I was in the middle of watching a R2 DVD movie earlier. I Was about 30 mins into the film when the player froze. Had no choice but to unplug the unit from the mains.

I plugged back in, turned on the power agian and ejected the disc, half expecting to see a fingerprint or other mark, but the disc was immaculate.
When I re-inserted the disc I was met with a horrible sound from the drive, tried several other discs too with the same result, the display says "no disc"

I get the feeling the drive has had an optical failure. Only just got the unit back from Philips last month after a circuit board had failed. The unit is now 13 months old. Seems like a good start to the new year.

Has anybody any ideas. I have tried a factory reset and an lens cleaner disc.

Thanks in advance

Philips support have confirmed my suspicions that the DVD drive has suffered a laser failure. This I'm advised is a fairly common fault on some previous models and on early current products.
I'm happy to report that they have agreed to a FOC repair and are sending round a courier to collect the unit.

So it seems that despite the love notes to Philips from Jethro and Musukebba,the current machines are exactly the same as every other Philips dvd recorder.......a pile of cack.
But give Philips some credit,they are making them last a few months longer with each new range.
Why waste time with a repair unless you want to sell the returned unit on ebay.
You can then buy a quality make that will not give up on you

Good - that's the most important thing.

Philips picked up the recorder on Thursday PM and I recieved it back just over a week later on the Tuesday AM. I think that is avery good response from Philips. No further problems to date.
Despite the problems I find the DVDR725 a worthy machine. The guide+ is great. I look forward to the release of the DVDR7300H because we need a 2nd unit.

Some of the 'No disc' fault on HDRW72x units is related to an IC chip becoming disconnected after a certain number of disc tray movements, and not related to the OPU assembly degrading.

If this was the problem with your machine, the repair should last.