DVD player broke...

[Cutlass]

I was given a used DVD player. A Sony 5 disk changer. Doesn't appear to be too old, it has HDMI and 1080i upscaling. So I guestimate probably not much more than 5 years old.

The remote and mechanics work. I opens and closes smoothly, and spins the disks up to speed. But does not read them. It will spin the disk for 2 minutes while saying 'loading' and then give up go on to the next disk and do the same. Once through all of the disks it says 'no disk'. I took the case off and tried compressed air on it. But it really wasn't dirty inside, and that did not improve anything.

Any ideas what is wrong and if it is fixable?

 

[Genocidicbunny]

Are you sure its actually properly spinning the disks, or does it just pop up a 'loading' for a while?

My old DVD player had a similar problem. It would try to load a disk for several minutes, then just die. The read head motor was dead which for a cheap DVD player essentially means its dead. Its not worth the time and effort to replace just that one motor.

Your issue is likely similar. One of the motors is probably worn out and so while it may sound like its spinning, it might just not be enough to actually read anything.

 

[Cutlass]

No, I took the case off. I can watch it spin. And while I don't know the RPM that it is supposed to move at, or what it actually is, it looks pretty fast to me.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

Well if it cant even get up to 1.35mb/s read speeds, you're not gonna get anything out of it. Same if the read head motor is faulty or completely broken.

 

[Cutlass]

As I say, it's spinning, and spinning fast, enough that the label is just a streak. But I have no way of measuring that. I have no money invested in this thing. If I can't work out a cheap fix, it gets junked.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

Could be a shot laser. The CD drive on my moms computer did the same sort of thing. I told her I thought it was a shot laser and then she went and spent $40 to have a repair place tell her the exact same thing. Sigh.

Any strange noises? (Tho' Id think you'd post if you heard them.)

 

[Cutlass]

Nope. All seems normal except it doesn't read the disk. I'll screw around with it when I have some more time. I inherited a group of 8 dvd players, and I'll have to junk at least 5 of them as not worth the effort to fix. The only reason I gave a damn about this one is that, if it had worked, it was a little more capable of the Sony DVD player I have. Mine is old enough so it doesn't have HD upscaling, and a few of my disks are old.