I've made my first recording on the four hour speed, and while the picture quality itself is VERY good, there seems to be periods when people's movements are jerky. Almost a strobe light effect, but without the flashing, and it can happen any time, even when people are in broad daylight.

The effect isn't there all the time, but there enough to catch my notice.

Anyone else seeing this? Should I stick with the 2 hour speed? Would an upgrade make it go away?

Is this the only 5005 that's doing this, or should I worry that mine's actually an alien come to take all our ice cream and oreos?

As I posted before I do most of my recording in 4hr mode and have not seen any jitter or strobe like. Maybe try a different media?

I've been poking around using the search feature and the words "jerky movement" and it seems others have found this to be a problem, some suspecting it's a heat problem.

It only started happening after I'd been recording non-stop for about three hours or more.

I intend to get a small fan and hook it into the same power source as a current one I use to keep a VCR cool in the same enclosed cabinet. Nothing internal. Just keep it blowing at the cabinet. I keep the existing one running 24/7 and will do the same with the new one.

It's kept the VCR from ever over-heating when an identical one in another part of the house went bad in a less enclosed cabinet.

We'll see what it does for the Lite On.

In the meantime, tho', if anyone else has anything to add, please feel free! I'll take any help I can get!

The fan on the 5005 blows out the back, if its on a shelf don't push it too far back if there is a back to the cabinet and it sucks the air in from the holes on the bottom under the drive. Is it on a shelf or on top of a TV set? Do you keep the doors closed if any on the cabinet?

Hi:
Quality cables, positive air flow, 2 hour mode, non-aggresive commands to the 5005, has improved the performance of my 5005.

If your problem is heat related and you don't want to open the case, then here are a few other ideas for keeping it cool without opening the unit.

1). If you have the vertical headroom, extend the length of the feet by placing a "twist-off" soda bottle cap ( or something similar - Lego block for instance) under each foot. This will give more room for cool air to be sucked in from the ventilation holes on the bottom.

2). Turn the 5005 off when it is not necessary for it to be on. Leaving in on 24/7 so you can record at any given moment only wastes electricity and generates heat. Obviously if you use the 5005 tuner to watch TV or pass your cable signal through the 5005 to get to the TV, the 5005 must be on when your TV is on.

3). Do not run the 5005 in an enclosed entertainment unit. At least have any doors open when the 5005 is in use.

4). In an enclosed unit you can mount a small exhaust fan to the back of the unit itself. Picture the fans used to exhaust air out the back of PCs. Obviously you would need to find one that meets your voltage requirements. I'm sure Radio Shack has several.

The easiest thing to do that has helped many in this forum is to open the case and rest the case back down on the screws which have been partially driven back into the chassis. This provides significantly greater ventilation, protects the 5005 from something falling in it and allows you easy access to inside the case if you want to add heatsinks or gather information.

Hey Raised Grain, how do you issue
"non-aggresive commands to the 5005" Do you try talking gently to the recorder?

But seriously I think I know what you mean. Some times we all have a tendency to press too many buttons when an operation is taking longer than we think it should. I for one have never had any jitter problems or media problem (always had good success with +R/+RW Ritek from Newegg).

Unwired's tips on air flow are good, but make sure you level the DVD Recorder if you shimmed the bottom feet of the recorder. These drives are not rated to operate in anything over 10 degree out of level and will cause you problems (eg these are not the portable/laptop drives which could be vertically operated).

Hi:
I don't think it should be necessary to to create a mode of operation that will make the 5005 function properly due to the lack of engineering on the part of Lite On but here we are buying a lemon and all we can make is lemonade. I feel for you guys that have all these problems, cabbage face, jitter, audio stuttering, etc.
I found that the Ritek Go4,DVD-R, made in China, is giving me the best results after trying 5 or 6 different manutacturers.

Latest "joy"...

The "jerky" disc made in the four hour mode?

My Apex player won't recognize it.

I don't know if it's because it's in the four hour mode, or because there's some sort of corruption that's both making for the jerky movements and leaving it unrecognized by the Apex.

Oh well...

This is still a step above my Terapin VCD machine. Two hours per disc instead of one, and better quality picture.

Ignore the above.

Just dawned on me that the 4hr disc still has 3 blank on it and so it isn't finalized.

No wonder it wouldn't play.

I'll make a full four hour one and then get back to you with the results later.

(By the way...sorry to be such a pain the last couple days, but the help you've all been giving really is appreciated.)

Yup, has to be finalized. I did the same booboo when I first got mine and said a few nasty words ! MY Apex 1225 and 2600 play everything I throw at 'em.
As mentioned good media + decent cables + no heat + close to level should = good results! By the way does your 5005 have the 3 heat sinks inside?

Made a full four hour recording. (FARSCAPE: The Peacekeeper Wars) on one disc.

Occasionally some signs of the jerky movement. Not as bad as before, but still some.

Grrrr....

Is the general opinion that of the 5005 internal rear fan being unable to cool the unit in normal work environments?

Mine has a small CPU type fan in the rear plate to cool the unit.

I used the three hour speed on the now upgraded 5005 to record the first three hours (off VHS tapes) of the mini-series "The 4400". Then went on to do the next three hours. (Second "year" begins next Sunday on the USA Network.)

About ten minutes before hour three on the second disc was over...

Yep.

The jerkiness started. I could SEE IT while monitoring the recording.

I wasted three hours and a disc I'd already thermal-printed with the show's logo.

I have the fan, it's just not installed on the shelving yet.

WHY did I start the second disc right away? And why keep recording on a machine I know has heat related video problems?

Gonna go back now and do some spot-checks just to make sure the first disc recorded okay.

We should have a permanent thread here about jerky movements and methods to get rid of the problem.

Hmmm....

Is that what this one is?

Hi all,

I have installed a small cpu fan on top of the heatsink in my Liteon 5005s, I have yet to see the jitter problem, but I really havent worked the unit too hard. If interested, the fans are about 1 inch wide, and I spliced it into the back cpu fan, so it runs when the unit is on. I plan on doing some recording later this week, I will let you all know how I do with it.

Maybe give that a try,

Later
PGD44

Any specifics on where you put it, how you spliced it in, etc?

Gastrof:

You can use a "Y" connector found at any Radio Shack or computer store to split the power off of the DVD power source if you cannot easily modify the power acess to the existing fan.

Don't assume that the jerkiness is necessarily heat related. Various potential sources of "jerkiness" have been reported in the forum. But we know for certain, that Liteon added heatsinks to the three major chips after a certain manufacturing date. We also know that many have modified their machines to improve ventilation/cooling. My point here is, you can do all of the right things and still get "jerkiness". It could be "dropped frames" in the data stream, poor media, some minute variation to the laser during the burn, etc, etc, etc.

But, good troubleshooting starts with eliminating the obvious simple problems first. That's why every manual starts out with "If the unit does not turn on, check the power source". This is the same thing. Eliminate heat as a possible cause and then you either solve the problem or move on to the next scenario. I just don't want you to assume that we "know" your problem is heat related.

I don't think the jerkiness is heat related. There have been other posts that this has been witnessed merely playing a signal through the 5005, not even recording, and this after just turning unit on. However have not witnessed that, but have only encountered with cheaper, no name blank media, and soon after a recording started (little time for heat buildup). My gut feeling is something to do with the encoder/decoder that they use, or just the symptom of a bad write to this cheaper media. Then again have had name brand (Philips 8x) show no jitter, but occasionally "freeze" on playback, but ONLY when played back on the Liteon.
Even their current "approved" disc list are pretty obscure brands (for U.S.), and you are lucky if you even see 4x on (at least for R-).
Still use though for cable recording, and generally still consider a good, flexible unit - although for Liteon to really eliminate the "biggies" (jitter, freeze, green patches) - certainly would have been nice. I also think Liteon's attention to the 5005 has faded, and we already have their latest, and last firmware update......

For me, too, the jerkiness is not heat related at all. With the three or four times that jerkiness has appeared on my 5005, it was always solved by simply cycling through the sources. Heck, I've left the machine on for days at a time without getting jerkiness.

Only one time (out of a hundred so far) has jerkiness appeared on a disk and it was quality media (Fuji +RW RICOHJPN).

I'm thinking the jerkiness issue neither related to heat nor media but I think the code/decode idea has merit...

I can agree about the heat related discussion, but I felt it was worth a try. Radio Shack is the best place to buy the necessary materials if you wish to try it. I had some scotchlock connectors, and some copper wire.

I am also doing my vcr recordings through the coax in an attempt to narrow down the problem. I am recording lots of basketball games, so there is lots of motion in my recording. If it is going to get jerky, freeze, jitter, what ever you want to call it, it should do it now.

I have noticed it on 3 and 4 hr speeds, not so much on 2 hr. It happens randomly, early, middle and late of recordings. But, until now, all of my recodings have gone through the rca plugs(mostly front).

Lets see if coax fixed the problem.

PGD44

I got an email from liteon when I complained about the "approved media list for the 5005" and they told me to go here -
http://www.liteonit.com/dc/english/disc_5006.htm

It's the approved media for the 5006 and it list more DVD's

Hate to tell you this...

If you mean you're transferring VHS recordings to DVD by way of RF, you've got a problem.

The average VHS player can't introduce the stereo audio into its channel 3/4 output.

I don't think ANY can.

That means what the LiteOn is getting thru the antenna input is MONO.

MONO audio is what's going onto your DVDs. (Especially if it's the 5005 you're using, since it's tuner IS mono-only.)

Even stereo TVs working with stereo VCRs only get mono thru the antenna feed. To get the stereo audio that the VCR actually DID record, you have to feed the audio thru the TV's RCA inputs.

Have they said on the website (or anywhere else) that the update currently offered for the 5005 is the last one they're doing?

Also, as for the jerkiness, I've found that it usually happens toward the end of a long recording session, but today had it happen in the middle of a one hour show I was copying from an old VHS tape (3 hour speed...as someone's said, I don't think it's ever happened with the 2 hour speed).

As for it being the media, tho', I've actually seen it DURING the recording, as I monitored. Are we seeing on the TV the results of our recording, having been freshly read off the disc as it's being recorded, or are we just seeing what's being OFFERED to the disc?

If the latter, then it's not the media.

It's the machine, and it's having momenetary "spasms". (I've only seen such jerkiness or "strobelike effect" for a minute or two at a time, then all is well.)

This is especially supported by those who say they've seen it happen even when they weren't recording.

Naturally I'm leaning in this direction because of the low-cost brand of disc I'm using, and my not wanting it to be the discs that are the problem.

Does anyone know if other brands of DVD recorders ever show this sympton?

All I am recording is old sporting events, mostly stuff from the 80's and early 90's. I do not care about mono or stereo, it really doesn't matter.

I appreciate the heads up, in case I am recording something important in the future.

FYI, I got no jerky movement, or jitter when going through the coax. I will keep you all posted if I find any.

Thanks,
PGD44

*groan*

Watch it turn out the only way to avoid the problem is to record thru the RF, meaning no stereo!

Mind if I ask what SPEED you're using to record? That seems to be a factor too.