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Troubleshooting CD Players

dr*audio said:
The problem is there is no manufacturer of new cd players that supports them with parts
Click to expand...

I was speaking theoretically. There are still plenty of CDROM drives produced for computers. Many of them are the same physical slimline format, with a SATA interface. If you designed a CD player using one of those, you'd probably have a fairly long life of replacement parts. They're about £20 a pop at the moment.

https://www.google.com/search?q=slimline+cdrom+drive+minisata

Admittedly, they are mechanically fragile, especially the thin plastic runners...

I mean, it's not as if replacement mechanisms and lasers for old CD players are particularly available, is it?
 
cpt_paranoia said:
I was speaking theoretically. There are still plenty of CDROM drives produced for computers. Many of them are the same physical slimline format, with a SATA interface. If you designed a CD player using one of those, you'd probably have a fairly long life of replacement parts. They're about £20 a pop at the moment.

https://www.google.com/search?q=slimline+cdrom+drive+minisata

Admittedly, they are mechanically fragile, especially the thin plastic runners...

I mean, it's not as if replacement mechanisms and lasers for old CD players are particularly available, is it?
Click to expand...
Actually you can still get Sony KSS-210A, KSS-213, KSS-240 replacements. BD Enterprises has the KSS213 and Liberty Electronics on Ebay has found a Chinese manufacturer that makes good quality parts. The part I can't find is disc motors. There are Chinese knock offs of the Mabuchi motors and they are supposed to be junk.
 
I was troubleshooting an Adcom GCD600 CD Changer about a year and a half ago with the help of this forum. Life got in the way and I put the unit down for a bit. This week, I cracked it back open. I am hopeful I can again get some guidance from the group.

The unit powers on fine.
When I put a CD in the tray and push close, the drawer closes, carousel spins.
It appears that the changer sees the CD because it appears to load and clamp (mechanism engages). But the spindle does NOT spin. Then, it unclamps and the carousel rotates further. Ultimately, the carousel stops and the readout shows all 0s. I always use my hand to prevent light from entering near the mech.

I checked the DC voltages. I was able to identify plus and minus 15 volts. Those are regulated and are spot on. There is also a rail for plus and minus 8 volts. Those are unregulated and measure about 9.4 and -9.4. The internal fuses are all fine as well.

That is about as far as I got last night and seek suggestions at this stage. I realize that this is an older machine and there is little monetary value, but I am intrigued by the challenge and want to get it running.

Thanks everyone.
 
rockrink said:
I was troubleshooting an Adcom GCD600 CD Changer about a year and a half ago with the help of this forum. Life got in the way and I put the unit down for a bit. This week, I cracked it back open. I am hopeful I can again get some guidance from the group.

The unit powers on fine.
When I put a CD in the tray and push close, the drawer closes, carousel spins.
It appears that the changer sees the CD because it appears to load and clamp (mechanism engages). But the spindle does NOT spin. Then, it unclamps and the carousel rotates further. Ultimately, the carousel stops and the readout shows all 0s. I always use my hand to prevent light from entering near the mech.

I checked the DC voltages. I was able to identify plus and minus 15 volts. Those are regulated and are spot on. There is also a rail for plus and minus 8 volts. Those are unregulated and measure about 9.4 and -9.4. The internal fuses are all fine as well.

That is about as far as I got last night and seek suggestions at this stage. I realize that this is an older machine and there is little monetary value, but I am intrigued by the challenge and want to get it running.

Thanks everyone.
Click to expand...
You have done well so far. You have to look in from the side and see if the laser lens is moving up and down after it loads the CD. If so it is doing focus search and the laser is probably bad because it never achieves focus lock.
 
dr*audio said:
You have done well so far. You have to look in from the side and see if the laser lens is moving up and down after it loads the CD. If so it is doing focus search and the laser is probably bad because it never achieves focus lock.
Click to expand...

Thank you.

I grabbed a few minutes at lunch to make the recommended observations and the behavior has changed. Now, the tray inserts but does not rotate and the clamping does not occur. The voltages all seemed to be the same as before and the fuses are all intact. I am not sure what might have changed.
 
rockrink said:
Thank you.

I grabbed a few minutes at lunch to make the recommended observations and the behavior has changed. Now, the tray inserts but does not rotate and the clamping does not occur. The voltages all seemed to be the same as before and the fuses are all intact. I am not sure what might have changed.
Click to expand...
There are many things that can cause this:
Bad belt
Power supply
broken flex cable to tray
Tray timing messed up from closing the tray with the power off.
 
dr*audio said:
There are many things that can cause this:
Bad belt
Power supply
broken flex cable to tray
Tray timing messed up from closing the tray with the power off.
Click to expand...

Shoot. I'll bet I messed up the tray timing along the way. The belts look fine and the voltages seem about right. Where can I learn how to re-establish proper tray timing?

Thanks.
 
rockrink said:
Shoot. I'll bet I messed up the tray timing along the way. The belts look fine and the voltages seem about right. Where can I learn how to re-establish proper tray timing?

Thanks.
Click to expand...
Open the tray by pushing the Open button.
Unplug the power cord.
Push the tray in slowly until it stops.
Hold the tray in and plug in the power, turn the unit on.
That works in most cases.
 
dr*audio said:
Open the tray by pushing the Open button.
Unplug the power cord.
Push the tray in slowly until it stops.
Hold the tray in and plug in the power, turn the unit on.
That works in most cases.
Click to expand...

Had a few minutes to look at the unit yesterday. I wanted to try the quoted suggestion. However, I discovered that the Open button does not work. I think today, I will spend a bit of time and just take a good look for any physical abnormality that might stand out -- belts, cables, flex-cable, component discoloring, etc. Of course, I did this at the start of the project but it feels like something additional failed as I was underway. I am very open to any suggestions.

As always, thanks for everything.
 
Brief update: Today I discovered that the FFC cable from the Mech unit to the main board is defective. I can physically see that several of the traces are broken. I'll try to figure out where to get one of these and then I'll pick things back up. I hope I am wrong, but I suspect that this is a thing that is broken, not the thing. . .
 
rockrink said:
Brief update: Today I discovered that the FFC cable from the Mech unit to the main board is defective. I can physically see that several of the traces are broken. I'll try to figure out where to get one of these and then I'll pick things back up. I hope I am wrong, but I suspect that this is a thing that is broken, not the thing. . .
Click to expand...
Digikey sells FFC's.
 
Issue with Sony CDP203ES.

Powers on. Tray opens and closes. Disk starts to spin. No TOC. Tray ejects, seemingly before the CD has stopped spinning. I disconnected the cable to the sled motor and put 1.2 volts through that cable to the motor -- operated smoothly in both directions. So I think the sled motor and cable are fine, but when I observe the operational sequence, it appears that the sled motor drives the sled as far toward the center of the CD as it can and stops. It does not appear to move back into a home position. It just seems to travel as far as it can and stay there. But the disk does spin. Out of curiosity, I observed the laser from a bit of a distance at an angle. It does turn on but appears more purplish than red. I gently cleaned it with a dry swab and it looked the same.

I was expecting the sled motor to move the laser all the way in and then back out a bit to a home position. I found both the limit switch and the loading switch. Cleaned them with 600 grit SP, sprayed with DeOxit and let it dry before proceeding.

I can't help but think that I am missing something basic. I have read through the sticky at the top of this thread and searched the thread for a similar symptom. Couldn't find anything. I know these are old machines and the value is not significant. But I want to get to the bottom of this.

What am I missing?
 
Thanks for giving us a hand with these intriguing but infernal little machines.

Unfortunately nobody makes a nice inexpensive component-style (box with buttons) media player that accepts memory cards and is only a digital media player. Just like a CD player but with no CD drive, just a slot for memory cards and a screen, so you can play your tunes, no Bluetooth or other jive, just a digital music player with a nice converter and nice preamp. Maybe a 100-dollar product that replaces your CD player with a similar box-with-buttons only for playing music with great sound and no fluff except maybe a remote control, kind of like an iPod but specifically for your home stereo.

I'm not aware of any such product, unfortunately. So, mucking about with old ass CD players seems to be the way it's done for now.
 
Opto5205 said:
Unfortunately nobody makes a nice inexpensive component-style (box with buttons) media player that accepts memory cards and is only a digital media player.
Click to expand...

Probably a bit off-topic, but I'd suggest having a rummage through the Digital Sources sub-forums, and this one in particular:

https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?forums/pcs-music-servers.122/

My experience of using a number of devices that can access a USB media device as you describe is that is a royal pain in the arse to select music to play, especially if there is a lot of music. That experience covers portable MP3 players, through cheap 'mini hifi', to streaming receivers (e.g. Denon Piccolo).
 
rockrink said:
Issue with Sony CDP203ES.

Powers on. Tray opens and closes. Disk starts to spin. No TOC. Tray ejects, seemingly before the CD has stopped spinning. I disconnected the cable to the sled motor and put 1.2 volts through that cable to the motor -- operated smoothly in both directions. So I think the sled motor and cable are fine, but when I observe the operational sequence, it appears that the sled motor drives the sled as far toward the center of the CD as it can and stops. It does not appear to move back into a home position. It just seems to travel as far as it can and stay there. But the disk does spin. Out of curiosity, I observed the laser from a bit of a distance at an angle. It does turn on but appears more purplish than red. I gently cleaned it with a dry swab and it looked the same.

I was expecting the sled motor to move the laser all the way in and then back out a bit to a home position. I found both the limit switch and the loading switch. Cleaned them with 600 grit SP, sprayed with DeOxit and let it dry before proceeding.

I can't help but think that I am missing something basic. I have read through the sticky at the top of this thread and searched the thread for a similar symptom. Couldn't find anything. I know these are old machines and the value is not significant. But I want to get to the bottom of this.

What am I missing?
Click to expand...
The home position is at the center, not the edge of the CD. The fact that is starts to spin means it achieved focus lock. The fact that it can't read the TOC may mean the laser is toast. To confirm it you'd have to look at the rf waveform with a scope.
 
Opto5205 said:
Thanks for giving us a hand with these intriguing but infernal little machines.

Unfortunately nobody makes a nice inexpensive component-style (box with buttons) media player that accepts memory cards and is only a digital media player. Just like a CD player but with no CD drive, just a slot for memory cards and a screen, so you can play your tunes, no Bluetooth or other jive, just a digital music player with a nice converter and nice preamp. Maybe a 100-dollar product that replaces your CD player with a similar box-with-buttons only for playing music with great sound and no fluff except maybe a remote control, kind of like an iPod but specifically for your home stereo.

I'm not aware of any such product, unfortunately. So, mucking about with old ass CD players seems to be the way it's done for now.
Click to expand...
A tablet and a DAC would do that.
 
dr*audio said:
A tablet and a DAC would do that.
Click to expand...

That's an awful lot of bread to play tunes, but yeah, it's a plan. I should keep my eyes peeled for an old tablet... That way I can leave it powered up and connected to the stereo. Still, I'm surprised that such a device hasn't been produced yet, simply to replace the almost-obsolete CD format.

For me it's mostly psychological anyway. To really focus on the music, I have to have no other devices in the room but the stereo on. Computers are the worst--I get distracted and end up mucking around on the Internet :)
 
Opto5205 said:
That's an awful lot of bread to play tunes, but yeah, it's a plan. I should keep my eyes peeled for an old tablet... That way I can leave it powered up and connected to the stereo. Still, I'm surprised that such a device hasn't been produced yet, simply to replace the almost-obsolete CD format.

For me it's mostly psychological anyway. To really focus on the music, I have to have no other devices in the room but the stereo on. Computers are the worst--I get distracted and end up mucking around on the Internet :)
Click to expand...
You can pick up a brand new tablet cheap.
 
Way off topic for this thread but look into a Raspberry Pi with a DAC running Volumio. You can control it from anything on your network.. phone, tablet, laptop, PC, Apple, Linux, etc.
 
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