Today, I was going to go down to the electronic shops and pick up a new HDD/DVD recorder because, as I’ve chronicled recently, my 3-year-old Toshiba machine broke down. It started showing an error message signaling a hard disk failure four or five days ago, and refused to start up–even just enough to eject the DVD that was in its drive. Repeated attempts to revive the machine failed, including letting it stay off for a long time, unplugged for a long time, and by pressing every available button I could press. I called customer support and was told that the hard disk would have to be replaced (they finally got back to me and told me it would cost about ¥40,000), and every report I could find on the web from people with the exact same problem suggested that this was the only chance for recovery.

So I decided to get a new unit costing about $700, including a $10/mo. upgrade of our cable box. I was just about to walk out the door to buy the new DVR when I decided, for the hell of it, to try to turn on the old Toshiba one last time. And what do you know, it turned on, and worked fine.

Over the past few days, I’d had the machine turned off while plugged in, and noted that twice, the front panel display had some mysterious message, “D-L-D.” I have no idea if that had anything to do with it, but either way, the old problem disappeared and now seems to work fine. I am busily archiving everything recorded on it to DVD, treating the machine as essentially on its last legs, which, for all I know, it might actually be.

So the new DVR purchase is on the back burner for the time being….