Re: Video Ref issue? Help before I jump off a bridge!

Perhaps the video reference signal is not clean/good??? (Though it seems like you checked for that.) The fun thing about that problem is that it tends to be intermittent and take a few to several minutes to rear its ugly head. Your symptoms seem like the deck not liking the reference signal (which gives dropouts and the channel condition flashing).

One way to check is to use another source for reference video. I think you can use a SD-SDI source with black picture as the reference source... e.g. throw a test pattern on the HDCAM, take SD-SDI off that, cable that into the ref. input on the dbeta.

Tapes need to be striped to the new reference video source. Make sure the stop button light is not blinking.

From what I remember, some of the switches on the deck also controls where ref. video is read from. Check the manual... it has a diagram showing the (perverse) logic. When you print to tape, it might be that the deck needs to grab reference from the video/SDI/kona (not the ref. input), and the Kona needs to grab reference from your reference source (e.g. the Aja Gen10 or some other source).

2- Did you check the error logger? What does it say?

3- (Maybe this'll help, maybe it won't)
It might be worth taking the legalizer out of the equation. Once you have your master printed to tape, you can enable pre-read and play/record the video onto itself through the legalizer.
**Pre-read is dangerous!! I would use an extra tape label/sticker and label the deck as having pre-read on.
**Not legalizing the video right off the bat is also dangerous... you don't want non-legalized masters going out before you forgot to do this.

4- Is confidence on or off? That might help rule out tape issues. If confidence is on you can spot problems with bad heads.