 'new' drive will not read CD-R, in which I have 1417 iso image. May be I should try burning it on a DVD-R and try it again.

5. There is a small battery ( like the cmos battery in a motherboard). Earlier, it would hold time/date update for a while, even after the power was disconneted. Now, I have to re-set it every time I turn the mains off. You will find this on the board, right-side of the DVD drive.

Rgds,
mpm

I think it's just getting the 'drive software' from the firmware of the dvd burner itself.. (and it doesn't "understand" this, it's just printing it as human readable text)

So basically, don't worry about it, at best you might be able to update firmware *for the DVD burner* on a computer -- but it will come from the DVD burner company, and *might* change the behavior in the XS32.

One question I think I asked a looooong time ago, but never got an answer to. Has anybody tried faster than 2x DVD-RWs in one of the replacement drives?

I *think* it's actually the drive firmware, not necessarily the XS32 firmeware, that is what handles the faster speed.. So with a replacement drive, faster DVD-RWs (which are about the only thing available nowadays) might work.

My RD-XS32 will not burn to a disc and shows a message of error 14. Any idea.

My RD-XS32 will not burn to a disc and shows a message of error 14. Any idea.
_____________________________________________
There are some postings in this form. Pls see below

mpmohan
_________________________________________
redsox_mark
Veteran Member




Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Bath, England
Posts: 6,512
My movie collection
I got this last night.
Err 14 means it thinks the DVD you were writing to is bad.
You can clear the error by pressing the display button on the remote.
Then try another disc.

Mark

Not all DVD-Rs are compatible

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You are probably using 8X Slivers (purplish in color). Avoid them and this should do the trick. Look for warning labels that say that it is the new dvd-r spec for 8x writing speeds.

If I am not going ot be around when the clock goes ahead 1 hour in the Spring, is there a way of having the machine auto advance one hour on the daylight savings change in March 14, 2010?

First of all thanks to all the posters who have discussed this topic before. Your posts gave me hope!!
I have had a RD-XS32SB for many years now , maybe 10 - I can’t remember, bought in the UK where I lived. It never gave me any trouble at all.
In 2006 we moved to the Philippines where I am now. The machine was set up here in July 2007 and everything worked. I made a couple of off-satellite recordings, the satellite box I had then had a PAL output, and also recorded from some VHS tapes onto the HD and then onto DVD. No problems.
Because the time it was showing was 6 minutes slow, 3 days ago I finally decided to amend the time. I went into Setup and found, nit very surprising it was set to get the time from BBC1, so it was out of luck here! I set the time manually and switched it off.
Next day I wanted to watch some DVDs on the machine as my regular DVD player was having problems. Two were DVDs I had burnt on my PC the third a commercial Region 2 disc. During the first DVD I heard a horrible clicking noise, I thought it was the DVD, so stopped it, took out the DVD, started again. No noise. A little later it began again. I ignored it, until I had finished watching and then realised that the noise was coming from where the HD was.
I looked at the content menu, it showed the titles but without the thumbnails. I tried to delete one title. It did delete but took much longer than normal. I powered down and then powered up again and got the dreaded 7061. Nothing I did worked after that.
After reading this forum I have tried all the suggestions, Zoom 701 Zoom, DVD-Top Menu-etc, pressing the eject button when the error message appears, nothing works.
I have opened the case, looked at the cables, nothing obvious.
So I am guessing it is the HD. Next trip to Manila I shall buy a new one but it is not easy to get IDE disks anymore, even here, least of all one with a specific Manufacturer code, so I shall do my best. I will update the forum if I get any results, positive or negative.
Meanwhile if anyone has any other good ideas, I should be pleased to read them!!

A new disk 80Gb was bought but it was one of the "thin" ones! Installation gave me the error code for disk not recognised so that was hopeless. Now i have alarge Toshiba door stop!! Unles anyone has any ideas on how to make the machine recognise other hard disks? Why do Toshiba do this, they must know tha HDs fail and will need to be replaced. I can't evcen buy a replacemnt machine 'cos here in the Philippines there are no HD/DVD recorders available. (Probably because there is nothing on TV here worth recording!!)

A new disk 80Gb was bought but it was one of the "thin" ones! Installation gave me the error code for disk not recognised so that was hopeless. Now i have alarge Toshiba door stop!! Unles anyone has any ideas on how to make the machine recognise other hard disks? Why do Toshiba do this, they must know tha HDs fail and will need to be replaced. I can't evcen buy a replacemnt machine 'cos here in the Philippines there are no HD/DVD recorders available. (Probably because there is nothing on TV here worth recording!!)

You are on the wrong thread (I know there are multiple RD-XS threads of marathon length). Have you seen this one:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=840132&page=14

There have been and still are many HDDs on Ebay which will work on the RD-XS32 and which will in fact increase the disk capacity to 160 GB automatically when you format the drive. You can get 'em for as cheap as $19. I already mentioned the slim drives won't work with the RD-XS series.

Stupid forum lost my message because I didn't check the 'old thread' checkbox. (No, going 'back' didn't have it come back.. Shorter version follows.)

So this weekend, I started having a 'problem' when stopping a recording(*). Something like it can't add it to the library. So I go into the library, which I normally never use, and it was ~372 pages long.

Does anybody actually use the library functionality? If so, what for? I like the idea in theory, but it seemed mostly a pain to use. (Esp since it remembered items AFTER I delete them -- what's the point?)

I'm now actually transferring stuff from my (newer) Tivos to computer, but I still use my XS32 for world news now and NBC Nightly News recordings... plus dubbing a lot of stuff *to watch faster than realtime*.. I wish there were a cablecard/QAM recorder that allowed this. (Actually, since I'm transferring stuff to computer, I can do this in quicktime, but really I mean on a TV screen.)


(*) Having an alert come up when you stop a recording is usually a bad thing.

Anyone have a solution for the minor issue of the clock being wrong (off by 1 hour) around the start and end of daylight savings time? I'm just having to manually set the time (like this past Sunday), rather than let the box discover the time automatically. This has been an issue since March 2007.

rd-xs32, ZL10, 1314

Thanks,

Gary

I have been looking to rip the DVDs I have made with this receiver and for some reason the chapters do not show up in any of the ripping software. Why would that be?

I own an old Toshiba RD-KX50SU which is similar to the RD-XS52 but smaller hard drive. About 3 months ago I started getting the error message “Err-3B” and the DVR would not display on my 42” LG HDTV. We leave the unit all time and pretty much just record all the shows we miss do being parents of a 2 year old. When we go to watch our shows we just switch over from the OTA HDTV to the DVR on the HDMI of the 42” LG. Often switching over we will get the “Err-3B” (HDMI connection errors detected) problem.

The only way to fix the problem has been to turn off the unit and restart it. Normally this is fine but you can’t do this if you want to put the DVR into time slip mode. :( I’ve tried different HDMI ports on the LG and I still get the same problem. Last night I finally got around to getting a new HDMI cable and the same problem occurs.

Does anyone know a fix for this? I haven’t tried a factory reset (not sure if this is even possible)

*If the RD-KX50 doesn’t fall under the RD-XS32 category I can have an admin move this post.

What firmware are you running? The RD-KX50 needs to be running version YA12 to be compatible w/1080p TV's. You can check your firmware version in the setup menu.

What firmware are you running? The RD-KX50 needs to be running version YA12 to be compatible w/1080p TV's. You can check your firmware version in the setup menu.

I can check tonight. I was under the impression there wasn't a firmware issue on the RD-KX50 since Toshiba site had no download or information about it.

I can check tonight. I was under the impression there wasn't a firmware issue on the RD-KX50 since Toshiba site had no download or information about it.

What firmware are you running? The RD-KX50 needs to be running version YA12 to be compatible w/1080p TV's. You can check your firmware version in the setup menu.

So it looks like I'm running YA10 on my RD-KX50. How would I go about updating the firmware? From some of the previous comments said the RD-XS32 firmware could harm a RD-KX50 and another comment mentioned the firmware on Toshiba site being corrupt.

There was a problem w/ corrupt firmware last year, but I believe it was corrected. I know for sure that YA12 (KX50) and YA13 (XS52) are in use right now. Contact Toshiba, they likely have a firmware disc available.

There was a problem w/ corrupt firmware last year, but I believe it was corrected. I know for sure that YA12 (KX50) and YA13 (XS52) are in use right now. Contact Toshiba, they likely have a firmware disc available.

Thanks for the information. I just talked to Toshiba and they are sending me a firmware disc. :)

There was a problem w/ corrupt firmware last year, but I believe it was corrected. I know for sure that YA12 (KX50) and YA13 (XS52) are in use right now. Contact Toshiba, they likely have a firmware disc available.

Booji, are you positive about this? The last I heard you needed to replace the DigiPC board on the RD-XS52 to upgrade the firmware. Has Toshiba actually progressed beyond that stage so that now the YA13 firmware file will actually work without hosing the board???

Booji, are you positive about this? The last I heard you needed to replace the DigiPC board on the RD-XS52 to upgrade the firmware. Has Toshiba actually progressed beyond that stage so that now the YA13 firmware file will actually work without hosing the board???

Yes, I'm sure. The firmware bug has been fixed.

Yes, I'm sure. The firmware bug has been fixed.

At least they're still working on this stuff. Dare I say future firmware updates to come from Toshiba???? :eek:

I'm looking for a used in reasonable shape, Toshiba RD-XS32. We have been extremely pleased with our unit over the last 5 years and want to get a 2nd unit to record shows at conflicting times. Tried a friends XS34 and just hated it!

Is it just me or has anybody else noticed that Toshiba has pulled ALL firmware updates for ALL RD-XS models off their website???

In addition, I called two different Toshiba numbers and both reps told me they do not have firmware disks for the RD-XS52, RD-KX50, or even the other models!

I wonder if this stems from the RD-XS52 fiasco where the update ruined the machines? The problem was not the customer doing the update correctly, but Toshiba providing a corrupt file! To pull all firmware files off their site because of this is ridiculous.

I got my firmware disc today from Toshiba for my RD-KX50 and they sent me a YA11 and not YA12 :confused: Since I"m running YA10 I went ahead and did the upgrade.

So far switching between TV to DVR via HDMI is not causing "err-3B" to show up...but it would always happen so randomly.

I'll post an update in a few days.

I got my firmware disc today from Toshiba for my RD-KX50 and they sent me a YA11 and not YA12 :confused: Since I"m running YA10 I went ahead and did the upgrade.

So far switching between TV to DVR via HDMI is not causing "err-3B" to show up...but it would always happen so randomly.

I'll post an update in a few days.

Sigh..."Err-3B" came back last night when we switched to the DVR in an attempt timeslip "24". We had to wait for it to finish recording before restarting the unit. :(

I called Toshiba today and they told me that YA11 is the only firmware available for the RD-KX50. booji, where did you find information regarding YA12?

There goes the hard drive again! :mad:

Okay this is becoming a habit with this XS-34! I even just bought a bunch of DVD-RAMs. Some stuff was backed up but most... :(

First thing noticed was a recording halted before finishing. It mentioned in the title "next rec". Next thing was that the timebar was missing. I was looking through the thread to see how to return it.

Read that by pressing the power button for more than 10 seconds doing a "hard reset" would restore it. After that... bye bye data!

The library is still intact but who cares! Just shows all of my lost recording times.

Does this problem also occur with the XS-35?

I'll just have to pick myself up, dust myself off and start all over again!

Thanks Toshiba for your quality control! :mad:

3vuVW78tCTM

There goes the hard drive again! :mad:

Does this problem also occur with the XS-35?

Yup, about once a year. An HDD, one must repeat to oneself mantra-like, is for temporary storage.:( The bright side is that despite the scare it creates, at least the machine isn't completely hosed and your setup even remains intact.

I'll have to start transferring things I want to keep right away so I don't forget from now on!

Lesson learned.

I thought maybe this problem was fixed with the XS35 but apparently that is not the case. :(

BTW: Clark Griswold's response was mild compared to mine. :D

There goes the hard drive again! :mad:

Okay this is becoming a habit with this XS-34! I even just bought a bunch of DVD-RAMs. Some stuff was backed up but most... :(

First thing noticed was a recording halted before finishing. It mentioned in the title "next rec". Next thing was that the timebar was missing. I was looking through the thread to see how to return it.

Read that by pressing the power button for more than 10 seconds doing a "hard reset" would restore it. After that... bye bye data!

The library is still intact but who cares! Just shows all of my lost recording times.

Does this problem also occur with the XS-35?

I'll just have to pick myself up, dust myself off and start all over again!

Thanks Toshiba for your quality control! :mad:

Pressing the power button for 10 sec or more will not reformat your drive or cause you to lose your scheduled recordings. You lost your data because when the HDD gets corrupted, the machine can act squirrelly. You will not be able to salvage anything by moving stuff off the HDD to DVD-R before the drive really goes, as you won't be able to access the titles.

To prevent this in the future, I do an ALL HDD TITLES DELETE every 4 months or so, as I record many titles a week. I don't think you need to actually do a reformat at this point; maybe 1x/year is adequate.

If your HDD is dying, you will get the same problem.

As I mentioned on another post, if you do a lot of editing, do it on playlists. I put in chapter divides on the original title, then make a playlist. I do my deletions and combining on the playlist. This prevents the HDD from being corrupted. The only deletions I do on an original title is maybe a beginning and end cut, that's it. Internal cuts I do via playlists. Besides, I'm sure everybody has made the mistake of doing chapter divides and deletions on the original title, only to find out you deleted the wrong chapters! So always do this with playlists as you can always start over.

None of the RD-XS models are immune to HDD corruption. Although the RD-XS35 is a higher model number than the RD-XS34, it's not really an improvement.

BTW: Clark Griswold's response was mild compared to mine. :D

At least you didn't go all angry German kid (http://www.famouspictures.org/index.php?title=Angry_German_Kid), I hope.:)

I think Clevor makes at least two good points. Do the bulk of your editing on playlists, and it might be a good idea to do a preemptive ALL HDD TITLES DELETE from time to time.

Thanks for the advice guys!

Besides, I'm sure everybody has made the mistake of doing chapter divides and deletions on the original title, only to find out you deleted the wrong chapters! So always do this with playlists as you can always start over.

That is good to know as I have done just that in the past. :o

One question: after making the playlist can I delete the original, or does it have to stay intact to retrieve the data to play. After 5 years of ownership, this is the first time I have done this!


http://video.google.com/ThumbnailServer2?app=smh&contentid=13821dba1dd0c730&offsetms=1&itag=w160&sigh=kqn4JlS372HlmKCdCcvrMtmlxb0&h=90&w=120&sigh=__OsZLJ7aAYO9TlHaddrp1PcnL9-Y= (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8pR1rZZHEs) German kid! :eek:

LOL!

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! STARTA, STAART OOOOOOOOOOOOHWHOOOHOHO!"

No the recorder still works. I didn't lose the escape button! I did however lose my mind. Now I need to go look for it!

Before you do anything that would cause you to... get upset: no, you can't delete the original when working with playlists; otherwise, everything you're working on is gone and this time you would have only yourself to blame, not the machine. We wouldn't want any further self-directed rage.

As plplplpl has alluded to, you can make as many playlists of the original you want, and edit the playlists to your hearts content, but be sure you dub over all the playlists you want to keep before you delete the original title!

What I sometimes do to free up more disk space (since I archive once a week at most), is if I have a 2-3 hour title that I have edited down to a few minutes on the playlist, I dub the playlist back to the HDD (the Toshiba RD-XSs can do this :D), whereupon I can delete the huge original title and save space. The short playlist is now an original title, but much shorter, to be dubbed over at the end of the week.

You can also chop up a playlist and dub over only the chapters you want. And you can create independent thumbnails of each chapter if you wish to give you an idea of the content.

Another excellent point, Clevor. Yes, the RD-XSs can dub the playlists back to the HDD as new original titles.

Another thing you may have noticed: as a matter of procedure, the machine throws up a warning each time you are about to delete an original recording to the effect that deleting this title will affect any playlists that use it. If you do make playlists, try not to rotely ignore this warning since it helps you avoid a possible regrettable mistaken deletion.

Okay so let me see if I got this straight.

I can remove the portions I want to keep using playlists. I then can take that playlist and dub it onto the HDD which now becomes an original title? Afterwards I can then delete the original recording, yet still have the playlist with removed content; i.e. commercials as if I had gone in and removed them from the original recording (way I used to do it). I can then (if wanted for archive) dub the new playlist to the DVD without loss of data?

One more thing can the playlists be combined as can be done with original recordings (hope that makes sense)?

I know there's a lot more to this recorder which I have yet to discover. Five years of ignorance by not willing to read through the massive instruction booklet! :o

You guys are terrific! :)

Okay so let me see if I got this straight.

I can remove the portions I want to keep using playlists. I then can take that playlist and dub it onto the HDD which now becomes an original title? Afterwards I can then delete the original recording, yet still have the playlist with removed content; i.e. commercials as if I had gone in and removed them from the original recording (way I used to do it). I can then (if wanted for archive) dub the new playlist to the DVD without loss of data?

One more thing can the playlists be combined as can be done with original recordings (hope that makes sense)?

I know there's a lot more to this recorder which I have yet to discover. Five years of ignorance by not willing to read through the massive instruction booklet! :o

You guys are terrific! :)

Yes, and yes.

Remember, once you dub the playlist, which is a virtual copy of the original with the sections you want removed, to the HDD, it is no longer a virtual copy. It is it's own original. You can archive that if you want.

The Toshiba RD-XS units were one of the fastest, if not the fastest dubber in it's day, so dubbing a 3-5' playlist back to the HDD to relieve yourself of the original takes seconds.

With the Toshiba RD-XS units, yes of course you can combine playlists like original titles. You can also mix and match chapters from different playlists in any order you want.

There are a lot of sophisticated features of the RD-XS model I am unaware of myself. I think I am using or familiar with maybe 50% of the stuff. I mainly record everything at SP, do a lot of recordings which require editing, and archive to DVD-R, but that's it. But I can record virtually anything I wish, as long as I can input it to a TV or computer screen (the Video Filter works very well on these units, BTW).

I've been using the RD-XS models since 2006 myself and only found out a year ago it can do chapter divides on-the-fly, when the topic came up here on a thread. If you are not aware of this BTW, it's a quick and dirty way to cut out commercials, although you might miss a few seconds of the movie each time it resumes again. When the TV cuts to a commercial, just press the CHAPTER DIVIDE button. After the commercial, as soon as the movie resumes, press the button again. After the movie is over, create a playlist, initialize the thumbnails, delete every other chapter, then recombine. This way you won't have to replay the whole movie to insert cut points :D. Essentially it's editing on-the-fly.

Doing something like this in full screen takes a lot of (resident memory) resources and engineering. What distinguishes the Toshiba RD-XS units from virtually any other HDD recorder ever made, regardless of how high end, is the ability to edit in full screen. This will become apparent whenever you use other HDD DVRs on the market, be that Magnavox, Pioneer, or Panasonic.

I can record virtually anything I wish, as long as I can input it to a TV or computer screen (the Video Filter works very well on these units, BTW).

Yeah I record a radio show by running the audio of the receiver to the front ports. I use the lowest quality recording setting. It doesn't affect the audio and the video doesn't matter because there is none. A three hour show will only take up 30 minutes of HDD space. I then can run quickly through the ads! ;)

If you are not aware of this BTW, it's a quick and dirty way to cut out commercials, although you might miss a few seconds of the movie each time it resumes again. When the TV cuts to a commercial, just press the CHAPTER DIVIDE button. After the commercial, as soon as the movie resumes, press the button again. After the movie is over, create a playlist, initialize the thumbnails, delete every other chapter, then recombine. This way you won't have to replay the whole movie to insert cut points :D. Essentially it's editing on-the-fly.

What I do is go into "timeslip" mode. When the commercial arrives, I pause it at the black cut (just before the ad) and enter in a chapter divide and do the same for the end. By doing that you end up with a precise cut.

I also have skip back (instant replay) entered as 10 seconds, because the networks nowadays love to stick in those 10 second commercials. They know that TiVos and DVR's have them preset to 15 seconds. If you run the "commercial skip" it doesn't come to complete time set as it is a bit short. I think Toshiba did this on purpose so you end up seeing the tail end of the ad.

I really wish that there was a setting on it for one minute. I mean, who is going to set it for 5 minutes anyway! I don't know why that is even an option.:p

Doing something like this in full screen takes a lot of (resident memory) resources and engineering. What distinguishes the Toshiba RD-XS units from virtually any other HDD recorder ever made, regardless of how high end, is the ability to edit in full screen.

Sounds like you have this running into your computer? How is that done?


Were you aware if you have a "copy never" title that it cannot be copied over to DVD-R nor to DVD-RW. It can however be moved over to a DVD-RAM! Even though it cannot be copied onto any media it can be moved one time.

That TV Guide On Screen was the biggest jokes of the unit! I really dislike how the recorder will automatically shut off after three hours of non usage. I wish there was a way around that! :mad:

What I have discovered with the playlists is that they can be assembled even when a recording is in progress! :cool: BTW: how are they combined? I cannot figure that out.

I have also noticed after formatting the drive that it performs faster! :D

Willie G., haven't figured out how to do multiple quotes so I'll just comment on some of your questions in sequence:

I don't use timeslip, but I guess when you pause, you have to enter a chapter divide. I know if you are recording and pause to change channels, a chapter divide is entered there. At least you can change channels and resume recording within the same title, which a lot of HDD recorders can't do.

Yes, a DVD-RAM disk fools the copy protection into thinking it's the HDD, so it works sometimes. But the Video Filter works better ;). Can't comment further as such talk is discouraged on this site.

When I use TV Guide in the U.S., I have no problems with the recorder shutting down after three hours. I use the feature of auto shutdown after every recording anyway.

Toshiba RD-XS units are prodigious multitaskers, so yes, you can edit while recording. The only thing you can't do is delete chapters or combine titles; the resources required to allow editing in full screen and chapter divides during recording probably prohibits this. I do notice that I can actually edit while dubbing to DVD-R :eek:, but sometimes I can't. Haven't figured this one out yet.

To combine playlists you create another playlist, and highlight the ones you want to combine. If you press that blue button, it opens up the chapters in each title, so you can mix and match those any way you want.

Formatting the HDD will make the drive perform faster mainly because at that point, you have few titles on the disk, plus the drive is defragmented. When you have a lot of titles on the HDD (and the more complex they are in the form of chapters), this will slow down actions such as thumbnail generation, deletion, etc. But only by a split second or so.

Does anybody have extra remotes to sell? When I asked this (a couple years ago), I ended up buying one from someone here -- and someone else had a couple extras.

I *think* that my second XS32 remote is now in the process of dying. (Yes I tried putting charged batteries in it.) Strangely, it seems like a ton of the buttons just stopped working suddenly.. e.g. quick menu (one of the most important buttons!).. but also many of the other buttons like time bar, display, remain.. and even most of the #s inside the flap..

Is there some way I could have accidentally put the remote in some other 'mode' (e.g. TV vs XS32)? I don't think so.

I know I *did* stupidly accidentally change (this is AFTER the fact) the XS32 to think I meant remote 2.. and now I can't change it back, because the '2' key on the remote isn't working.. so I'm kind of stuck..

But does anybody have remotes to sell?

Is this it?

http://www.remotes.com/remotes/servlet/rs?a=gmi&smodel=RDXS32&brand_pn=TOSHIBA_RDXS32&mode=large&uuid=12755635673480

Does anybody have extra remotes to sell? When I asked this (a couple years ago), I ended up buying one from someone here -- and someone else had a couple extras.

I *think* that my second XS32 remote is now in the process of dying. (Yes I tried putting charged batteries in it.) Strangely, it seems like a ton of the buttons just stopped working suddenly.. e.g. quick menu (one of the most important buttons!).. but also many of the other buttons like time bar, display, remain.. and even most of the #s inside the flap..

Is there some way I could have accidentally put the remote in some other 'mode' (e.g. TV vs XS32)? I don't think so.

I know I *did* stupidly accidentally change (this is AFTER the fact) the XS32 to think I meant remote 2.. and now I can't change it back, because the '2' key on the remote isn't working.. so I'm kind of stuck..

But does anybody have remotes to sell?

I just bought a new remote for my XS34 here. (http://www.toshiba.newremotecontrol.com/catalog_item.php?catnum=P000446020) I actually bought the wrong one - I think it's for a XS54 but it seems to work fine.

I believe there are other places offering new remotes for the Toshiba XS Series as well. Look at this (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1248300) thread for more info.

Actually, at some point last night, it started working again (rather, the rest of the buttons started working again). I vaguely remember that my orig remote did that before it really died.. but at least it's usable now.

Yeah, those are the right remote -- but I guess I was hoping that someone had extras that they'd sell cheaper than those new remotes (pretty darn expensive if you ask me). I'd be willing to gamble on a used remote that might die at some point.

I've seen entire XS32's (including remote!) going for about that price. (and in fact I'm semi-seriously considering getting one, just to use the original DVD burner to hopefully recover stuff from my unfinalized DVD-Rs from years back when the orig drive went bad).

Can someone tell me how to get an mpg home movie off my computer and onto the HDD on the xs32? It doesn't seem to recognize a "data DVD" and if I burn a dvd with a video-ts format, it thinks that it is a commercial dvd.

I'm using dragonburn on a mac with dvd-rw discs.

Thanks.

Can someone tell me how to get an mpg home movie off my computer and onto the HDD on the xs32? It doesn't seem to recognize a "data DVD" and if I burn a dvd with a video-ts format, it thinks that it is a commercial dvd.

I'm using dragonburn on a mac with dvd-rw discs.

Thanks.

Assuming it's just a home video that's been converted to a standard DVD, it should work.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding.. Did you try LINE-U dubbing?

(e.g. Select HDD mode. Select LINE-U input. Start (HDD) recording of LINE-U. Switch to DVD Mode. Play DVD. Once done, Stop DVD. Switch to HDD mode and Stop recording.)

If it still doesn't work, maybe the RW disc is the problem, I don't know.

[[ Oh wait, maybe LINE-U dubbing only works with discs that were created on the XS32 to begin with -- I can't remember now ]]

[[ Oh wait, maybe LINE-U dubbing only works with discs that were created on the XS32 to begin with -- I can't remember now ]]

Good tip on using the oft-overlooked LINE-U feature, but on an RD-XS35 anyway, it normally works with any non-commercial DVD. I've used it with home movie DVDs I had made on my computer (a PC, though, not a Mac).

Assuming it's just a home video that's been converted to a standard DVD, it should work.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding.. Did you try LINE-U dubbing?

(e.g. Select HDD mode. Select LINE-U input. Start (HDD) recording of LINE-U. Switch to DVD Mode. Play DVD. Once done, Stop DVD. Switch to HDD mode and Stop recording.)

If it still doesn't work, maybe the RW disc is the problem, I don't know.

[[ Oh wait, maybe LINE-U dubbing only works with discs that were created on the XS32 to begin with -- I can't remember now ]]

This did work. Thanks! I guess I never really understood what the Line-U channel was for. I wish I could just copy between the dvd and the hdd, instead of having to play each movie in realtime, but this will work.

Yes, it's time-consuming to do a real-time dub, but in cases like this it's a pretty good solution, and the quality is remarkably good for a real-time dub; on my RD-XS35, it's virtually indistinguishable from the original. How does it compare to the original on your RD-XS32?

I am an owner of an RD-SX32 and I was trying to get an ir blaster cable for my unit.
Any ideas where I could get one? Even one for a different piece of equipment that would work.

I am not sure if I posted this correctly.

If I were in your situation and I had 5 or 6 bucks to gamble, I'd bet that one of these just might work:

http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-IR-Blaster-Repeate-r-Transmitter-E-mitter-Cable-/330446039428?cmd=ViewItem&pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4cf01e6984

http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-IR-Blaster-Repeater-Transmitter-Emitter-Cable-/360247104677?cmd=ViewItem&pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item53e06694a5

I was wondering what people are using for recordable media. The last I used were the yellow 4x Maxell which I bought 360 of them when they were blown out by Staples or the like.

I've put the Memorex DVD drive in mine due to failure of the original. I chose it because it seemed to handle the majority of CD audio functions. Unfortunately, my RX is sitting on top of my TV with the case off and the Memorex just laying on top of the stock drive. m'I bad, huh?

Does the non-stock DVD drive have an effect on what media will work? My guess is probably not since a 16x replacement drive will not work with 16x media (or at least for all the 16x I've ever tried.) I suspect the RX streams the data to the DVD in which case we are pretty much out of luck.

I know that with the replacement drive, you DO NOT update the drive firmware. However, what about putting the replacement drive in a PC and updating the firmware?

Thanks
Tom

Putting in a replacement drive doesn't change the fact you should use the best media available, which is still Taiyo Yuden. The XS32 won't burn faster than 4x no matter what you put in it, though.

I had an LG H22N that didn't work in an XS32 when I upgraded the firmware on the drive -- but another H22N with stock firmware worked fine. My opinion is unless there is some CRITICAL reason to try it, if you're happy with how it works in your XS32, don't touch it again! these machines are pretty picky about replacement burners.

I think that the worst chance is with 16x media. Verbatim 16x and Sony 1-16x both failed to work. Ironically, low quality 1-16x Playo's work 80% of the time.

It would be nice to know if any TY 16x work.

I seem to recall people saying the 8x work much better than the 16x

My RD-XS34 has been displaying ER0000 message for many months. The service manual shown this is "unable to power on" error. I tried reset, hard reset, power off. Nothing. I open the box and power on. The hard drive sounds like it's working, but it still refused to power on. I disconnect the power connector to the internal DVD writer. It displayed error code ER7071. I finally disconnect the power cord to the box and reattached the internal DVD power connector. Finally reconnect the power cord to the box. Voila, it worked again. Good save.

Are there any burners currently available at Newegg that will work in the XS32?

Are there any burners currently available at Newegg that will work in the XS32?

I have owned an xs 32 for about 4 years and the burner went out after about 2 years. I have accumulated a list of burners that people have tried with varied success. I tried the h22N and it would only read not write. Someone had luck with the h22L. Many people have luck with the LG-GSA-H10 but they are hard to find. You may have to expand your search beyond newegg.

Here is my list. You should search on them an see the comments.


LG-GSA-H10N DVD
LG 4167B
LG GSA-4163B
LG gsa H22 L not the N
GSAH10NI
LG H42.
LG H54N

I used to have my XS32 hooked up to a SDtv and an older PS3. Now I have a Samsung LN52B630, the 'slimmer' PS3 and I'd like to record my gameplay to the XS32's HDD like I did with the standard tube tv. Trouble is, I can't figure out where my connection set up is going wrong.

I can get the XS32 TV guide screen to show up by connecting A/V cables from the front ports to the back of the Samsung, but when I minimize the TV Guide screen it's just a blue screen--the PS3 game doesn't show. However, I can hear the PS3 game over my HT set up (a Panasonic SC-BT300).

The Samsung has 4 HDMI ports; I have the PS3, Panasonic & the U-Verse HD receiver hooked to three of them. TV also has one set of A/V ports, Component, DVI, etc. But no S-Vid...which the XS32 does.

Since I can get audio with the Tosh menu on the screen I figure I'm halfway there, but can't figure out what I'm doing wrong w/ the video feed from the PS3; I can play and see content already recorded on the Toshiba, also. Before trying to connect the XS32 I always change the 'tuner' via the HDTV's "source" button on the remote (from one HDMI 1-4, or to 'component', 'A/V 1, 2' etc). Connecting the A/V cables that came with the PS3 to the XS32 (back) input ports still doesn't get the game showing thru the Toshiba. I've tried various input/output switches with the A/V cables I have and the TV's sources as well as the Line Input on the Tosh and I'm ready to pull my hair out :confused: Anyone have any ideas?

I have a RD-XS32 with a LG-GSA-H10N installed and the original burner also. Still works good but I need to sell it. I am selling it for $125.00 plus $20.00 shipping. So if anyone needs one...... pm me.

I am not sure where to post this.
I have an rd xs32 toshiba with an IR blaster. Does anybody know an IR code for the comcast dc50x dta which comcast gives for free. I tried searching but never saw a post that told what 3 digit ir code to use.
The dta is attached to comast, its output goes to rd xs32 the ir blaster goes to dta. rd xs32 goes to the tv.

Has anyone ever checked the Panasonic recorders to see if they use the same burner as the KX50? I'm wondering if the ES10 might be the same since they were the same year. The circuit board might be different but that's an easy swap.

Has anyone ever checked the Panasonic recorders to see if they use the same burner as the KX50? I'm wondering if the ES10 might be the same since they were the same year. The circuit board might be different but that's an easy swap.

The Panasonic DMR-ES10 is a 2005 model. Attached below are five photos of Panasonic DVD Drive VXY1867 DVD found in a 2005 DMR-ES30V. Panasonic's 2004 model year DVD Drives are similar in appearance. Panasonic's 2006 and later model year DVD Drives have metal cases. See this thread for more information:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1082922

I am not sure where to post this.
I have an rd xs32 toshiba with an IR blaster. Does anybody know an IR code for the comcast dc50x dta which comcast gives for free. I tried searching but never saw a post that told what 3 digit ir code to use.
The dta is attached to comast, its output goes to rd xs32 the ir blaster goes to dta. rd xs32 goes to the tv.

This post might provide some clues:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=19633609#post19633609

From what I've read, I don't think people have had much luck getting any of the old DVD recorders to control the DTA's.

Things like the Replay TVs they have, because those are code updatable.

Maybe you'll get lucky though, and find a code with your unit by going through the fun task of searching one-by-one. ;)