Boo! Yay! Boo!

I have two DVD players in my living room.

One is the code free DVD player, which I use to play British DVDs.

The other is a DVD-recorder.  (Add some dubbing cables and do the math.)

The other day I had a friend over, and we wanted to watch a British DVD.  But my code free DVD player was dead.  Dead in the "wouldn't turn on" sense.  Completely and utterly crapped out.  Dead.  Dead.  Dead.

I did a bit of research into new ones.  They aren't that pricey, so no big deal.  Didn't order one yet.

We watched an American DVD on the DVD-recorder (which, y'know, can also play.)


She came over again tonight.  We planned to watch the next episode of the American DVD.  Plopped it in the DVD recorder.  Cranked it up.


Six minutes and forty-eight seconds in, the picture froze.  Wouldn't fast forward.  Wouldn't rewind.  Wouldn't stop.  Wouldn't eject.  Wouldn't power off.


I pulled the plug.


I replugged the plug.


Wouldn't power on.


WOULDN'T.  POWER.  ON.


Two DVD players just died on me within the space of a week or so.  Weird.  Wondered if maybe there wasn't something wrong with the power strip.  Tried plugging it in another outlet on the power strip.  For good measure, I tried plugging the code free in another outlet on the power strip.


The code free went on.  Cheerfully.


The DVD recorder would not get out of standby mode.  Nor would it give me my DVD back.


We changed plans and started watching a British DVD on the code free, while I sat on the couch with the DVD recorder, four screwdrivers and a pair of pliers, attempting to free the DVD.  (It wasn't very long into the process that I stopped trying to save the DVD Recorder.  It was a refurb purchased several years ago.  That I got this much use out of it was pretty incredible.  I'm now strictly on a rescue mission for the DVD.)


The technical terms of what went wrong are beyond me, but things were quite unseated in there.  Once I got the DVD out of it, I still had to push and pull (and break) various parts in order to get the tray to glide in and out when forced.  That thing was broke but good.


So, the code free which I thought was broken is now working perfectly.  Replacing the DVD recorder, however, will cost about five times as much.