[David Williamson]

I just put a brand new tapehead drum, with the tracking adjusted spot-on, in an HV30 and found that the recording signal to the heads is lower than normal. When this new mechanism is connected to a test rig it records and playsback HDV faultlessly. This particular HV30 must have an amplifier problem. The effect is that it can record and playback HDV or DV fine if the tape used is new and blank or has only ever been recorded on and overwritten in this particular camera, which has the weak signal. If you try to record on a tape which has already been recorded on in another camera, with a higher strength recording signal, then this camera cannot fully overwrite the existing stronger timecode signal and on playback there is a loss of locking on to the trigger signal and the image defaults to blue screen. On fast forward HDV does not attempt to lock on to the trigger signal so you can see the poor quality, speeded-up, image (although with a tape which has already been recorded on in a camera with the stronger signal, then over recorded with the HV30 and is then playedback on this HV30, the timecode/date will often flicker rather than count smoothly). Could it be that you are experiencing the same and the tapes which playedback o.k. were previously only used in your problem camera but the one which won’t playback had been previously recorded on in a different camera?