Neuros Technology Forums

Thanks Harv... a shame you couldn't be a bit more detailed. 

My icon in the upper left looks like an SD card but says MS on it.  I took it out, played with the card on the PC, and successfully added a picture to it.  I put it back in the Neuros, and I think it slid in further than ever before.     Now the icon says SD.

I quickly tried to record something but the menus are so slow and I need to get to work.   Thanks for your help, and I'll try more tonight.

MS means memory stick. The recorder 2 takes CF on top and MS in the bottom slot. The recorder 2 plus takes CF on the top and SD in the bottom slot. You said you have the plus so that's odd it would say "MS" since the plus can't even take a Memory stick. {{confused look}}..

Like I said, you might have one of those cards that the recorder has trouble reading. I explained I have a 128mb card that I had to insert and remove a bunch of times before the recorder saw it. Probably a cheap brand or slightly out of spec or worn out contacts or who knows. But when I got two Dane 2gb SD cards it has never had problems recognizing either one of them and I've inserted and removed them dozens of times. One of them is in a CF > SD card adapter in the top slot (so it always shows up as "CF" which is how the Neuros behaves).. the SD card in the bottom SD slot always shows up as SD. No problem. There are just some cheap cards out there which are slightly out of spec so the Neuros doesn't recogize them properly.

Remember too, the SD cards don't go in all the way flush with the front of the recorder's case. This throws some people off. Just gently push it in until it stops and don't try to force it in further. (Not that you are, but just in case you are).. The recorder WILL tell you in its onscreen display when you've correctly inserted a card. It'll recognize it and display its directories and files in playback mode and in card to card file copying mode.

My answers tend to be verbose because I write for a living and I've always found it's more helpful to give more information than not enough to prevent an endless back and forth of asking and answering.

By the way, the recorder's menus aren't really slow. You're just new to it and learning where things are. Use it for a couple weeks and youwon't even have to think about what's where. It IS more complicated to use than a VCR.

It sounds to me like you just didn't have your SD card inserted all the way. Since it just slides in about halfway and the recorder doesn't beep or anything to indicate correct card insertion, my guess is that that's what happened.

Harv

Thanks Harv... a shame you couldn't be a bit more detailed. 

My icon in the upper left looks like an SD card but says MS on it.  I took it out, played with the card on the PC, and successfully added a picture to it.  I put it back in the Neuros, and I think it slid in further than ever before.     Now the icon says SD.

I quickly tried to record something but the menus are so slow and I need to get to work.   Thanks for your help, and I'll try more tonight.

MS means memory stick. The recorder 2 takes CF on top and MS in the bottom slot. The recorder 2 plus takes CF on the top and SD in the bottom slot. You said you have the plus so that's odd it would say "MS" since the plus can't even take a Memory stick. {{confused look}}..

Like I said, you might have one of those cards that the recorder has trouble reading. I explained I have a 128mb card that I had to insert and remove a bunch of times before the recorder saw it. Probably a cheap brand or slightly out of spec or worn out contacts or who knows. But when I got two Dane 2gb SD cards it has never had problems recognizing either one of them and I've inserted and removed them dozens of times. One of them is in a CF > SD card adapter in the top slot (so it always shows up as "CF" which is how the Neuros behaves).. the SD card in the bottom SD slot always shows up as SD. No problem. There are just some cheap cards out there which are slightly out of spec so the Neuros doesn't recogize them properly.

Remember too, the SD cards don't go in all the way flush with the front of the recorder's case. This throws some people off. Just gently push it in until it stops and don't try to force it in further. (Not that you are, but just in case you are).. The recorder WILL tell you in its onscreen display when you've correctly inserted a card. It'll recognize it and display its directories and files in playback mode and in card to card file copying mode.

My answers tend to be verbose because I write for a living and I've always found it's more helpful to give more information than not enough to prevent an endless back and forth of asking and answering.

Harv

Brand new Plus, just getting started with it.  My firmware is 2.00.0019.

In the Recorder Menu setup, I can change Resolution, Quality, etc, but I can't change the Storage value off of CF.  I can't change it whether or not there's an SD card in the machine.  Regardless of the setting, I tried to record anyway, and it just sat there looking at me.

Any ideas?

Do you have one card in the machine or two? i.e. a CF or and SD card in a CF > SD  adapter in the top slot, and an SD in the bottom slot?

When you are in recording preview mode, i.e. the source video fills the entire screen, press the display button on the remote. What icon do you see in the upper left hand corner of the screen? a CF icon or an SD icon? If you have an SD card in the SD slot and you see CF in the upper left hand corner, press the "storage" button on the lower left hand corner of the remote. You should now see an SD icon on screen in the upper left hand corner, to the right of that will be the space remaining on your card and the estimated time available to record based on your current settings (resolution and quality mode).

To change resolution and quality modes, while looking at the preview screen (full screen with the white overlay on it), press the button on the remote that looks like two little boxes. Change your settings there. Then use the remote's back button (just under  the home button) to go back to the preview screen.

If you changed resolution and quality, the numbers next to the card icon will have changed.

If the icon says SD on it, press the red record button on the remote. In a couple seconds you should see "REC" in red in the upper right hand corner of the screen andthe red LED on the Neuros will turn on.

Hit the red record button again to stop recording.

Then you can go back to the main interface, swich to playback mode, find your file and play it or erase it.

It's possible the recorder is not recognizing your SD card. When I got mine I only had a spare 128mb no-name card laying around to try it with. I had to insert and remove the card multiple times to get the Neuros to recognize it. Then I got two Dane Elec. 2gb cards from the TreoCentral store. I have one in the top slot in a CF > SD adapater, and one "naked" in the bottom slot. They work perfectly.

Also IMPORTANT!! Make sure when you put an SD card in the bottom slot you put it in UPSIDE DOWN with the Gold contacts facing up. This seems counter-intuitive but that's the way the Neuros wants you to insert an SD card. Gold contacts facing up and in.

Go to TreoCentral.com and on the front page you'll find my four thousand word review of the Neuros MPEG4 Recorder 2 Plus with lots of screen shots.

Let me know if I solved your problem. It could be your card, it could be the way you've inserted it, it could be you haven't told the Neuros to record to a card i the SD slot. I can't think of any other possibilities.

Harv

According to this Topic, the 2-hour limit is in the hardware (4MB RAM), unless a different file wrapper is utilized:

http://forums.neurostechnology.com/smf/index.php?topic=7398.0

Just FYI.

I guess I simply don't understand how 4mb of ram in the machine translates to a 2 hour recording limit when I've created recordings up to 800mb in size (a two hour movie in 320x240 "normal" mode = an 800mb file).. how is the amount of internal RAM directly related to the 2 hour per file recording limit? Are you saying it buffers 4mb of data at a time and then writes it to the open file and then buffers another 4mb of data? If that's what it's doing, then why should it care about the final recording time limit?  I'm not an engineer so as Denzel Washington might have said in "Philadelphia".. explain it to me like I'm a 9 year old 

Harv

[The "feature" I like the least:]

Hi Joe

I wrote the 4000 word review of the Recorder 2 Plus that went up on TreoCentral yesterday. As you probably know, I had MANY phone calls with Johan while prepping to review the unit, and he was extremely patient and listened to everything I said. Give that man a raise!

I trust you've read my review by now. I mentioned some of the quirks with the unit, but I'll list them here in what I think are order of importance - if you can fix any of these things in a firmware upgrade, I'd love to see it happen.. so here we go:

(But first, let me mention that I play back files I've made with the Recorder 2 plus ON the recorder and my teevee, ON my laptop with VLC, and ON my Treos with TCPMP.. so I use all three methods of playback.. not necessarily with everything I record, but I watch the stuff I record all three ways..) ..

- The "feature" I like the least: get rid of the two hour recording limit. I mainly record commercial-free movies from premium cable channels and MANY films run over two hours. I get a20-30 second gap (whether I've started the recorder manually or via timer) when it hits the two hour mark, closes the first file and opens the second to get the rest of the movie. This seems like an artificial limit and I can't comprehend why it's there

-PAUSE during recording - let me pause during recording, same as I can pause during playback. This would be especially useful when recording shows with commercials in them and any VCR can pause during recording.

- 12 hour timers with AM/PM indicators: Make the timers 12 hours with an AM/PM indicator like every VCR I've ever seen has. And when scrolling up or down through hours or minutes when setting a timer, say Iwant to set a timer for 9:30pm, if the digits are at 00 i literally have to punch the up or down button thirty times to get to :30.Fix it so holding down the button increments or decrements the timer hour and minute counters at an increasing speed the longer one holds down the button.

- Zero out used timers: Zero out any timer after it's been used. In other words, like a VCR, if I set it to record a show from 10pm to midnight, and it records tothe tape, afterwards, that timer is gone from the VCR's timer screen. On the Neuros, the "old" timers are still set to the date and time they made a recording. This seems pointless and strange.

- Visual recording or timer on indicator: Make the red LED blink when the unit is recording, or when timers are set for future recordngs. If this drives some people nuts, then make it a toggle.

- When was this recording made? Put a timestamp on each recording so when it's played back ON the Neuros, and the white overlay is visible with the remote's display button, it shows when that recording was made: mm/dd/yyyy hh:mm instead of showing the current time, or in addition toshowing the current time

- FF/RW speed indicator: When using FF/RW mode, indicate on the overlay which speed FF or RW you're using. There SEEM to be five speeds but there's no visual indication as to which speed it's going

- Card space remaining in real time during recording: Decrement the space available on the card, in real time, on the recording screen white text overlay AS the recording is in progress. In other words, I'm looking at the overlay and it says I have "1006 MB/260 Min" left on the card. I hit record. Those numbers stay static. I'd like to see them decrement to show me how much space is left on the card AS a recording is being  made, not just AFTER a recording has been made and the file has closed.

- Renaming files: How about an On Screen Keyboard so one can rename recorded files on the card while it's in the Neuros? "MV400023.MP4" doesn't tell me much about what that file is, and I usually have to play it because the preview window shows me one frame which may or may not be enough visual information to tell what show or film it is. Let me rename the files with an OSK so, for example, instead of displaying MV400023.MP4 in the list of files on the card, it would display "Unforgiven" or "Annie Hall" or "Curb Your Enthusaism #12" or  whatever I typed into it.

- Resume and Bookmarking. If I'm watching a movie play back on the Neuros, and I leave the playback screen, and go back to it again, I have to FF back to where I was to continue watching from that point. In other words, I'd like a "resume" feature. Make the unit either remember where it was if one leaves playback mode, or allow one to put bookmarks in a file AS it's playing and then jump to them.  Like if I want to bookmark particularly memorable scenes in a film, how in the world am I supposed to remember where in a 2-3 hour movie a certain scene is only by its HH:MM:SS??..

I'll stop there. Don't get the impression I don't like the product. I gave it TreoCentral's highest rating in my review.

I just think it needs the stuff I listed above. If you could only fix ONE Of those things, the two hour time limit per file is the one that drives me batty the most. 

Regards,

Harv