Mr. Lin
Lunatic Member
^^^
I can't tell you how elated I was to see that glowing indicator of proper operation today - and to see it stay on for more than two minutes (I'll explain in a moment).
About four and a half to five years ago, I was all about vinyl, all the time. CDs were a necessary evil in my view, and couldn't possibly compare to the sound I was getting from my analog rig, as far as I was concerned. But I figured it would be prudent to have a respectable standalone CD player aside from a DVD player, and thus I purchased a used, original, Rega Planet CD player from a nice guy on ebay.
I have a sentimental attachment to the Planet because it was the first CD player to show me the sonic potential of well-recorded CDs, which was beyond what I had anticipated hearing at the time. So I happily lived with the Planet, still listening primarily to vinyl, but nonetheless seduced by the warm, natural, anti-stereotypical-CD sound it produced. It worked flawlessly for a couple years, and then a strange problem developed.
In the middle of playing a CD, the Planet would suddenly shut down - as in, the power completely shut off - then turned back on, but reset as if I'd just put a CD in the transport and had yet to press the play button. This issue grew worse and worse, until I could no longer get through more than about 2 minutes of playing a CD at most before it would restart itself.
I immediately took advantage of the situation and saved up for a new CD player. This turned out to be the popular Jolida 100, which is "tubed." The Jolida offered a more exciting, detailed, and spacious presentation than the Planet, from what my aural memory could conjure up.
A year or so later I invested in a used Musical Fidelity A3.5, and then finally one of my dream CD players, the Naim CD5i-2. Both of these retailed at double the original prices of the Jolida and Rega players, and both, IMO, are clearly superior in nearly all areas.
But it seemed to me a shame that the Planet was going to waste, regardless of its status at the bottom of the CD player food chain in my house. I posted a thread in AK's DIY forum asking what the problem could be, and whether I could fix it. Some offered help, but nothing came of it, aside from the affirmation of what I'd already suspected: the problem with the Planet was in the power supply. That was back in March of 2010.
I don't know what inspired me to suddenly just Google the issue a couple days ago (which I should have done in the first place), but it didn't take long to find information about a known issue with the original Planet that causes the very same problem mine was having. Whether sloppy soldering, or a bad batch of parts, apparently the four bridge rectifier diodes in the power supply were to blame. An easy fix. I was overjoyed.
But it gets better! Not only was this a simple thing to fix myself, it turned out the packet of special Vishay glass diodes I'd won on ebay years ago would be compatible. Finally something I could use them for! So let's get down to the specifics, and the pictures, which will begin in my next post...