Time to buy a new VCR!
Posted November 28th, 2007 at 01:45 AM by mwong92683
Updated December 14th, 2007 at 06:42 PM by mwong92683 (Added Category)
Updated December 14th, 2007 at 06:42 PM by mwong92683 (Added Category)
OK, get over it, my VCRs are about 10 years old (I mean who buys these things nowadays???) and its about time for one of them to die, so I sit at my computer to do some shopping (where I do almost all of my shopping, hahahhahaha) and I found the perfect replacement. VCR/DVD with 2 way dubbing. Now I can record from a video tape and end up with a DVD, or the other way around (???). I have a DVD recorder on my computer, and I can make copies, but not from a video tape (although my Dad now has that capability, I can't just bring over 100 video discs and ask him to convert them can I???). So, now I can actually replace my entire collection of video tapes with newer DVDs (all in good time of course - this certainly won't be happening overnight)! BUT, VERY COOL!!!
So I made my selection, bought it, and then went to pick it up (why pay for shipping when Circuit City is only a mile away??), brought it home, and started to set it up.
Now I thought I had the perfect situation - 2 VCR's already set up to record off both the TV, and each other, so I figured that I'd be clever, and just put the wires in the new one where the wires on the old one were, and VOILA 5 minutes later be playing with my new toy (sometimes I surprise myself with how naive I can be).
Well, things rarely go as planned (go figure!). Particularly when it comes to computers and electrical devices! Plug 'n Play at my house, is typically Plug and "Swear a Lot" for a couple of hours (or days), and then eventually, get to the damn thing to Play. I don't know why, but there is always that huge gap between the Plug and the Play part, so try as I might it never works the very first time, although, I do always tend to get there, its rarely a straight line!
So I set up the new one on top of the old one, and here I go. Fantastic plan in mind. Remove the old wire from old unit, plug into corresponding place on new unit. What can possibly go wrong with a fail-proof plan like this??? Here we go, red to red, white to white, yellow to yellow - so far so good. I'm actually humming along - having a good time, convincing myself how clever I am. This is going to be an easy 5 minute job! WAY too much patting myself on the back at this point! I'm surprised my shoulder is still in its socket!
OK, what's this? I look, then look again - uh oh, there is one less coax input on the new device than on the old device. This is where that sinking feeling in the pit of the stomach comes in. Here we go again! And it was doing so well up to this point!
ARRRRRH!!! How can this be??? Check again - yup, 2 on the old one, ONLY ONE on the new one. NOW, the perfect circuit that I had created, had to be tampered with and reconfigured. I can feel the sweat starting to form on my forehead.
So I made my selection, bought it, and then went to pick it up (why pay for shipping when Circuit City is only a mile away??), brought it home, and started to set it up.
Now I thought I had the perfect situation - 2 VCR's already set up to record off both the TV, and each other, so I figured that I'd be clever, and just put the wires in the new one where the wires on the old one were, and VOILA 5 minutes later be playing with my new toy (sometimes I surprise myself with how naive I can be).
Well, things rarely go as planned (go figure!). Particularly when it comes to computers and electrical devices! Plug 'n Play at my house, is typically Plug and "Swear a Lot" for a couple of hours (or days), and then eventually, get to the damn thing to Play. I don't know why, but there is always that huge gap between the Plug and the Play part, so try as I might it never works the very first time, although, I do always tend to get there, its rarely a straight line!
So I set up the new one on top of the old one, and here I go. Fantastic plan in mind. Remove the old wire from old unit, plug into corresponding place on new unit. What can possibly go wrong with a fail-proof plan like this??? Here we go, red to red, white to white, yellow to yellow - so far so good. I'm actually humming along - having a good time, convincing myself how clever I am. This is going to be an easy 5 minute job! WAY too much patting myself on the back at this point! I'm surprised my shoulder is still in its socket!
OK, what's this? I look, then look again - uh oh, there is one less coax input on the new device than on the old device. This is where that sinking feeling in the pit of the stomach comes in. Here we go again! And it was doing so well up to this point!
ARRRRRH!!! How can this be??? Check again - yup, 2 on the old one, ONLY ONE on the new one. NOW, the perfect circuit that I had created, had to be tampered with and reconfigured. I can feel the sweat starting to form on my forehead.
Total Comments 2
Comments
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oooooohhhhh don't you just HATE that????
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Posted December 3rd, 2007 at 07:55 PM by Shiisa
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New VCR/DVDYes, i've been down the same road. I assumed you'd just pop a tape in and it'd be childs play to record to the shiny kind of discs you get in the shops called CD's. Childs play, yes, but not for an old fart like me. I didn't know that there are several types of shiny disks. I assumed the world had learned after Beta/VHS etc. but No, we still like to confuse our consumers. After reading the manual and finding that the model I had bought was the ONLY one in the range (why do you need a range of Tape to DVD recorders? - surely one good one would be enough?) which only accepts one type of disk DVD-R. Well I went out and bought a pack of those and tried it, however the "Easy Record" button doesn't sem to work except on days with a T in them, however I finally managed to record one of my old favorites and happily played it back from the new disk before taking it home to show my wife (I do all this in the office where I keep my best toys and pretend to the trouble-and-strife that i'm working all day). Popped the disk into our player at home and...Ta Da....snow. Grrrrr.
Back to that telephone directory called the manual and after half an hour I find you need to close the disk after recording it. This is neat. I don't remember having to close a reel to reel tape, a casette tape or a video tape after recording. You just stopped, rewound (I don't miss that bit) and played it back. Anyway I followed the complex procedure, including all those "are you sure...?" messages...Grrr, gritted teeth...and now it all works fine. So my 230 euro machine now will reluctantly backup any un-protected favourite tape from my massive stock and record it, with added noise and snow onto a particular type of disc, often changing randomly from LP to SP. Ain't technology wunnerful? |
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Posted February 28th, 2008 at 08:07 PM by Maxinspain
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Recent Blog Entries by mwong92683
- Homemade Chocolate - To DIE for!! (December 20th, 2007)
- Update on the new DVD recorder (December 11th, 2007)
- All's Well that Ends Well (November 28th, 2007)
- And the Snowball starts rolling - - - (November 28th, 2007)
- Time to buy a new VCR! (November 28th, 2007)
