When I first purchased my Sony VX500 DVD/VHS recorder, I also purchased about 100 blank DVD-R disc (made by Sony). They all worked well. I recently purchased another batch of blank dics. Same brand same speed etc. They did not work. I could see by the front of the blank disc that Sony had chnged manufacturers. I just purchased a batch of Memorex disc. Same problem. The VX500 will not record on it either.
When I put these newer blanks in the recorder. The recorder says Please wait will disc is loading. After that message goes off the red light indicates that the media is in the machine and ready to record. But... it does not record. The recording timer says it's recording but it's not.
But if I put one of my older Sony blanks in the machine they do record.
Anyone have any ideas on my problem?
Thank you for your time.
Kelbrit

I found the problem (I think). When I bought the first batch of blank Sony media the speed was 8X. Sony is now packaging 16X. I was told that may be the problem. I'll buy some 8X and see what happens.

Blank media is embedded with a "media ID" that the recorder reads to see exactly what the disc is (who made it, how fast), which it then uses to determine exactly what speed it can record on it. However, if the firmware doesn't know about a particular media or speed, then it often simply won't work. From what I hear the the VX500 will not write to 16X media and must use 8X or slower.

All it needs is a firmware update to recognize 16X media, but everything I've read says that isn't going to happen.