Blu ray recorder

bridster007

TMull


I notice some problems recording sound on Freeview are being reported in UK.
May help to push the Saorview sound problem towards resolution. See post # 322 from Avforums below.
Is the sound reliable now on the HDD ? - if so I presume I could copy recordings via scart to my other DVD recorder for archiving if needed. Does it allow that for both SD and HD recordings ?

http://www.avforums.com/forums/blu-ray-dvd-recorders-media/1627259-panasonic-dmr-bwt720eb-twin-hd-bluray-recorder-1tb-master-thread-12.html

tmull

Bridster 007, Thank you for your input. I am a member of that forum but have not been active there for some time. I shall study their posts and report further here. I hope to speak to the store people later this morning and see if they have any news back. The UK problems will bring this problem to a head surely. I am going out now so shall bring ye all up to date later this evening.TMULL

tmull

Spoke to the Panasonic store people this morning but sadly no news yet. One certain individual is the contact with the factory engineers and he keeps in touch with the store. My own 720 still has problems in that about one in five recordings is affected whit the No Sound problem.I have recorded a few late night films just for test purposes and most have sound when I test them but the occasional one for some reason does not. One particular film from one of the RTE channels that I wanted to see is silent.I can record from the same channel on different nights and end up with one of them affected. Had I recorded that film from my Saorview HD sat receiver through the av ports of the 720 I would not have the problem.It is a good box but not fit for purpose.
That thread you posted is interesting and seem to be pointing to a diffrent sound problem to mine. I might stick a few posts on there and see what responce comes from it. If I get any worthwile information I shall post it here. No point in coming on here without an update.TMULL

tmull

It is so long since I posted on that other forum that I had forgotten my login details. I have re-registered today and posted my problems there. Advice received is to wait it out and it will proberly eventually fixed.TMULL

tmull

Today I was asked by the Panasonic store to return the 720 to them for testing.Also an offer of refund or new box.Box has been posted so I will let ye know how I get on. TMULL

bridster007

Thinking the OP problems were specific to the blu ray recorder version only, I bought the related model DMR-PWT420 over the w/e and found the same problems with sound on Saorview reordings. All Freeview recordings perfect. Have returned it to the store.

The problem relates to sound playback, not recording. All recordings played fine with sound on my PC when connected over the network. They just won't play with sound on the unit.
The problems only arose when I updated to v1.04 firmware (have to do this to use the internet function).
I could get no sound onany TV3 or TG4 recordings and about 50% on RTE recordings. There semed to be no problem with RTE HD recordings though. Strangely, the sound for all stations inc TV3 was present via the live pause function when rewinded. I reckon it is a simple problem to fix so will wait to buy again if Panasonic release a fix. I emailed them today.

Otherwise its a fantastic machine. Saorview and Freeview on one EPG, can record from both at same time. Channels can be sorted to put Saorview at the top. Can copy the recordings onto PC using XBMC. It is both a DLNA server and client. Nice clean interface. Netflix/Youtube/Dailymotion and various other apps available. Timeslip function also.

One niggle is that the network/internet services cannot be used when recording. Also did not carry the detail program information for Saorview. It populates the EPG ok, just does not have the 3 or 4 lines of detail info behind it. This is strange as even my non-approved Panasonic TV from 2010 carries this. Digital teletext is working fine. Also cannot select recording quality like other machines. Everything is in DR Mode which makes files very big and reduces recording limits.

tmull

Iam still waiting for news back from the Panasonic store. The 720 also does not give the extra information on the epg but I imagine a software upgrade should sort it out .But with so few channals on the Saorview package it is not a big deal.I am surprised that you cannot alter the recording from DR.Have you a conversion option on that machine?All these machines have very good reviews on Brian Lees review page of the Amason website. There is also a very good section on all these machines ,under the heading Blu-ray Recorders on the avforums forum. Hope this is helpful.TMULL

bridster007

tmull wrote: »

Iam still waiting for news back from the Panasonic store. The 720 also does not give the extra information on the epg but I imagine a software upgrade should sort it out .But with so few channals on the Saorview package it is not a big deal.I am surprised that you cannot alter the recording from DR.Have you a conversion option on that machine?All these machines have very good reviews on Brian Lees review page of the Amason website. There is also a very good section on all these machines ,under the heading Blu-ray Recorders on the avforums forum. Hope this is helpful.TMULL

No converion option unfortunately. Only DR. Conversion option exists on the 720 to facilitate reducing size for DVD recording. Would need the 1 TB version then because even though I can archive recordings to my NAS, I cannot play them back again on the recorder. It doesn't see them. Only another DIGA unit can see them as a client.They would need to be converted on the pc to some other format. May consider the 720 if the sound is fixed up.

There is no doubt that this range is the rolls royce of recorders, just need to get the Saorview issue sorted.

bridster007

Spoke to Panasonic support today.
They said they won't be investigating or fixing any issues relating to Saorview as it's not certified for Saorview..
He said however, that they will release a Panasonic Saorview approved recorder in Mid 2013.

tmull

They are trying to wash their hands of the problems with the 720.But why did they release it on the Irish market in July.It is incapable of receiving the Irish analogue channels so if it is not capable of recording the Irish digital channels what was the point of releasing it in Ireland? I got a call on Wednesday evening from the Panasonic store stating that my box was being tested later that evening and a decision on weather to give me a replacement 720 or possible refund would be made on Thursday. hearing nothing I rang later this afternoon to be told that the person who tested was out of the store and her report was not yet submitted.They also think that the problem may be only on my box as they are not getting any other feedback on it.So I await with abated breath the outcome of this long running saga.I shall post here with the outcome.TMULL

bridster007

tmull wrote: »

They are trying to wash their hands of the problems with the 720.But why did they release it on the Irish market in July.It is incapable of receiving the Irish analogue channels so if it is not capable of recording the Irish digital channels what was the point of releasing it in Ireland? I got a call on Wednesday evening from the Panasonic store stating that my box was being tested later that evening and a decision on weather to give me a replacement 720 or possible refund would be made on Thursday. hearing nothing I rang later this afternoon to be told that the person who tested was out of the store and her report was not yet submitted.They also think that the problem may be only on my box as they are not getting any other feedback on it.So I await with abated breath the outcome of this long running saga.I shall post here with the outcome.TMULL

The 720 has other uses on the Irish market as it has a scart input so people use it for sky archiving. Peats in Dublin sell it but only for this function and not Saorview. The 420 model I had, had no scart input so no excuse like that. Currys returned it for me no problem but when buying I got them to write on receipt that I could return if there was a problem with Saorview. Had assumed you got your money back though. That's a poor show.

tmull

No news yet.If you read my earlier posts here you will see that I consider the Saorview issue a miner problem. As I had done a fair bit of research into both dvd and bluray recorders before I purchased I knew what I wanted. One of my main requirements was external inputs into the recorder. That ruled out almost all other recorders except the Panasonic range.Samsung does not have scart or component inputs into their recorders as they have given in to the pressure coming from American media companys who do not want anyone to be able to record their programmes to keep and to copy.As I have two HD satellite boxes hooked up to my two bluray recorders I intend to keep the 720 alongside my 750. If I need to record a Saorview programme I can do so from my Tecnomate 6900 which has a digital HD tuner that decodes the Saorview package.If you could live without the Saorview package I would recommend one of the Panasonic freesat recorders whilst you can still get one.Panasonic are or have ceased production of freesat boxes.TMULL

tmull

What appeares to be good news received from the store.An employee who owns a 720 has tested my box and changed the settings to the ones in her box.Did a lot of recording and believes she has cured the problem.Being sent out to me today so I should have it back on Wednesday.Will test it again and keep ye updated here.TMULL

bridster007

tmull wrote: »

What appeares to be good news received from the store.An employee who owns a 720 has tested my box and changed the settings to the ones in her box.Did a lot of recording and believes she has cured the problem.Being sent out to me today so I should have it back on Wednesday.Will test it again and keep ye updated here.TMULL

Interesting.
Came across this query from someone who has same problem as yourself.
http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?t=173203

Looking forward to an update as to the settings needed, as I said earlier, the sound was being recorded on all HDD recordings, just not played back.

ambulator

Hi guys. I’m glad I found this forum. I’m the person who was redirected from Askaboutmoney. I am fairly certain that I bought my DMR-BWT720 two weeks ago from the same shop as tmull. I sent it back there this morning presumably for the same fix they did / tried on tmull’s machine.

My problems (all relate to the hard drive. I haven’t even put a blue ray disk or DVD into it yet):

Perfect video recordings from Saorview channels sometimes with sound, sometimes without. Completely random – no discernable pattern - not confined to any particular station.

It gets more bizarre. When I leave on standby overnight and retry to playback the following night, some recordings that did not have sound now have them and vice versa. The following night again, some of the recordings that had “found” their audio content have now lost them again and sometimes vice versa.

I recorded a documentary on TG4 one night as I had work to do. I played back about half of it that same night with sound before going to bed. The following night I tried to watch the 2nd half. You guessed it –picture but no sound.

Another bizarre event. I recorded a programme from RTE2 for my wife. When she played it back it had picture and sound and also the following audio message that was repeated over and over again to the finish “This is the audio description broadcaster mix on embedded audio tracks 5 and 6 on RTE”. Can anybody make sense of that?

The machine records flawlessly from my freesat set top box.

I am most disappointed with the machine. I only bought it as it was going to save me buying a Saorview box. I have a brilliant Pioneer HDD & DVD recorder that has served me well since I’d say about 2003. It is simplicity itself to use, very intuitive and user friendly and has never let me down. Unfortunately it wont record digital TV – hence the Panasonic.

I am also unimpressed with the DMR-BWT720 user manual. I am not a technophile but by no means a technophobe. The manual allows me to access all the settings but it would be nice if it explained what many of the settings are for. It’s a bit like being given a one page manual to operate the large Hadron Collider.

I will inform Panasonic tomorrow that I only want my machine back if it is recording flawlessly on HDD, Blue Ray and DVD. Either that or my money back.

tmull

Ambulater,Welcome to the forum.I am expecting my 720 back today and will be the most surprised man in Ireland if a setting change has finally cured the problem.Panasonic has made a bo-bo with this machine and rather than interact with the customers it is now hiding behind the statement that the box is designed for the UK market only.Then why did they release it on the Irish market.In truth,proberly to take Paddy for a ride.There is really no comparable box out there at the moment so problem fixed or not I intend to keep my box. I shall test as much as I can and report here.Now nearly two months after buying the box I firmly believe that Panasonic have no intention on helping us.Can I ask what part of the country you are from?I am in Cobh.Co. Cork. TMULL

bridster007

“This is the audio description broadcaster mix on embedded audio tracks 5 and 6 on RTE”. Can anybody make sense of that?

This may be what is causing the whole sound problem.
See below thread about audio description and Saorview. Maybe it is now turned on RTENL. Possibly some programs have it and others not ?

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=75875856

Inadvertantly hitting the AD button on the remote either during recording or playback may be the issue.
Also a lot of discussion in this thread about AD recording problems on similar Panasonic machines.
http://www.avforums.com/forums/blu-ray-dvd-recorders-media/1566067-panasonic-dmr-bs850-audio-commentary-aka-audio-description.html

ambulator

tmull wrote: »

There is really no comparable box out there at the moment so problem fixed or not I intend to keep my box. --Can I ask what part of the country you are from?I am in Cobh.Co. Cork. TMULL

Hi TMULL. I live in Galway and I too will be most surprised if a simple settings tweak will solve the problem.

I think ability to record Saorview is more important to me than it is to you as my Pioneer will handle the satellite broadcasts. If they can't fix it, it is no use to me.

Fearing the worst and looking ahead, do you know of any Saorview box that can record to a hard drive (internal or external) or even a USB memory stick? Do you know of any Saorview box with twin tuners?

tmull

This AD thing has me pusseled. I though i had tried every combination of settings in the 720 before I returned it to the store. But now it may not be a box fault at all but a broadcast problem. Possibly we will all wake upon the 25th Oct and all will be well.As far as i know there is no Saorview box with twin tuners. You could look what is available on the UK market at ntwin tuner Freeview+ boxes that should decode Saorview and record another channel at the same time.But maybe record to hardddrive only. Sorry i cannot be of more help.TMULL

bridster007

tmull wrote: »

This AD thing has me pusseled. I though i had tried every combination of settings in the 720 before I returned it to the store. But now it may not be a box fault at all but a broadcast problem. Possibly we will all wake upon the 25th Oct and all will be well.As far as i know there is no Saorview box with twin tuners. You could look what is available on the UK market at ntwin tuner Freeview+ boxes that should decode Saorview and record another channel at the same time.But maybe record to hardddrive only. Sorry i cannot be of more help.TMULL

Having done more research I'm convinced it is the AD problem. This thread referring to Panasonic TVs replicates what I found on recorded clips especially TV3 and TG4. Hence no sound.
A long thread but worth reading.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056079528

Strange that the recorder has no problem with sound when viewing the TV broadcast, only issues when playing back the recording. Wish I had seen this before returning the machine to play around with the AD settings.

As an aside, I think its unbelievable that the PanasonicStore were still selling this machine 2 weeks ago when they themselves had replicated and knew of the problem.

tmull

Boy,there is some very interesting reading in that tread.I see the last post was back in March.As it is so quiet now I wonder if the problems were sorted out?A few things are very obvious throughout that tread.One is the very unhelpful attitude of Panasonic and the other is that every retailer in the country selling Panasonic tvs must have a fair few irate customers as a result of said problems.Back now to the main issue of this tread. received my box back and had it set-up again at 1530hrs.Have set about six timer programmes up to 2200hrs on about four of the Saorview channels.Will check in the morning and hopefully everything will workout.One positive out of all this is the great customer service I have received from the store.Have had no problem on phone calls or emails etc. I would recommend them to any members here.TMULL

tmull

Have made seventeen recordings in the past 24 hours. Every one perfect.Whatever that girl did seems to have cured the problem.I hope to speak to her later this evening.If every thing stays as they are I see no point in posting here again.But if all is not right ye shall be hearing from me.TMULL

bridster007

tmull wrote: »

Have made seventeen recordings in the past 24 hours. Every one perfect.Whatever that girl did seems to have cured the problem.I hope to speak to her later this evening.If every thing stays as they are I see no point in posting here again.But if all is not right ye shall be hearing from me.TMULL

Thanks for update. Could you ask for and post the required settings here ?
Do the recordings you had on the unit when you returned it to them now have sound also or were they deleted ?

tmull

I though just after closing my last post that posting the settings would be a good idea.I spoke to Jean the girl who seems to have sorted out the problem and apart from playing around with the settings she dosent quite know what she did.Now I spent days playing around with the same settings and though I had tried every combination of same.I am busy babysitting grandchildren this evening and pretty busy tomorrow,but when I get the chance I shall go into the menu and write them down and post them here.
It strikes me that after reading all the sound problems on the Panasonic tvs if this has not been a broadcast problem all along and now getting close to analogue switch off if someone at the broadcasting end decided to switch all the switches instead of some of them. But saying that,it is verly early days on my test of the 720.TMULL

ambulator

Great to hear the good news, tmull. I’m looking forward to receiving my unit back tomorrow and keeping my fingers crossed. I spoke to Jean today and she says she has it 100% fixed. I asked her to write down the settings and send them with the unit just in case I ever do something stupid or get some automatic software update and lose the settings. She said she will do. Whatever I get, I will post on here.

BTW. My software / firmware version is 1.05. I presume yours is the same.

Happy viewing and recording.

tmull

First some answers to a few questions posed here. My firmware is the same as yours.No, my harddrive was not formatted by the store even though I had giving permission to do so if needed. All my original recordings were still there when I got it back but I eliminated most of them once I got it back.As I was away most of yesterday I set 15 timer recordings on a different range of the Saorview package.Checked this morning and all 15 have perfect sound and picture.What I have noticed is that all 32 recordings that I have made are all still in the DR mode.I thought then that the conversion was after been switched of in the store but no.It is still set to convert files in the stand-by mode.The machine was in stand-by all night but no conversion took place. I can live with that.
The settings are a long-winded affair but I feel may be helpful to record here that proberly will be useful to members and possibly retrievable in the future if needs be
Just found out the settings will not fit on this page so I shall follow this post with another one just for them.TMULL

tmull

These are the settings in the Sound and Audio menu of the Panasonic DMR 720 Blu-ray recorder that appears to have fixed the problem of no sound on the harddrive of recordings on some but not all,on the Saorview package.
There are six main settings under the heading SOUND
There are six sub settings under the heading DIGITAL AUDIO OUTPUT

SOUND
1 Dynamic Range Compression

---

Automatic
2 Downmix

---

Stereo
3 Bilingual Audio Selection

---

M1
4 Digital Audio Output
5 Audio Delay

---

0 MSEC
6 Audio for HG/HX/HE/HL/HM Recording

---

5.1 Channel

Note that No. 4 appears blank,but on highlighting the line the sub menu opens up.
1 PMC Down Conversion OFF 2 DolbyD-D+1-HD PMC 3 DTS/DTS-HD PCM 4 MPEG PCM 5 HE_ACC PCM 6 BD-Vidio secondry Audio OFF.
to summerise the sub menu Nos1 & 6 are OFF Nos.2,3,4,5 are PCM

Hope this is helpful to someone. TMULL

ambulator

Many thanks for posting the settings, Tmull. I got none from Jean (I know she is extremely busy and travelling away today). Your settings will be a useful reference to have for the future,

First, I would like to record here a big vote of thanks to Jean for all the time and effort she put in in solving (or trying to solve in my case) this problem.

I got my machine back this morning. Connected up – no signal- utter frustration. Spent ages tracing the fault, unplugged RF feed and sent it direct to TV and had a signal, so nothing wrong with aerial. Finally the only option left was to retune the unit. This is called setup in manual. I was afraid to do this as I feared that all would default back to factory settings and I would lose Jeans settings. Rang shop. Jean away for all next week. After many calls to shop we decided the only option was to run setup again. I did this and made a few recordings. Alas picture and no sound. I was getting more and more into an “I want my money back” frame of mind as I was back in the same position as before I sent the unit back to them.

I turned AD off and bingo everything worked perfectly after that. I made 12 recordings from various Saorview channels to the hard drive and all worked perfectly. I wish I had known about the AD thing before I returned the machine as it would have saved me €15 on a courier charge.

Maybe it was that simple all along. I didn’t even go into settings but reading tmull’s post above; the settings look very similar to those on mine before I returned it.

All’s well that ends well after a very frustrating morning.

tmull

Ambulator,One question please.How do you turn AD either on or off? I also had no signal on receiving the box back.Straight away I realised for the shop to receive the Saorview package to test the machine she would have had to retune it to get the package in Limerick..So I just went into set-up and retuned to my signal and was up and running again.I bought my machine in mid July and three months later after Panasonic and the factory engineers couldent fix the problem a girl in a shop in Limerick comes up with a solution.Them engineers you wouldent get in a Lucky Bag.I seriously dought if anyone really had a look at the problem.Pity the manual is so poor.The manual for my 750 is not much better,but I am very happy with both machines. Good luck with yours.TMULL

bridster007

ambulator wrote: »

Many thanks for posting the settings, Tmull. I got none from Jean (I know she is extremely busy and travelling away today). Your settings will be a useful reference to have for the future,

First, I would like to record here a big vote of thanks to Jean for all the time and effort she put in in solving (or trying to solve in my case) this problem.

I got my machine back this morning. Connected up – no signal- utter frustration. Spent ages tracing the fault, unplugged RF feed and sent it direct to TV and had a signal, so nothing wrong with aerial. Finally the only option left was to retune the unit. This is called setup in manual. I was afraid to do this as I feared that all would default back to factory settings and I would lose Jeans settings. Rang shop. Jean away for all next week. After many calls to shop we decided the only option was to run setup again. I did this and made a few recordings. Alas picture and no sound. I was getting more and more into an “I want my money back” frame of mind as I was back in the same position as before I sent the unit back to them.

I turned AD off and bingo everything worked perfectly after that. I made 12 recordings from various Saorview channels to the hard drive and all worked perfectly. I wish I had known about the AD thing before I returned the machine as it would have saved me €15 on a courier charge.

Maybe it was that simple all along. I didn’t even go into settings but reading tmull’s post above; the settings look very similar to those on mine before I returned it.

All’s well that ends well after a very frustrating morning.

Do you mean turn AD off before recording or before playing a recording ?
If you have time could you check if Irish language recordings on TG4 are ok ?