WWTBAM Bored

Last night I went to the restaurant where I'm hoping to have my viewing party next Monday to test out the VCR/DVD player and make sure all was well with it. The owner does not know ANYTHING about the equipment and I am a techno idiot as well (no cable, no DVD player) so we could not get it to work! This kind of puts a crimp in the ol' viewing party. I'm hoping the school technology guy is still able to attend the party (he was part of my PAF group), but with the date change I'm not sure so I'm turning to you guys as people-who-know-everything.

Here is the set-up: The TV does not appear to be super new so not likely it is a digital TV. It is hooked up to a small DirectTV box. The VCR/DVD player appears to work (the tape at least advanced when I checked at home later), but I could not find the channel to actually see the tape/DVD that I brought with me. Channel 3 was unavailable and Channel 4 was just a channel.

My latest thought is that the DirectTV is making the TV "digital", and perhaps the player is analog? I don't know if this makes any sense, but it is the only thing I could come up with. If this DOES make sense, is it possible to turn the DirectTV box off and still have the TV work for the recordings?

If I can't solve this, it may be the death of the viewing party as I don't know what else I can do. Might be able to move it to the school, but would not be able to have food as easily in that scenario.

Any help/advice anyone has would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

By pass the DirectTV box. Unplug it from the TV and connect the VCR to the coaxial connection. It should play on Channel 3 or 4.

Are you trying to play a tape or a DVD?

If tape, you should be able take the OUT (output) cable from the DirectTV box and hook it up to the OUT connection on the VCR. If the other end of that cable is hooked to the TV and the TV is set to channel 3 (sometimes 4), that should be all you need.

If DVD, it has been my experience that output from a DVD player requires RCA cables or some even more high-tech type of connection. RCA cables are the Red, White and Yellow plugs with a male connector on each end.

If this doesn't help, post a picture of the back of the VCR/DVD player and the back of the TV, where the connections are, and perhaps we can figure out what you're missing.

Hire the Geek Squad.

You can afford it.

Oh this is so familiar...here is my advice...ready? BREATHE..........................

We had about 500 freak outs over getting the tape, playing the tape, etc. Your friends and family will forgive your technology illiteracy! If everything isn't perfect, it will still be awesome!

That's all I can add, everyone probably remembers my "help me I'm a technology idiot" posts!!! My only advice is unplug everything and go for the most basic setup possible, it usually works. Make sure you hit the little vcr/tv button on the remote too, that gets me every time!! Good luck!! Have fun!!

Thanks, you guys! Sounds like at least a couple of these ideas could do the trick. I'm going to print this page out and show it to the Tech guy, who is coming to the party, to see if it makes sense to him. Part of the problem is that I need to use both DVD and VHS for the party. The player is good for both so I would think as long as the DirectTV is bypassed, it should work. Then we just have to be able to get to it as it is located in a rather inconvenient way in a corner of the restaurant.

I may still see if my back-up idea for using the school might be better. Just don't know if they will let me do it that way.

Thanks again! I'll keep you posted.

If you only need the DVD player and VCR and don't need to watch any live TV, then bypassing the DirecTV box is probably the simplest solution. If the TV has only one input, it is probably your only solution. But chances are the TV has RCA plug inputs (the red, white and yellow cables mentioned earlier). If it has these (and you have this cable -- it most likely came with the DVD/VCR), this connection would be the easiest to set up. Once connected, you would be able to switch from TV to DVD/VCR with a TV/Video button located either on the set or on the set's remote. This button cycles through the TVs input. Just put in a tape or DVD and keep hitting the button until you see the DVD/VCR output on the screen.

Just to throw another tip to my fellow "Jackson Auditionee" :

For my old style TV, the remote control has a button that says "Game" that I have to push for it to show the DVD. I think some remotes say "video" or some other special button that accesses other devices that are hooked up besides the Direct box.

I may not be making myself clear here, but I thought it might help!

Estonut wrote:Are you trying to play a tape or a DVD?

If tape, you should be able take the OUT (output) cable from the DirectTV box and hook it up to the OUT connection on the VCR. If the other end of that cable is hooked to the TV and the TV is set to channel 3 (sometimes 4), that should be all you need.

If DVD, it has been my experience that output from a DVD player requires RCA cables or some even more high-tech type of connection. RCA cables are the Red, White and Yellow plugs with a male connector on each end.

If this doesn't help, post a picture of the back of the VCR/DVD player and the back of the TV, where the connections are, and perhaps we can figure out what you're missing.

No! You always need to take the OUT from one device and plug it into the IN of another! Plugging an OUT into another OUT might fry both devices!

Bob Juch wrote:

Estonut wrote:Are you trying to play a tape or a DVD?

If tape, you should be able take the OUT (output) cable from the DirectTV box and hook it up to the OUT connection on the VCR. If the other end of that cable is hooked to the TV and the TV is set to channel 3 (sometimes 4), that should be all you need.

If DVD, it has been my experience that output from a DVD player requires RCA cables or some even more high-tech type of connection. RCA cables are the Red, White and Yellow plugs with a male connector on each end.

If this doesn't help, post a picture of the back of the VCR/DVD player and the back of the TV, where the connections are, and perhaps we can figure out what you're missing.

No! You always need to take the OUT from one device and plug it into the IN of another! Plugging an OUT into another OUT might fry both devices!

I wasn't suggesting connecting OUT to OUT, as evidenced by the next statement "If the other end of that cable ..." That would require a cable with 3 ends. Upon re-reading now, I guess I wasn't clear enough.

What I should have written was:

If tape, you should be able take the end of the cable attached to the OUT (output) connection on the DirectTV box and hook it up instead to the OUT connection on the VCR. If the other end of that cable is hooked to the TV and the TV is set to channel 3 (sometimes 4), that should be all you need.

With the additional information that you plan to play both VHS and DVD, I will reiterate that my DVD/VHS combo players require RCA cables (Red/Yellow/White) for the DVD output to the TV AND coaxial cable for the VHS output to the TV. Just hooking up the RCA cables (on my combo units, anyway) will NOT support playing the VHS tapes.

The additional points are well taken with respect to the remote control. You should have a DVD/VHS button, which tells the unit whether the "Play" or "Pause" actions apply to the DVD or the VHS player. On the TV remote, if it has the RCA connections, it should also have a TV/VIDEO or an INPUT button, where it rotates through VIDEO1, VIDEO2 (some TVs have easily-accessible RCA jacks on the front and more permanent ones on the back). You will need this button to tell the TV whether to play the feed from the cable input or the RCA input.