SONY CCD-TRV138 8MM CAMCORDER

Mechanical fault. Contact any service technician; or the authorized service centre for Sony. Electro help

If you are playing the tape in the camcorder, are you sure the volume control didn't get accidentally turned down or off? The control is the thumb wheel on the back of the camera below the viewfinder. See page 22 of your manual. If you are playing the tape in another VCR there is some other problem.

This Sony code in your camera is telling you the video heads are dirty, buy or put a cleaning tape in the camera and press play for around 30 seconds, if problem is not resolved use tape cleaner for 30 more sec, that is all it is I assure you.
bye
David

try rewinding the tape and play it from the beginning.if still the same,video heads may be dirty and needs to be clean.i recommend you use a dry head cleaning tape.after which reinsert tape and play it again.if issue persists use a diff tape with previous recordings.if still no go,use new tape and try recording on it,play it back and check.if still the same your unit will require service.thanks:) hope this help.

I used head cleaner and my camcorder started working.

Since it is playing the tape, the play head is ok. Now recording is done by recording heads so you may have a clogged heads or damaged recording heads. Try to clean the heads with head cleaning tape to see if it would help. 1. remove the tape and leave the door open. 2. using a canned air, blow out any dusts in the tape area. 3. run head cleaning tape for about 10 seconds and no more. 4. try the recording.. If this does not resolve, you may have a damaged or heavy clogged video heads. Take it to nearest video technician for a diagnostic. -James

I had that problem also and I found that using smaller tapes helped. I was using the 120 minute tapes, I think they may be too heavy.

http://esupport.sony.com/US/perl/news-item.pl?mdl=CCDTRV128&news_id=161

CCD sensor problem ( that you can play back but have no image in capture mode is typical of this common problem ). Sony might do this repair free of charge because properly manufactured CCD sensor should last 10 years+ .

Dirty video head! Playback newly opened blank tape for five minutes, after that eject, reinsert, playback then eject again five times, these will serve as your video head cleaner, never use "video head cleaning cassette tape" for it will only damage your camera. Most camera has built in video head cleaner installed inside and activates only when you insert, initial play/rec, and ejects a tape. If the problem is still there you need pro fix then.[:0)