My video camra keeps destroying my tapes and telling me to press "reset"?
My video camra is having an issue where I put a tape in and it tells me "reset". I hit reset and then it goes back to normal, so I press play and it makes this loud grinding sound. I open it up and my tape is destroyed...so I tried putting in another tape and it did the samething, told me hit "reset" i hit reset pressed play and sure enough it did the same thing. It's not an old camra only about 3 years old I don't think I should be having any kind of an issue with it after just a couple years. Any idea what might be the problem?
Comments
Can be two things.
1 the mechanism needs a good cleaning, When was the last time you had the camera cleaned or used a tape cleaner. Also there was and is to a limited degree problems Mixing different tape brands, the lubricant can react, and really speed up the clogging of the video heads. try a tape cleaner, (if not already done) not more than 10 seconds at a time and for no more than three times. try it again, if that does not help you will need to get the heads, rollers and guides cleaned. you can di it yourself if you are brave, not hard but you have to be careful, or get it done professionally. can be a little expensive, you don't say what camera it is But I will assume it was not cheap.
2 there is actual damage to the mechanism, however caused, you will need to get it looked at.
once you have cleaned the camera do not use the old tapes, unless you want just to get the video off, but then clean the heads each time you use another tape if not you will be back at stage one, with dirty heads. then throw them away and get some new ones (of the same make)
RR
you will need a tape clean , and in particular the rubber roller which drives the tape through the camera , grab some methylated spirits , and an ear bud ,and dab some metho on and wipe on the components , two pins , a rubber roller , and a square with a black centre , wipe on use the other dry and to wipe off , otherwise it does require a head cleaning kit not the dry type , but the wet type head cleaners to get rid of tape lube buildup