I am updating my experiences with a drop out issue I have had with my JVC GY HD101.
After many visits to the local JVC service company we are not much further down the track of solving the problem. Briefly it occurs only in HD720 25P/24P mode not in HD SD or DV modes.The engineer has aligned the tape path correctly and the heads have been cleaned and are only a few months old (the whole of the tape path mechanism was replaced last year which included heads, head drums rollers and guides.)It occurs regardless of which high grade tape is used (NEW JVC, Panasonic or Sony). Considering all of the above the engineer believes that the problem is electronic rather than mechanical.

After further testing, having taken the camera back (since I had some jobs which I only needed to shoot in DV mode) the following has been also noted.
If the camera is turned on from cold ie has been off for at least 45 minutes the problem is manifested much more severely than after it has been turned on for at least 30 minutes.
The type of power supply and or voltage seems also to have an effect such that the jvc power supply seems to exacerbate the problem when cold compared with running the camera on a full (15.7 volt plus) v lock battery . When warm, the effects of the type of Battery supply voltage are clearly related to the number of drop outs per minute, at 15.7 volt no drop outs per minute were detected but by the time the voltage fell to 14.5 volts about 14 dropouts per minute were detected, using the supplied jvc battery at 7.8 volts more than 60 drop outs per minute were detected.

If this rings any bells or suggests any solutions to the forum I would appreciate your suggestions as this problem has been going on for 3 months and I am at a point of going back to JVC and complaining that the camera is unfixable.

regards
Ian Skurrie

Best solution I found for chronic dropouts is Firestore. They're dirt cheap now, save yourself headache.

It occurs regardless of which high grade tape is used (NEW JVC, Panasonic or Sony).
The fact that you have tried different stocks on the same heads might have caused more problems than you realize. As with any tape-based system the rule of thumb is to choose a tape brand/model and stick with it for the life of the camera. Mixing the different manufacturer's lubricants can cause some serious side effects like dropouts or worse yet: total head clogs.
As always I recommend JVC's ProHD stock (not just their "Pro" stock.)

Have you cleaned the heads with a JVC head cleaner? Are you capturing to FCP? Does your 101 have the (A) update?

I also vote for the firstore method. love it. tape is now a redundant back up and it saves me odells of time. I love the idea of a firestore that's flash memory instead of hard drive, but I swear I read the new flash memory firestore DOESN'T do 24p??? oh well could have used it on hot 108' days like today.. or last year where it was 114'f. makes me want to move to Canada for the summer months.

I had to swap brands of tapes while working with a multi camera shoot.. sony/jvc seemed to do ok.. but mixing those AWFUL Fuji tapes meant after 3 tapes I got the "clean head" message. Luckily I always carry 2 head cleaning tapes. But yes, I'm with Tim and I try 99% to use only JVC tapes. I honestly go cheap and just use the cheaper JVC pro tapes.. but I never reuse them.

The fact that you have tried different stocks on the same heads might have caused more problems than you realize. As with any tape-based system the rule of thumb is to choose a tape brand/model and stick with it for the life of the camera. Mixing the different manufacturer's lubricants can cause some serious side effects like dropouts or worse yet: total head clogs.
As always I recommend JVC's ProHD stock (not just their "Pro" stock.)

Have you cleaned the heads with a JVC head cleaner? Are you capturing to FCP? Does your 101 have the (A) update?

Thanks Tim,

Yes I am very aware of the lubricant issues and I carefully cleaned the heads when we changed brands. The fact that the drop outs only occur with HDV plus very careful and repeated tape alignment,tensioning checks, and careful head cleaning by the technician rules out a physical cause to this ( neither the Australian JVC engineer or the local repair agency nor the factory in Japan believe that this is a tape issue or a mechanical problem)

Fortunately the local repair company is in frequent contact with the chief JVC engineer in Australia who has already referred back to the factory in Japan in an attempt to find and fix this problem. His latest suggestion is that the issue is probably due to a faulty encoding chip on the main board. Unfortunately,this could be a show stopper as it might even effect recording onto an external drive.

I take the point about using a firestore, however I believe that the camera should do what it was designed for and has done for the past 3 years without a problem. Ideally I would like to get the camera repaired and then place it on the market therefore unless it is functioning 100 percent then I would not get a reasonable price for it. I am also worried about the audio glitches that have been reported to the forum, especially since I film concerts as part of my business and the first I would know about it would be after the event.

regards

Ian Skurrie

It seems that the problem lies in one of the coding chips on the mainboard. The probable solution is the replacement of the main board ouch!!!!. The net cost of this is going to be about AU$2000.00. I am therfore going to try either the jvc hard drive solution or look for a solid state solution using SDHC card since I take it that the SXS recorder won't work on the JVC gy hd 101. Any suggestions???

regards
Ian Skurrie