Official Sony BD Mega-Changer Thread: BDP-CX7000ES & BDP-CX960 - Page 88

I have had that problem before with reading an invalid disc. If you have a flash drive installed in your player, try reformatting it. It worked for me.

I am a professional installer. I have a client with a BDP-CX960 that he bought right about a year ago. In the last month or so we are getting random Invalid Discs. I've read through this thread and several others looking for some kind of solution.

Firmware Downgrade - Downloaded several older firmware versions from Sony's site by changing the download address of the most recent 020 update. When I try a disc update it says "Already Updated"

Leveling the unit - Seems to make no difference

Power Cycling - Seems to help somewhat... maybe????

Reset all settings in system setup - No difference...

Inserted 4gb USB Drive formatted to FAT32 - Meh...

We are trying all the invalid discs several times now, and it really seems to just work at random with no rhyme or reason. Such a frustrating problem! I would recommend he buys a 7000es, but I'm afraid we will run into the same problem eventually with that! Is there any other option for a large bluray collector? Anything remotely affordable?

Has anyone been able to get the invalid disc problem to go away completely?

Edit:

So we decided to take the cover off and watch what was happening. The "Invalid Discs" get loaded into the player, but then they never even try to start spinning. What could make the player just decide "Nope, I don't wanna spin this disc!"? I'm thinking there may be an issue reading dual layer discs? The Dark Knight plays about 50% of the time, and I saw the player hesitate for a second or two before deciding to spin it up. Total Recall just refuses to play. Moving discs to different slots or changing the tilt of the changer made no difference whatsoever. The problem follows the disc. And the discs are fully loaded into the player part. I can spin them with my finger, but they don't spin on their own.

We bought this thing 11/10/10 so the warranty just ran out. Sony says we will have to pay for repair. But their support people are all but worthless. I would LOVE to be able to resolve the damn problem once and for all!

I have the Sony BDP-CX960. I just bought the Bad Boys(1983) bluray but it doesn't play on my megachanger. The bluray starts but the screen goes black. It never gets to the menu. It's not a disc problem because it plays just fine on my PS3. Does anyone have this problem with this disc or any other blurays? I wonder is it's a firmware issue.

Most of your message has been posted here before in one form or another, but it's good that you've put it all together in one place for people to see (and hopefully read).

One comment: I found that if I spun the disc myself with my finger at the appropriate time, it seemed to work. It's really a mystery as to what is happening, and my guess is that it's something that could be fixed in a firmware update (fat chance at Sony deciding to invest the time/effort in a discontinued product, though).

So, after the above problems in my CX960, I recently bought a refurb CX7000ES from a Sony outlet store, and this time I bought a 5-year warranty. Not cheap, but I wanted to be able to grab Sony by the short hairs if I have the same problem with the CX7000ES. Meanwhile, I play music CDs in the CX960, so that the higher "usage rate" is consumed in the CX960 and not in my CX7000ES.

Despite my initial very favorable opinion of Sony starting 40 years ago, my more recent purchases (eg, a Sony expensive, top-of-the-line TV that was severely subject to external RFI) show that Sony is no longer the quality leader that they used to be; they have become just another established hardware vendor. Sad.

I was not able to get the problem to go away per my 960 which currently sits in my closet collecting dust. I've since upgraded to the 7000 and have not experienced the issue since due to the fact that I'm no longer using the XMB for disc selection and everything that entails. I have yet to use the "load" function of the changer and only access the XMB to adjust the settings of the changer. If I want to play a disc I simply send the changer the appropriate RS-232 command from my remote or PC. The changer immediately responds loading the disc residing in the given changer slot, no questions asked.

Desperatly need help! Sony tech that particpates in this Forum...?!!!

Have several BDs that use to play fine in this player that are now being flagged as "Invalid Disk". This is more than a don't have metadata anoyance. The player will NO LONGER PLAY the disc once it is labled "Invalid". All discs labeled Invalid" play fine in all other BD players I have. So, it is not the disc. This supposedly High End player is connected to my dedicated Home Theater via Control 4. So this problem has really deadlined being able to bring guests in to enjoy Movies, VERY FRUSTRATING! I've reset everthing I can reset, cycled the power, nothing works.

Can anyone help with the fix for this? I've searched Google, Sony sites,...Nothing I'm about ready to set this player on fire and set up an Occupy Sony camp outside of their headquarters.

have you tried updating the firmware

Yes, updated the s/w to the latest revision.

I have no idea why you would have these issues if you are using Control 4 instead of the Sony interface, but since you have the 7000es you could control the system with an IPAD and Cinemar Solutions software interface. I have had the 7000es since they first became available and like Low Profile above have never had this issue using the 3rd party software.

Can you help explain the XMB commands you use? Control 4 can send commands via RS232 port. I have not tried this.

Nitro, I think you have noticed and experienced the same problem I found when the 7000 goes out via the Internet to get Gracenote metadata. From day one this unit has hung going out to get this data. The s/w upgrade seemed to fix this problem but may have introduced another. I also use iPad Control 4 to run my system. I'm using Composer 2.05. Getting disk info via Control 4 has never been a problem. Will try disabling Automatic Player Gracenote access and see if I can force it to play the disc by slot number from Control 4

For all ES7000 fans, I picked a unit today at Sony Outlet store for 199 and paid 30 bucks for 3 years warranty. This is my second unit.

Has anyone been able to get "Bridesmaids" info from Gracenote?

When I load the disc it goes out to Gracenote & then comes back as can't receive data.

I haven't been able to get any info for it since I bought it the week it came out.

I don't know about Bridesmaids but Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown and Planes,Trains & Automobiles don't have any info yet either.

Same issue here, the 7000es worked essentially flawlessly for the first few months then last month started this occasional invalid disk thing. I just reloaded all of the disks and it gave me 39 invalids out of the 227 loaded. All but 4 were previously loaded recognized disks.

I would rather not go the alternate control software route but have become accustomed to the convenience so may have to.

Update: I did a " Factory Reset" then re-loaded all of the disks. All but 5 were ID'd. I have not confirmed that the previously marked "invalid" disks can now actually play but will check that tonight if time allows.

...

What store?

I have had the invalid disk error just starting to occur. I have checked for the firmware update and I am current. I would get it at random earlier but was always able to repeat the load procedure and get the disk info. The last time I could not get it to load the info after multiple attempts. I took the disks out and put them into another slot where it was given the unknown disk message. I pushed the play disk button and it loaded the disk information. I tried this with 2 other disk and it worked. The manual says that it will not do this. I have about 80 disks in the unit and they are all grouped together. I have noticed that some of the threads have suggested tilting the player. I am going to add some more disk to balance the carousel this weekend to see if that might help. Does anyone know if the disk load and the disk play function work the same? That is does the disk load function completely extract the disk from the carousel into the player as it does to play the disk. Could the disk be skewed during the load function not allowing the unit to read them and generating the invalid disk message. Any input or suggestions would be appreciated.

either clean or replace the laser. apart from updating the firmware...

It looks like it has the info for those but not the picture. Gracenote doesn't have anything for Planes, Trains. Halloween II & Super 8 has the info as well but not the picture.

if gracennote is anything like dvd profiler I would say some user imput is required including decals for slicks..

user database is required if it isn't in gracenote you add it in yourself.


as for loosing info nothing is full proof when in doubt keep a text list available..

if you keep relying on gracenote for everything it will eventually fail afterall it is a utility it isn't going to work 100% of the time, personally i'd have a backup utility in place for emergency use.

Can some one suggest a cost effective way to deploy Control4 or other external control mechanism. I checked with BestBuy but seems very expensive? Any ideas or suggestions, alternates are also appreciated.

maveTOR - I'm not being a smart a**, but the remote that comes with the 960 is pretty good and essentially free.

I am a brand new BDPcx7000es owner. Got an awesome price of 576- no tax free ship. Anyway can someone please explain the best sound settings to keep on the blu ray player??
(I have a 7.1 setup and pioneer elite sc37 receiver)

Assuming you want your receiver to do all the audio processing:

Audio Output Priority: HDMI
Audio (HDMI): Auto
BD Audio Setting: Direct

Nothing else is applicable.

For Video you probably want the following:

YCbCr/RGB: YCbCr (4:2:2)

If your video device (projector or TV) is capable of showing 24 fps then you want to set the HDMI resolution to Auto and BD-ROM 1080/24p Output to On.

Then you want to calibrate your display.

Enjoy!

Hi All,

I, too, have just recently been experiencing the "Invalid Disc" error on my 7000. My unit's a year old and I did the update many months ago, but this error has just started - affected discs were: Nightmare Before Christmas and How to Train Your Dragon.

I'm running mine via a Control4 unit, as well. Would be curious if anybody finds a solution.

Thanks,
Frank

dust is your enemy my friend whack in a cleaning disc that should fix the issue you are having sai that, if it fails to correct your issue time to start seeking a repair agent as by the sound of it to replace the laser..

as it looks like the laser is dieing and needs replacement, sadly doesn't matter how you have had the player, the 1st thing to die is either the disc draw mechanical's or the laser age of the unit matter not, including the time you had it before failure happens

Great thank you for the helpful information!

a point to note badly formatted disc can also a part no read situation I've seen this happen with both my sony 5-disc dvd player and a onkyo 704 6-disc dvd player, too the point it has the disc fine 2-3 times then sudden;y stops working for no reason, sometime the laser spits the dummy and doesn't want to pay the disc, sometimes a quick clean of the disc should fix it.

a few years back some co's went on a nut rampage and started doing a 1 play only rental release which was suppose to lock the player out for a 2nd play some of these got released ontp the public domain and started causing issues in playback all in the aid of stopping piracy.

not sure if they reintroduced this in some form within brd frat or not..