Philips DVD player DVP642/37 - freezes up

[Peabody]

It will be playing fine, but then just stops, with the picture
frozen. But not at the same place each time, and on multiple
discs.

If possible, I need this to work because it plays DivX files.

Any suggestions? Should I try to clean the head?

 

[Peabody]

Does it simply stop playing at that point (but can be

persuaded to continue playing if you
fast-forward/chapter-skip)?

Or, does it freeze up entirely, and have to be
power-cycled to start working again?

It will not fast forward or do anything within the current
file, but I can make it skip to the next file and start
playing it.

It may be that there's something wrong with the files. I'm
working on that possibility. I hope that's it.

 

[Nelson]

It will be playing fine, but then just stops, with the picture
frozen. But not at the same place each time, and on multiple
discs.

If possible, I need this to work because it plays DivX files.

Any suggestions? Should I try to clean the head?

I have the same problem, but only with DVRs which have been ripped by
someone else. I haven't pursued it, but I suspect errors in the
encoding rather than physical media errors.

 

[Bruce Esquibel]

It will be playing fine, but then just stops, with the picture
frozen. But not at the same place each time, and on multiple
discs.

If possible, I need this to work because it plays DivX files.

Any suggestions? Should I try to clean the head?

One longshot possibility, on those, there are one or two electrolytics in
the power supply that are very common to go bad.

Normally the failure causes the unit not to turn on or shut itself off
after it's on and loading the disc (current draw from the tray motor).

If the unit never had them replaced, it's a cheap and easy fix.

It might help. Google for like "dvp642 capacitor".

-bruce
[email protected]

 

[Peabody]

Thanks for the responses.

I re-rendered two of the files that were causing problems, and the
new renders seem to play fine. It's not clear what may have been
wrong with the original files, particulalry since they didn't
freeze at the same point on each play, but if this works for a few
more files, then I'm going to chalk it up to unknown encoding
structure errors. But actually, I think that's the best answer I
could get. At least is suggests the player is ok.

But I'm going to check on those capacitors, just in case.