Camera playing back with black bars

[mmace]

Anyone got any ideas?

I lent my old camcorder to my brothers to watch some tapes of themselves (they're in a band) before I was going to sell the camera (Panasonic GS400, 3CCD).

They said they watched one tape fine, put the next one in and there were big black bars accross the image, they tried different tapes and even the one that worked before and they all do the same.

Does anyone know what could be wrong with it or what I can do to fix it (had it a few years so it's out of warranty)?

[Peter Brereton]

Six (or five on an NTSC camcorder) horizontal bars usually indicates dirty heads. Try a cleaning tape first!
The bars can be blue, grey or black depending on the manufactuer.

Peter

[JH4]

Before you use a cleaning tape, try just recording for a few minutes on it. I have found this works sometimes, for some reason. A cleaning tape should be a last resort, I think.

[senu]

It is a dirty tape head

Sometimes just playing a "clean" tape for a few minutes can dislodge the Dirt. Sometimes you need to use a tape head cleaner : Not a big deal TBH

Just out of interest ( to me) what brand(s) of tape were they using and which do you use regularly?

[mmace]

Originally Posted by senu

Just out of interest ( to me) what brand(s) of tape were they using and which do you use regularly?

the Sony "high quality" ones from Amazon that are fairly cheap in a yellow/orange box of 5