Update on EH59/69 availability

I noticed today that J&R no longer lists the EH59 as available. In the past it has been listed as sold out, or on order, but now it clearly says DISCONTINUED. It this a portent of what CitiBear has been predicting about these machines? The comments I got from B&H are starting to resonate in my head. The end of product life with no follow-on model planned, if I remember, is what they said, or at least implied.

On the other hand, it just might be a J&R product availablity shift. I have seen them de-list these in the past, only to get them in again.

This morning, it shows as sold out, discontinued. Just being the guy that I am, I wrote them a letter. Here is my question:

And their reply:

That seems kind of definitive. It is at least, very similar to the reply I got from B&H a couple of seeks ago. What Gracie SHOULD have said was, they will no longer be available--PERIOD! I fear the end of product messages will NOT be recurring until 2022.

If that used one is like most of their used ones, it won't last past noon on Monday!

Really, that's the way these used items have been flying off the shelves.

A while back I wrote down the B&H and J&R proces for the international Panasonics. I don't remember when I wrote them down as I never put a date of the slip of paper, and J&R doesn't have any more EH59s. I just found that sticky which is at least several months old, and it says the prices of the EH69/59 at B&H were $430/$320. Those are the same prices as they are listed today.

off topic, but kind of funny/odd. Amazon.com STILL has the 513 listed for $800 and the 515 listd for $1450. You would think with the new models out, they would change this.

On topic, Amazon.com has both the EH59 and EH69 listed. Last week, they said that there were only three EH59s left, and that they were sold by Ghandi electronics (appliances?). I was always very hesitant ordering from them because, when navigating their web site, I just got a bad feeling. BUT, if Amazon uses them, they must have a level of acceptable trustworthyness. This week I noticed that Ghandi is no longer listed, but the EH59 and EH69 are BOTH listed as Sold by Bombay Electronics. Both have a statement that there are Only 20 left in stock.

I think that they will still be available around Christmas time. I would contact MICKINCT about your older machine.

If the repairs are THAT extensive, and expensive, I can understand your reluctance to fix it.

What you should do is, instead of waiting for Christmas, you should check daily for a returned EH59 or EH69 at BHPHOTOVIDEO.COM. They show up occasionally, and they are usually at a considerable discount. I have purchased more then one EH59 used from B&H and have had no problem with them, as had jjeff. Their normal price is (today) $330. The last one for sale used was (I think) $240. That would be a $90 savings, so rather than wait, I would wait-and-see.

I was kind of wondering who had purchased the used EH59 that was listed a couple of weeks ago. I guess that mystery is solved.

That -RAM question is a good one. On page 14 of the manual, it clearly indicats that -RAM disks in a cartridge are supported by the E85H, as well as double sidded -RAM disks. All I can think of is that I have had a few -RAM disks that came up in protected mode (read-only) on my EH50 and EH55, but would work on my EH59, and once I reformatted them on the EH59, they would work on all my machines. Maybe that's what you were seeing.

Oddly, like ti-triodes, I have seen this as well. I recommend you do a format on the ones you can with the machine that will allow you to, and see if that "clears" the issue. Surprisingly, it did for me. I had saved quite a stack of "unusuable" -RAM disks, but when I formatted them in a brand new EH59, they suddely worked in all of my machines again.

-RAM disks are just kind of flaky that way. I have never tried, but have heard, that if you format them (for video) in a computer multi-drive, you gain extra space that the Pannasonic DVD recorders won't give you with their formatting, but that they will work with the extra space until the disk is formatted again. I don't know if formatting them this way will make them less finickey.

I wish that there was a more definitive answer, but I'm afraid not. The oddities you are seeing, are the ones I and others have seen.

One other item. At my local Best Buy store, they sometimes have -RAM disks preformatted for computer use rather than video use. these are the same disks that are sold as -RAM for video, except that they are less expensive. They only need to be formatted for video before use. The Panasonic DVD recorder does the formatting just fine.

Richard, do you have a PC with a drive that accepts -RAM disks? If so, try formatting themon the PC and see if the Panasonics can use them after that.

You know, there are times when I am just confused about "things". I was doing some cleanup last weekend, and I realized that to my surprise, I had only one SCART adapter left. Apparently, I THOUGHT I would only need to use one per machine, for the extra input. Well, that isn't necessarily the case. Anyway, I was looking for SCART adapters, and I ran across this! I know, the Amazon prices are not very stable, but right now, that link says the scart to RCA (composite) adapter is $0.01 per unit. Yes, one cent per unit. That just doesn't seem possible! The reviews are pretty entertaining too...

Previously I had purchased these from Lindy, and they have worked very well for me. Looking at the item closely, doesn't look very similar to this one, at about 30% the cost? For a while, these adapters were pretty hard to find, now I can find them all over.