Taped show not showing up on TV screen

Does a channel tuned with your VCR show on the TV? If so, pressing "PLAY" on the VCR's remote should replace the tuned program with the program being played back. If not, find out why you can't get the VCR tuned program to appear on your TV. That will solve your playback problem, too.

Absolutely correct, in principle.

I'm also puzzled how changing the /cable channel/ lets you select the channel to record on the VCR. Unless you have a video output from the cable converter feeding the VCR, you need to select the channel to record on the VCR itself.

You probably still have to selected the right channel - being the video input - on the VCR. Conceivably the VCR is usually 'tuned' to its video input, and the OP has inadvertently changed that. The result, if there's no antenna input, or the selected channel is not tuned to a broadast channel, will either be a recording of static, or a blank screen on playback, depending on the VCR.

Either way, the increasing numbers on the front panel likely indicate nothing more than the passage of time, and not that a real signal is being recorded.

Sylvia.

a few checks.

1. set the tv to the video channel, and play a known good tape - what happens? Any sound ?pic?
2. if playback is OK - leave the tv on the video channel, and stop the tape, what do you see? if you are hoping to record from cable, you should see the cable programme going through the video. If not, you need to check the cable box is wired to the vcr's AV input ,and then you select that input (usually called 0, AV, input, line, or EXT) on the vcr.

Post back with results and we'll take it from there.

-regards B

The only thing that lets me see something on the TV is the HDMI selection on the TV remote. The only thing that changes the channels is the cable remote--pressing numbers on the TV and VCR remotes doesn't do anything-the show on the screen stays the same. The wiring is the same as it was the day the VCR was installed several months ago. The tape is fairly new and everything was doing fine before I started pressing buttons to find out how to change the clock. So far, any taping I've done is taping a show that is on the screen at the moment--have not tried to program a show to be taped later. If we can get back to just instant taping that will be ok. Taping at this produces only a black screen.

Some things I've noticed on the VCR remote--the only buttons that work are the playing, stopping, forward and backward buttons, the rec/otr button and the input button. None of the other buttons bring up anything on screen, including the setup button, which is the first step in programming and probably in setting the clock. Cannot bring up an menus. I'm wondering if the remote and/or the the VCR is/are defective.

When the cable guy tried to help me (he got me to the HDMI button), he had me press the VCR, TV, and Cable buttons on the cable remote, then turn power off, then back on.

In my own meagre defense: for 5 or 10 years I've had TV's with VCR's attached. Got a separate VCR when one of those TV VCR's failed. So far I've had to rely on Geek Squad to get me set up, but not even that guy could get it so that ALL of these functions could be done with one remote.

I am grateful for any help you can give me.

Admit defeat, and read a book. Maybe one on VCRs.

There are so many variations on hooking up a piece of multimedia equipment now days that it's hard to guess what to check. If you could describe how it is hooked up, it would help greatly. Also maybe the model of the connected equipment (Television, cable box, vcr, dvd player, &c...), so that we may look in the user manuals.

I'm afraid you're going to have to sit down and /learn/ exactly how this equipment works. If the self-proclaimed experts in this group can't figure out what's going on, you'll have to put out some effort on your own.

The OP may never get it. Some people have blind-spots.

My mother, not otherwise unintelligent, could never understand how the VCR could record a TV program when the TV itself was away being repaired.

Sylvia.

Did the explanation that the VCR had its own little TV receiver inside it make any sense to her? It should have.

My father -- who was of ordinary intelligence -- could not understand the phonograph-record metaphor when I tried to explain how a hard drive worked.

I never expressed it quite that way. But I certainly tried to explain the concept of a tuner and recording the signal coming from it.

She seemed to find the idea slippery. I think she just about got it when I explained it to her - but the next time the television needed repairing (which it frequently did), she'd raise the same doubts.

Sylvia.

In fairness... About 12 years ago I was working on COM Apps documentation at Microsoft. One of the people in that section was a German conputer scientist who was one the few people I've ever met who was smarter than I. On several occasions he explained some of the theory involved in their work, and I was at a complete loss. I couldn't begin to grasp it. I had no idea what he was talking about.

Perhaps it was all bilge, though I doubt it. It was probably that he wasn't explaining it very well.

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I have found that "if a person cannot explain something to another reasonably intelligent person, they don't understand it themselves."

Blindly pressing buttons. No wonder something is amiss. Methinks it is time you tell us *precisely* how you have everything wired - and why.

This isn't meant to sound rude or nasty... But if the OP knew how and why, he probably wouldn't be asking for help.

My audio system controller (a Parasound C2), has only one direct-analog 7.1 input, and no provision whatever for external processors. So I added three dbx 400X switchers (Front, Side, Rear), with the Front unit rewired to permit a given tape deck output to feed its own input. *

I can now switch in or out just about anything -- but the setup is horrendously complex. As a result, I had to write a set of instructions (!!!) to remind me how to use the switchers!

• The change was required because I wanted any of the inputs (CD FM LP), which went to the tape-deck outputs, to be able to feed any of the hall synthesizers, which were connected to the tape-deck inputs. I nearly went crazy and blind trying to unscramble the maze-like schematic. I had to find and unsolder the interlocks that prevented same-deck feedback.

none of what you posted above in your last response will help us to help you, as it does not respond to any of the checklist points I made in my last post in this thread. The only way you're going to resolve this permanently is by being systematic and eliminating various possibilities. check the setup out, carry out the simple checks mentioned before and we'll try and solve it.

-B

That's only true up to a point. Complicated ideas may require significant background knowledge before they can be understood.

Sylvia.

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I think a large part of explaining a concept to someone is the amount of effort that someone wants to put into understanding it. I can be as dumb as a knob in an area, but if I put enough time and effort into it, I will eventually understand it. However, without the initial building blocks, the amount of time and effort could be well beyond the scope of reality. In which case the op might starve to death before learning to fish on his/her own (to use the old analogy).

-J

Is there some teenage kid living nearby that could come to your house and try to figure it out. Maybe you could give them some cookies & milk/pop/beer/whiskey in return? Kids these days can be much more adept at solving problems like this than us adults.