BizRodian

My friend was having problems hooking up her player, so I said I'd come over and do it.

And I can't do it

Maybe her TV is too old or something, beats me.

I thought I'd covered everything, but the TV doesn't seem to be realising that there's a DVD player hooked up to it. I turn on the DVD player and get nothing, not on any channel. I don't get any distortion or anything. The player and TV just aren't accepting each other.

Here's what I have done.

Yellow (video) from the Yellow Video Out on the DVD Player, to the "Video 1" on her TV (which is yellow)

Red and White Audio1 Out on the DVD Player to the Red and White "Audio 1" on the TV.

Her TV is too old for S Video.

She says she doesn't have to switch to a special video mode to get to her VCR...

I tried switching to Audio Out 2 and such, but that doesn't work either...

I player is and LG Goldstar, the TV's some old Magnavox... I'm thinking it's about 7 years old.

I'm sure this is something pretty damn simple, or something requiring a new part. Can anyone shed any light on this?

OldDude

The TV set and/or its remote should have a button for "input source" )or something like that, and give you a choice of "tv" or "video 1" If tv has a video 2 input, that will be a third choice on the same button. It usually toggles inputs with an onscreen indication of what is selected.

stevevt

There's a chance that if more than one source is hooked up at the same time, the set will either be "confused" or at least not looking at the signal from the dvd player. I'd recommend unhooking everything except the dvd player.

If that doesn't work, hook it up where the vcr was, since you know that input works. This way, you'll be able to rule out the tv or the dvd player as the problem. I'm assuming the tv is the issue, but you never know.

belboz

Most TV's use one of two methods to control the internal video switching from its tuner to any composite/s-video/component inputs.

The most popular method is as OldDude described. There's a button on the TV and/or the remote usually labelled something like "input select," "source select," or "aux input" that will toggle between all the inputs the TV has.

A somewhat rarer method is for the TV to put its input selection in with the tuner. That is, the input selection would be selected by the channel selector, usually located between the highest channel and the lowest channel at the "wraparound." For example, channel 2 is usually the lowest channel and if you were to press the channel down button, it would go to an L1 channel which sets the TV to the composite input. Pressing the channel down button again, it would wrap around to the highest channel and the TV would be switched back to the tuner again.

What sort of complicates all this is that some TV's can be programmed to hide inputs/channels that you aren't using. If at some time someone saw that there was nothing hooked up to the composite input, they may have set the TV to never switch to it. This is usually done through an on screen setup menu.

BizRodian

Hmmm.. ok, I'll look around. I don't know if she has her original remote, maybe only some universal one. There's nothing on the actual TV about selecting the source...

There isn't anything else hooked up to the TV... there's a stereo... but it's got nothing to do with the TV. I'm assuming the VCR worked, but I disconnected it to put the DVD player in it's place.

BizRodian

Ok, figured it out. There was a button on this universal remote which is poorly labeled, pressing it switches to the correct source.

Thanks for your help!