Panasonic DMR-EZ47V: DVD/VCR recorder with ATSC (digitl), QAM(digitl) & Analog Tuners - Page 21

It's good to read of modifications that allow EZ series machines to function better than those that many of us must endure.

I own one 2008 DMR-EZ28 model and four 2007 DMR-EZ17 models. All are in current daily use. The 2007 models are more prone to be problematic than the 2008 model. The 2007 models have the occasional scheduled recording pause/record/freeze-up with counter at 00:00:00. These and other freeze-ups, requiring use of the reset button to regain control, are common to the 2007 and 2008 models.

One difference between the 2007 and 2008 models is the Digital PCB and the chips found on that board. The first photo shows a 2007 EZ17 Digital PCB that has LSI and ATI chips. The second photo shows a 2008 EZ28 Digital PCB that has Magnum and AMD chips.

Panasonic did not use heat sinks on the large chips in 2007 and 2008. There were heat sinks fitted to the largest chip on the Digital PCB in the 2006 models. The third photo shows two Digital PCBs found on DMR-ES35V models from 2006. The fourth photo shows the large Panasonic brand chip on a DMR-ES35V Digital PCB. The fifth photo shows the RAM and some other chips on the underside of a DMR-ES35V Digital PCB.

The Panasonic Service and Technology Company (parts) website is down at the moment so I am unable to locate the retail price of a replacement RFKB79142DP Digital PCB used on the DMR-EZ47V/475V.

Addendum: This morning the PSTC website is functional. The RFKB79142DP DIGITAL PC BOARD for a DMR-EZ47V/475V is priced at $150.28.

I have a rather strange problem on EZ47 - lately it will not start recording during a (roughly) two hour window from 11:30pm till about 1:30am. Don't know when this started (due to not frequently recording at that time slot) but seems to be somewhat recent. It works fine at other times; if a recording is in progress before that window it will stop at about 11:30pm; its like the clock circuit logic is just not working right but seems odd.

Anyone else have a problem like this?

thanks
Terry

Wanted to record last night with my lightly used EZ47. DVD-R in the machine. Started up but then started making noise, falshed a 'U61', and the zero's started scrolling. Called the service desk but could not fix it. Am I screwed?
Disc still in machine; can't get out.

If a recording is in progress and stops suddenly you may have encounted a commercial that has copy protection. Welcome to the digital age as signed into law by Bill Clinton and implemented by the Bush Administration.

If an early a.m. scheduled recording fails to record you may have encountered the EZ series "Midnight Bug." Whenever you schedule an early a.m. recording you should also schedule a brief "dummy" recording to begin just before midnight and end just after midnight, say 11:59 p.m. to 12:01 a.m. ahead of the early a.m. recording. Use the EP speed so you don't use up much disc space for the "dummy" recording. I use the "dummy" recording to bridge midnight ahead of any recordings scheduled to begin before 6:00 a.m. Another EZ series problem occurs with scheduling repeating recordings, say every Tuesday, Monday-Friday, etc. The workaround is to use actual dates for all scheduled recordings.

Masbama,

The U61 error may indicate a problem with the disc, a problem with the DVD drive or a problem with the Digital PCB. The disc must be removed from the DVD Drive before a determination may be made as to the nature of the problem.

See this post for more information concerning the manual release of the disc tray, photos, and be sure to heed the cautions:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...6#post14709306

If you remove the DVD Drive lid in order to remove the disc from the DVD Drive be sure to reposition the roller/slider at the rear of the disc tray to the far left before securing the drive lid. If the DVD Drive lid has been removed be sure to clean the rubber hub atop the drive spindle. Do not extend the disc tray with the DVD Drive lid removed. If the disc is of inferior quality (Memorex or another inferior brand) is soiled, has some defect or failed finalizing, do not reinsert that disc in the drive.

See other posts in the linked thread for some additional advice and/or links to other posts that address related situations, including cleaning the lens and rubber hub.

If you use search to find earlier relevant discussions be sure to set the search date criteria back far enough, say a year, to locate those discussions.

Before trying the options given in Digado's detailed servicing posts, first try ejecting the disc by pressing and holding down the stop button and power button simultaneously on the 47. Disc should eject. Power off for a few minutes then restart. Then see if you still get the U61 error again.

Thanks all!. Will try all suggestions; these are great machines when they work but it seems Panasonic bit off more than it could chew with these.

My Panasonic DMR-EZ475 has just started this strange behavior: the unit will power itself up at random times (no recording scheduled for anytime near the time this happens; nobody near the remote). The front display will show 'Read' as the unit reads the disk. After the disk is read the unit will just sit for a while and will not respond to any buttons on the remote. Then it will power itself off or else I will have to hold in the power button on the front of the unit for ~15 secs til it shuts down. How bizarre is that? Anyone else have this experience?

I have had random power ups with my 2007 DMR-EZ17 models, the disc tray briefly extends and retracts and then the machine powers itself off a minute or two later. I remember saying "What was that all about?" The cat, awakened by the noise, sometimes answered "burrt-meow" which means "The Panny had a little snit."

Panasonic's EZ series machines are "bizarre" in a number of ways.

Well I had to send it in for service. Just got it back. It works very well and a lot quicker. Seems like a different machine. It costs $130.00 but I bought it with a VISA that extended the warranty an extra year and they reimbursed me.

It seems after the DTV transition June 12th, my EZ47K freezes up at the same exact time each day...11:57. I hard reset always works. It records and plays DVDs, Ram-disk and VCR tapes fine. Could this be some auto time signal or something I could turn off. It is connected to a roof top antenna.

Have you examined the clock settings under Other Functions, to see if the Auto Clock setting is on or off?

Functions>Other Functions>Setup
Setup tab>Clock settings

I would personally turn Auto Clock OFF. Even though the EZ-47v has a digital tuner, other DVDRs with a digital tuner(the Philips 3575/6 comes to mind) are only able to get Auto Clock Set from a analog channel, which in your case is no longer available.

Yes, the EZ series recorders are often "bizarre."

Can you imagine that after three years there are still some folks purchasing EZ series combo recorders?

In this and the next two posts there are some photos of a DMR-EZ47 that found a new home yesterday after spending a few weeks on Craig's List:

This March 2007 DMR-EZ47 combo recorder was advertised as having a functional DVD Drive but a non-functional VCR section. The seller had been using this EZ47 as a DVD player with Progressive Scan and HDMI connectivity enabled.

The top cover had scuff marks indicating that this EZ47 had been placed in a stack but it had been removed from the stack before my arrival.

The seller demonstrated this EZ47 with a connection to a large flat panel HDTV by briefly playing a commercial DVD. I brought along a blank TY 8x DVD-R and a recently finalized home-recorded TCM disc that was played satisfactorily for a brief time. DVD Drive operation, to that extent, appeared normal. As the EZ47 was not connected to a signal source I did not attempt to record to the blank DVD.

Later it was found that this EZ47 had been set up for clear QAM and/or line in/out use. A general reset was carried out; setup menus were accessed and reconfigured according to my regular utilization profile. Following minor repair/restoration and servicing procedures this EZ47 has been set aside as a standby recorder.

Upon opening this DMR-EZ47 there was a “what’s this?” moment, a power tap spliced into the DVD Drive wired power feed, but for what purpose? The power tap was removed to restore original wiring integrity.

I found that the VHS mechanism had two issues. First, with non-powered manual operation the videotape visor release finger didn’t always align properly with the cassette visor release. This resulted in a jamb at the cassette’s forward-most point of travel. With powered operation this condition prevented the tape from being drawn out for threading along the tape path and across the rotating drum. Second, following such a jamb the resulting powered eject revealed other alignment and functional irregularities during the eject routine. The upper cross-over brace and the lower cradle assembly were replaced with boxed spare parts (from a DMR-ES35 parts machine). These swapped-in parts are indicated in the first photo. (Later examination of the removed parts revealed no obvious irregularities.) Now, with the swapped-in parts, the cassette visor opens normally followed by normal tape threading, as seen in the second photo. The tape path, including the fixed/rotating heads and pinch-roller, were very clean prior to the cleaning procedure, with very little soiling of the cotton swab, see the third photo.

The DVD Drive was opened for lens, rubber hub and spindle cleaning. There was no dust found on the disc tray. The rubber hub/spindle area appeared in near-new condition. The lens, rubber hub and spindle areas were given the routine cleaning. The cotton swab, seen in the earlier post, had very little soiling. In operation, the DVD Drive is quiet and reads normally. I haven’t yet had an opportunity to test recording and/or finalizing performance.

The rear-mounted cooling fan functions normally.

To supplement the earlier photos, the fourth photo provides a closer view of the power supply, the Digital PCB showing the LSI and ATI chips and the cooling fan; the fifth photo provides a closer view of the power supply and the “tin can” tuner.

I purchased this EZ47 primarily as a standby recorder, an ATSC tuner/recorder or as a source for a VXY1961 DVD Drive for swapping into one of my other 2007 model year EZ models that had a laser assembly failure last fall.

If I remember correctly the original asking price was $55 in the first Craig’s List ad. The asking price was dropped in subsequent ads. The final ad had an asking price of $25. I paid the $25 without bargaining.

Here are more photos from the DMR-EZ47 repair/restoration project.

The first four photos illustrate the problematic VHS mechanism and the original parts that were replaced. In the first photo the pencil points to the VHS mechanism lower cradle finger that is supposed to release the VHS cassette visor lock. In the second photo the pencil points to the VHS cassette visor unlocking button. The third photo shows the actual point of the VHS mechanism jamb due to the locked VHS cassette tape visor. The fourth photo shows the VHS mechanism original upper brace and lower cradle that were removed and replaced with spares from a DMR-ES35V parts machine.

The fifth photo depicts the What's this? discovery of a power tap spliced into the DVD Drive power cable. That power tap was removed.

Not trying to "bump" this thread but would really like to know if this DVD player can play region codes other than region code 1. Some other DVD players have a remote key combo that will turn off the region code checking or tells the unit to treat the DVD as region code 0. I want to be able to get some German DVD's but no point if I won't be able to play them. Thanks for any help... Pat

You could follow these few posts by dave, it's for a EZ-27 but other than the VHS it should be very similar to your EZ-47v.

Thanks for the link to the other thread. It looks a bit more complicated than anticipated and would require purchasing the appropriate type of remote. Now I just have to figure out how to get the German DVD's...

Unless they are major commercial movies they just may be region 0. I would think a bigger problem than the region would be the fact that they may be PAL format.
If I were you I'd just get a region free DVD player that can play a PAL disc and output as NTSC. I've seen them not much over $50 at places like World Import and other grey market dealers. A international Panasonic DVDR should be able to play any region but won't convert to NTSC if that's the only type of TV you have. Most if not all Vizios and other smaller brand TVs will play PAL but flat screen TVs like Sony or Panasonic will only play NTSC.
Germany and most of Europe would use PAL.

After four years of good service my DVD tray won't eject. Any fixes to suggest?

First of all try this thread's 7 April 2009 tip from Westly-C:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...1#post16217671

Has there been any disturbance to DVD Drive ribbon cables or the ribbon cable from the DVD Drive to the Digital PCB? If so, a ribbon cable might be misaligned in it's connector or a ribbon cable connector might have drifted forward upon removal of a ribbon cable damaging the ribbon cable contact strip. In that case it might be necessary to drift the connector's wayward contact back into place and trim back the leading edge of the ribbon cable contact strip to provide uniform connectivity. These matters are described and illlustrated in this post:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...0#post17050430

When you press the front panel OPEN/CLOSE button is there a click or is there no sound at all? The click is normal. If there is no click heard the front panel circuit board mini-switch behind that button has most likely failed and needs replacement. These matters are described and illustrated in this post:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...5#post16541995

The black mini-switches on the front side of the front panel circuit board are seen in the last photo attached to that linked post.

Do the other front panel buttons function normally? If not there might have been a traumatic event, say using the EZ47 as a step-stool causing the chassis to bow resulting in misalignment of the contacts between front panel circuit boards and chassis motherboards. The first photo is a view of a DMR-EZ47 front panel right side printed circuit board as seen from the rear. The front panel printed circuit board to chassis motherboard connecter is black and is partly visible to the front far right in the open area of the DVD Drive platform. The second photo is a closer view of the front panel right side printed circuit board in a DMR-ES35. In that photo the chassis motherboard connector is white and is located along the left lower edge of the printed circuit board and the OPEN/CLOSE mini-switch soldered pins are seen at the upper right, see S7707. Use a straight edge to find any bowing across the front of the chassis or from front to back or from diagonal corners across the chassis. If the chassis is bowed remove the case top cover and the front panel, gently straighten the chassis, recheck with the straight edge, refit the front panel (taking care to hold the VHS door open in order to properly align the VHS door opening mechanism--see the third photo) and refit the case top cover.

YES, the circuit board under the dvd drive is faulty. replace it and your good to go. these models have been known to do this after a while. trust me i fixed these many times.

The attached photo shows the DVD Drive on-board controller circuit board. Notice that the locking type connector for the ribbon cable that's being handled is in the locked position:

is there a guide on opening the case for this model? a dvd is stuck in this machine (that was written to but not finished from another source) and now i cant get it out. i dont hear a click when pushing eject, it states no disc on the display. ive tried stop and power, stop and up button simultaneously w/o luck. hope someone still watches as ive had this over 4yrs.

Disconnect the power cord at the rear of the recorder. Remove the two screws on both sides of the case and the three screws at the lower left, right and top center at the rear of the case. Then remove the top of the case. That will give you access to the DVD Drive.

Use a small, flat-bladed screwdriver inserted into the manual release access hole, see the first photo. Press the screwdriver straight in but only until coming to the stop. CAUTION: Pressing beyond the stop will damage the mechanism rendering the DVD Drive useless. The disc tray will open slightly. Open the front panel door. Use a large paper clip or similar hooked device, see the second photo, and slide the disc tray out far enough to remove the disc. Then drift the disc tray back into the DVD Drive.

Refit the top of the case and reconnect the power cable.



Edited by DigaDo - 12/11/12 at 10:52pm

awesome, i cant wait to try this. thanks.

i was able to get the case off but am wondering do i need to also take off front panel to get to the manual release access hole? im trying to get a phone up but it is failing...omg. if so, how is this done safely because i was reading before and it was stated when putting front panel it must line up exactly to the buttons in order to remain working properly. i dont think that will be a problem but dont want to mess it up anymore..lol. your 2008 post about possible locations is down. guess ill try this later.
Edited by dz2k - 12/12/12 at 7:07am

Don't remove the front panel. The manual release hole is on the side of the DVD Drive as seen in the first photo in my post. The front panel is at the left in that photo of a 2006 DMR-ES35 (that has a grey case).