I am posting this for a PDW-700 user who is having problems logging in. It appears that a disc will not eject, and after trying to remove it through the manual process the camera has now failed. 0ther details are the error message -20-218. Has anyone with XDCAM experienced this?

Regards: Stu
www.studioscotland.com

Got to be REALLY careful with that manual ejection. It has caused a fair few issues in the past. Might need a phonecall to Silver Support.

Hi Steve,

Error 20-218 means: An abnormal current of the loading motor is detected during vertical move of loading.

This is something for Silver Support like Simon already said.

I have been told there is no Silver Support for the PDW-700

Regards: Stu
www.studioscotland.com

Hard to believe that this isn't included with the PDW-700.

Sony : PS.HDXDCAM.12X.1 (PS.HDXDCAM.12X.1) : Product Overview : United Kingdom (http://www.sony.co.uk/biz/view/ShowProduct.action?product=PS.HDXDCAM.12X.1&site=biz_en_GB&pageType=Overview&imageType=Main&category=BCWarrantySupport)

Yes Ivan, I was not that chuffed when I was told this by our dealer. I have contacted Sony direct to see what they say. Our camera has been working hard nearly every day since we got it, and while we have not had any problems it would be nice to know we do have Silver Support for peace of mind. I have been told we can buy insurance cover, but I will wait to see what Sony says.

Regards: Stu
www.studioscotland.com

We have had issues with this. Beware of camera covers, or anything else blocking the drive cover as the disk ejects. when this happened on a recent shoot, I pulled out the disk, shut the drive cover, powered down the camera and removed the batter. Cold Boot. Turned the camera on, hit the eject button and the disk inserted as normal. Everything was fine.

Then I just had to restart my heart.

Jon

Yes, no silver support on the PDW700, stops on the PDW3xx range.

I had a disc that wouldnt eject regardless of what I did.

The unit has worked flawlesly over the last 11 months, this problem happened 2 weeks after coming back from Sony for a firmware update. Possibly related to movement in transit by courier handling?? or stripping and rebuilding the unit to fit the new circuit board on motherboard related to firmware update?? Could just be coincidence...

Unit went back to dealer for repair, the entire loader was changed. This is the part LOADER (P100) ASSY (RP), Sony A1256958C at PartStore.com (http://www.partstore.com/Part/Sony/Sony/A1256958C.aspx) At $600 a time plus Engineer time - not good now the 12 month warranty is up.

The dealer confirmed they have had 5 x PDW700s back with this same problem (and thats just one UK dealer out of many). Another PDW700 user I spoke to had exactly the same experience as me, within a couple of weeks of getting his camera back from the firmware update, he had a disc jam requiring to go back for a new loader to be fitted.

My dealer has highlighted concerns to Sony UK and the faulty loader is being sent back to Japan for investigation.

Given the facts of the above, the probability of disc jam again in the future is worryingly high!! Part of the reason we invest in this grade or equipment and xdcam is for the realiability and low maintenance costs...

I experienced a similar problem when an audio cable was lying over the disk door. I also powered down, restarted the camera, the disk then came out normally and the camera functioned as per usual thereafter. It felt very uncomfortable though...

Peter