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kgallen

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Everything posted by kgallen

  1. One other check - the lithium battery, BT420, and that the link, CN420, is in place (and not dropped off). I can't find the battery listed on the parts list, but in the other decks it is a Panasonic ML2020. If this is dead then maybe the NT1 looses config information which means the USB driver doesn't detect it properly. Just guessin' (no 'g'...). Just saw the comment above about a "heater". Not sure what the heck this is. Not in this machine! (And I certainly wouldn't describe the laser in record mode as a "heater"!).
  2. Hmmm, if anything from your reports it feels a bit like it could be a hardware reset problem. Looking at the schematics, and I've not seen this in the "normal" decks, is there is a dedicated reset chip, IC420 with cap C420, 330nF. However capacitors don't gain capacitance over time, their capacitive abilities deteriorate. Anyway at 330nF, this is likely to be a ceramic or similar type of cap, and they are stable and last forever (unless physically abused) as there is no electrolyte to dry out or deteriorate. Otherwise this is superficially a fairly straightforward unit. Most of the audio path is on the MD drive, which looks a lot like an MDM7S1A using CXD2664 Type-S DSP (SM says it's an MDM7S2B which must be the next iteration). The DAC is unremarkable and there is no ADC (no analogue record path). The power supply is very straightforward in comparison to most decks and the USB/NET functionality is wrapped up in a single chip with virtually nothing external. All that's left is the microcontroller, again very little external. What is there, two buttons and 3 LEDs on this thing? If I was inside I would check the power supply voltages, the reset generator, then I'm struggling a bit. Maybe 12MHz clock on the USB chip and 10MHz on the uC. Then I'd be suspecting the USB really, and quite possibly the PC end or driver issues. There is nothing much inside here to look at USB-wise as it's all wrapped up in IC901 (CXD1873). USB doesn't supply power although the USB VDD is sensed by the microcontroller via D901 and the potential divider of R904/R903 which will give (5-0.6)*47/(47+22)=3V on IC301 pin 77 when USB is connected. Sorry, that's all she wrote. If you have any more observations on behaviour, post 'em here.
  3. No idea, sorry. The current diagnosis is too vague to pinpoint such a component. I will at some point see if there are schematics but I'll be stabbing in the dark. 5 hours is a very long time for any sensible RC time constant!
  4. Were you using monitor mode? I'm kinda surprised that the Copy Bit setting doesn't affect that, although I guess in reality I'm not that surprised as I guess they wouldn't want to make SCMS defeat too easy. I suspect even having this function on these decks was somewhat a compromise from the RIAA... I suspect actual recording will be the same behaviour as monitor mode. But I'm just as likely wrong...!
  5. I think when you have a collection of rack gear collected together in a rack then i agree I think it looks good in its own way (One lonely rack mount piece of gear does look a bit sad though!) Not ‘front room pretty’ though like the consumer decks! I’m in two minds about juggling a few bits of the case now with this one since at least for now it’s working perfectly. I have a better top lid I can use. And in my OCD I’d also like to match up the case serial number with the main board - since really that is the correct combination re lineage. My working E10 has the main board from another deck so the serial number doesn’t match the heart of the deck. Just my OCD though! E10 and E12 prices are silly at the moment. The messy E12 I bought was just at a level it was worth the punt for a broken unit, but I could easily have come off badly and I might yet come unstuck if the over-voltage event did deeper damage to the reliability. The drive from that unit won’t write so I don’t have a fully working MDM7SC drive spare.
  6. Those budget ones look like they have metal shutters. The Sharp one that arrived inside my recent E12 has a plastic shutter. I’m not keen on those at all (reliability wise - looks like a disc jam waiting to happen…).
  7. Edit: Just looked at the SM, this machine has very little I/O, we might struggle. @sfbp is good with this sort of ‘software’ machine. Much of what I wrote below is irrelevant with this machine. Hi Aaron. So this sounds like an audio path issue rather than a disc read/write issue as such since the disc seems to have good TOC information. Do the VU meters show anything during record or play? If you go into monitor mode (eject disc then press record) do you get any output from either the phono sockets or headphone socket? What about input/output using coax or TOSLINK, can you get any audio in either direction there? Ie known good disc played on the NT1 or disc recorded on the NT1 via TOSLINK or coax rather than analogue.
  8. Hi Aaron, Welcome. Could be a number of issues. Firstly, if you are recording LP2 or LP4 then the playback machine also needs to support MDLP (so decks MDS-x40 and later). If you play back an LP2/4 track on an SP only machine then you will get silence. When you say no sound, I think you're saying there is a track recorded, it's just there is no audio - I'm wanting to rule out an overwrite head issue. If the OWH is broken then the disc will get corrupted, since the laser will erase data but there is no new data recorded. The TOC can get corrupted in this way which makes the disc, or parts of the disc corrupt (usually this disc can be recovered by erasing the problem tracks or doing a title modification and thus rewriting part of the TOC). First steps, can you record a track on a known good machine, and then does this play back on the NT1? If there is really "just one capacitor" that fixes this then we'd be pleased to know (personally, I'm sceptical but happy to be proven wrong!). Kevin
  9. To reiterate here what I found and documented on the SCMS thread: "non-PRO" E10/E12 don't care about SCMS on the input SPDIF/TOSLINK. However they have no way to configure the copy bits on the recording, so the tracks have the same copy bits as the source, i.e. if the incoming signal is Copy Prohibit, then the recorded track is Copy Prohibit too. Note: I don't know what comes out on the output TOSLINK/SPDIF - I suspect the same as the source. The "PRO" versions of these decks allow you to set the recorded copy bits, e.g. the source has Copy Prohibit but you could make the recording Copy Permit or Copy PreRecorded. Again, I don't know what comes out on the output TOSLINK/SPDIF, could be as source or as recorded. That would be an experiment for another day!
  10. Yea we all went back to Newbie! And it takes some fair old work to get up the ranks. I’m only a little ahead because Christopher bumped me on my MD-CD1 post a couple of weeks back. Glad to see you back on here John! Tell us what you’ve been up to with your 470’s (not a model seen about much). Stick something on the ‘This week I’ve been…’ thread if you don’t think you have anything juicy enough for it’s own thread.
  11. I now have a ‘non-PRO’ MDS-E12. i.e. the startup says ‘MDS-E12’ not ‘MDS-E12 PRO’. This machine does *not* have the Copy Bit option in the Setup Menu. However it does (already) have the updated SCMS resistor configuration shown in the SM Supplement. I was intrigued to know how it handled, or didn’t handle SCMS. On one of my PRO MDS-E12 I recorded a track with Copy Bit=Inhibit. I *was* able to record this track from the PRO onto the non-PRO E12 via SPDIF. I took the two discs and tried to copy both the original track and the copied track from my MDS-JE770 to my MDS-JE530 via TOSLINK. For both tracks, the 530 reported ‘Cannot Copy’. Conclusion: A ‘non-PRO’ E12 ignores incoming copy bits regarding SCMS copy control. The copied track appears to have the same copy bit settings as the source track. The former is welcome to know. The latter is expected since the ‘non-PRO’ machines don’t have the menu item to configure the recorded copy bits. I would expect a ‘non-PRO’ E10 to have the same behaviour, but I don’t have a working one to confirm this.
  12. Haha thought that might be the case! Happy to be in good company!
  13. Headphone socket is fine now: resoldered the pins on the headphone jack PCB. Joints can get cold fractures due to the stress of inserting/removing the jack plug. It is mechanically supported too, just not very well.
  14. As promised: "PRO" - have Copy Bit menu item in Setup: MDS-E12 PRO, S/N: 500446, 502802, 503360 MDS-E10 PRO, S/N: 704658 "non-PRO", no Copy Bit menu item in Setup: MDS-E12, S/N: 701332 (Flash "E10E12-449B 875983651") (this thread) <--- S/N not within range of SM Supplement (for E12). Resistors already correct. MDS-E10, S/N: 702121 (Flash "E10E12-449B 875983651") (faulty main PCB, not functioning so can't use for any testing) <--- S/N within the range highlighted for the mod in the SM Supplement (for E10). It already has the resistors set per the SM Supplement mod, but I didn't make this change (R434 fitted, JW302 not fitted). [Other observation: this PCB has the Rohm device for IC104 which is described in the Supplement as used for later decks. This E10 is early for the SCMS change but late enough for the IC104 load/eject motor driver change.) MDS-E12 has gold legends on the display, MDS-E10 has silver legends. Not clocked that difference before now. I though at first it might indicate early/non-PRO vs late/PRO models but it seems to follow E10/E12 instead. What I haven't checked (yet) is whether the "non-PRO" E10 and E12 still ignore SCMS on the input, but just don't have a menu item to set the Copy Bit state as recorded to the track. This was our other thread where this came up recently:
  15. Damn. Predictable! 😄 [Tascam 112 cassette deck was a machine I saved from the skip in a clearout - cleaned up, recapped and new belts and it's also 'good as new' :-) Everything else you've read about on here at some point!]
  16. Just for you Rich. I don’t feel too bad saving this stuff from landfill, I know you lot are just as bad. And no, it doesn’t normally live on the house (well ok some of it does!). One on top being the latest addition. Sorry for grainy photo, I’m shooting into the sun.
  17. Well usually they are hooked up to a Behringer X32 Compact digital mixing desk - now that does have a lot of coloured lights on it. I don't really have a photo of my sound setup for a show (I'm too busy!), but I'll see if I can find something for you Richard - won't be your standard of photo though! I'm not sure I'll trust this "new" E12 for anything serious. However since it is an E12 and has the remote I/O ports, it will come in useful for when I get back to my DMX remote project. Means I'm not risking one of my decent machines should my coding not be quite what it should be!
  18. Not too shonky finally. Parts stolen from the E10 are the transformer assembly, MDM7SC drive, front panel assembly. All of the metalwork is from the E12 but fully disassembled, cleaned and all of the sticky gunk and residue cleaned off (it had some microphone preamp module double-sided taped to the top and lots of those yucky foam-pad cable clips). Creases in it carefully removed with finger pressure and gentle ball-pein hammer on some small dents. I thought it might be too yucky to use but with a bit of elbow grease it’s come up quite ok, so is used. For some unknown reason it records ok now too! Can't figure the Copy Bit - must be different firmware in the later "PRO" models. I need to do a proper check of all of the I/O at some point. These jobs go on forever! Remaining ‘left over’ parts from the E12 were stripped and cleaned. Front panel itself is very bashed but all of the electronics attached to it seem fine (VFD, button PCBs, headphone PCB) and the metal front chassis is fine (not bent or rusty). I straightened the bent AMS spindle carefully in the vice and that seems ok now and the push function works (I thought I might have to try and identify the part and replace it. It looks like it might be a Bournes encoder but could be Alps. I had to do the same fact finding on my Tascam MD-CD1 as that did need a replacement for the MD pitch control). I might use the headphone PCB as the headphone socket on the donor front is a bit iffy.
  19. Sorry I thought you knew! 😄 E11 is a fairly old 1U "pro" deck, pre-MDLP with a green display. Not sure what ATRAC version as the SM doesn't have the drive schematics. Possibly ATRAC1 4.5, but I suspect earlier, as there is the MDS-E52 "pro" deck which is based on the 520 and thus ATRAC1 4.5. The E52 is 2U rackmount though. The E11 User Manual is dated 1998, the E52 also 1998. E10, E12 are from 2001 and are MDLP CXD2662 chipset on MDM7SC drives. My mash-up will be an E12 (not PRO), just with an E10 front panel.
  20. Note also the OWH on the E12 drive checks out ok for resistance and is the same on the E10 drive. So the write problem on the E12 is down to some other problem… We all least for now i have a ‘play’ deck. Hopefully the chassis parts have dried thoroughly over night so I’ll attempt an assembly some time today (although I really must do some ‘house’ jobs!!!)
  21. Absolutely! I’ve never seen anything like this stuff @Richard is posting. Fascinating! Good quality photography too! 😄
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