I have a Canon ZR40 and when I'm in the "camera" mode there is a message on the screen that says "no card" (I don't know what the heck it is talking about since it doesn't have a card slot. at least I haven't found one in the several years I have used this camera) and it won't let me record any thing. When I'm in the "play" mode the screen and viewfinder are black and none of the rewind,fast forward, play or stop buttons work. Does any one know of a solution and is this a common problem? cause I can't find any info on how to fix it any where and when I called customer support they didn't know of the problem or how to fix it.

Thanks!

I have a Canon ZR500 with the same problem. Every time I turn it on, it boots into "Card Mode" then of course throws the "no card" error, because the model HAS NO CARD SLOT! I've gone through every single menu option and physical button or switch on the thing and there's no option to force it into "tape mode" anywhere.

I emailed Canon support and they sent me instructions for connecting the camcorder to a computer to capture video. Not even close guys....

My camera has done this before but after a couple days it just went back to normal and operated fine but this time it has been about 20 days and it still says "no card"

Try taking the backup battery out and then put it back in to reset the camcorder. My ZR40 was dead in the water until I did that and everything came back to life. Yours is having different problems but it couldn't hurt!

Confirm.
I too rec'd the "No Card" error with my Canon ZR500.

I removed the small back up battery (watch style battery) to reset the camera.
The error has now gone away and has yet to return.

I did email Canon support (in Canada) about this and they had no clue.