kgallen

The silk screen printing on my BD board just says MDM7-BD, but as it's a genuine (I presume!) E10 then I'm also presuming all of the external interfaces work including the Serial Control ports (actually surprised the BD board cares about this I would have thought that a function of the Main Board). Not that I need the SC function at the moment... I might get to the point where I have to pull apart my E12 to do some swapping of drives etc to see if I can trace where the fault may lie. As with other debug I'm really resisting that at the moment as I need the E12 working, particularly as I have shows in June and July where I must have it - so I don't want any risk of breaking it! No point me trashing a good E12 for a broken E10. When I'm through July and if I've still not got the E10 going, then I'm going to end up doing some mix-and-match to track down the E10 issues. I don't really want to break either the E12 or the E10 or use one for spares. I'd like to get both working. The default position at the moment is the E12 is fully functional (hope I haven't jinxed that!) and the E10 working would be a welcome addition. For the June show at least I'll be using the E12 and a Tascam MD-350. But the E10 would be so nice to have so I can rack two 1U units (the E12 and the E10) as my main machines (I prefer the Sony interface - I can get at all features from the machine controls, whereas the Tascam I need to have a PS/2 keyboard to access some functions like AutoPause [grrr]). The Tascam will then stay as a backup, but it's in a much larger flight case with a CD player. But you're absolutely right - I don't know where the fault is at the moment, whether it's on the BD or the Main Board. Swapping bits with the E12 might be the only way to find out if my current debug-foo yields nothing! I'm not sure what the SIRCS board is (or if it's separate), I don't recall coming across that one in the SM. The main guts of the machine are the BD, the Main Board (with all of the audio I/O), the front panel/display and the PSU/transformer boards. Plus small boards for the power switch and headphone jack/control. Frustrating because I think (hope!) there's just a tiny-weeny little problem in there to fix. It's just finding the darn thing!!! In the back of my mind though, I'm still slightly nervous that there is a "from new" issue there, given that the deck seems to have had so little use given it's immaculate condition and the odo counts. If there really is some early-life failure somewhere I might struggle to repair it. But... if I can sniff out the problem and get it fixed, I've got myself another top-of-the-range MD machine to use :-) What other machines use the MDM7 board (*)? It would be worth me keeping any eye out for a spares/scraps machine. Thanks for continued help! (*) My list so far: MDS-JB940 MDS-JB930 930/940 units seem to be doing healthy business on eBay here in the UK, no cheap prices and low bid counts to be seen here! It's nice that there's so much interest still in our beloved MD! :-)

It's just a small plastic end-stop/clip at the end of the laser sled. So I took a look at the I2C on pins 21 and 22 of the 27-way ribbon. The data (SDA, pin21) looks very good. The clock (SCL, pin 22) I'm a bit undecided about. With the ribbon cable out, it's a nice clean square clock. With the ribbon in, it seems to be permanently high with some noise on it. I guess I might not have had my scope triggering properly. Certainly this bus has plenty of bursts of data on it. However from the schematics it does just look to go to the 24C08 EEPROM (non-volatile memory). Both of the ribbon cables buzzed out ok. All three motors on the BD board had continuity (sled and spindle ~5 ohms, load motor ~12 ohms). I had a look at some other signals on the ribbons. Noting much of note there. I couldn't see any activity on the loading motor signals (pins 26/27). I had the lid off of the drive and the motor I could hear operating on occasion was the spindle motor, not the load motor. So the drive is thinking there is a disc in there to run that motor and with the sled/laser focus activity seen. I'm a bit concerned the laser sled usually ends up bouncing against the outside end stop. It makes quite a noise so I'm a bit concerned it's being stressed a bit. Didn't see anything interesting on any of the 4 PCB switches (REC-SW, PLAY-SW, OUT-SW, LIMIT-IN-SW). I need to do some more investigation there. The "REFRECT(???)/PROTECT" switch S102 seems to buzz out ok on both its contacts. I had the drive apart a bit more having a look around. Thoughts are that when you insert a disc you press it in slightly which moves the slider a little. This action pushes through the slider and I suspect onto one of those switches on the PCB. I haven't proven this yet but I can't see another mechanism for disc insert detect. I've not had the guts yet to disassemble the BD PCB away from the drive chassis to be able to see the A side of the board where the switches are. That's quite an involved job needing to remove many screws around the PCB and motor assemblies and I don't want to go damaging wires/flexicables or the laser/OWH. I want to exhaust what I can find out from the ribbon cable signals first. Since all of those switches and the load motor just go out onto the ribbon cable, disc load seems to be the responsibility of the main board rather than part of the servo/laser control which is handled by the main servo/DSP IC151 (CXD2662R) on the BD board. So not much progress but nothing "bad" found as yet... Thanks for watching, as they say on YouTube.

Hi Stephen, It's this that I'm looking for. It must be some kind of switch although as yet I can't find a mechanical actuator that goes from the disc slot to any kind of switch. There are 5 switches shown on the schematic: - S101 LIMIT-IN-SW - Not sure but I don't think this is the one. - S102 PROTECT switch - for record defeat, detects the disc record prohibit slider position. This is the one that has the tiny white and blue pins that align with the dimples on the back of the disc when the disc is seated fully into the drive - S103 OUT-SW - Hmmm could this be the one? - S104 PLAY-SW - S105 REC-SW - This and the PLAY-SW are on the other edge of the PCB. I don't think they are related to disc load. All of these - and the loading motor - go straight out to CN102/27P which I think is one of the ribbon cables. So I should be able to probe these. It also means they are monitored and driven by the main board rather than the BD board, so I need to have a look around that PCB for likely issues. Also I2C comes in on the same ribbon, but it only goes to an EEPROM on the BD board, which will be there to tell the main board what type of BD board it is, and probably holds the Iop/Iow settings etc for the laser. More investigation to do... thanks!

I have an MD-350. I think it's slightly higher end and slightly newer than the MD-301. I have the MD-350 service manual, but it's not as comprehensive as the Sony ones. It lists the MD drive unit as an DYME2Z202B. Looking at the mechanical exploded diagrams for the drive, it looks quite a bit different to the drives I see in my Sony units (MDS-JE520, MDS-E12, MDS-E10). I've read elsewhere, probably on this forum, that the drives in the pro Tascam have more metal components (gears etc) than the drives that Sony use, however I don't know this first hand. I don't see a load belt for example in the Tascam drive drawings. For the optical pickup, the Safety Information section of the SM does indeed list this as a Sony KMS-260A, 4.55mW, 785+/-20nm. For what it's worth as I've just seen it, the MD-350 quotes Molicoat YM-103 as the lubricant grease to use. Hope that helps a bit! Kevin

Spawned out my own fun and games to a new topic to avoid hijacking Jim's thread.

Creating a new topic for a fault discussion to avoid hijacking an existing active thread! So I've rescued an MDS-E10 from eBay listed as spares or repairs because of a load failure. I'd like to fix it to use at my local drama society. I already have a working MDS-E12 that might help me fix the E10. Particularly for the next show in June, it would be really beneficial to have both the E12 and the E10. The E10 I've just received is in immaculate, pretty much "as new" condition. It's virtually perfect outside (no rack rash or even signs of being much out of the box really), and inside it's spotless. Not even any dust. In Service mode, the odo counts claim record time "Less than 1 minute" and play time "2Mins". It's possible of course that a previous owner has reset these, but given the apparent unused state of the deck I'm inclined to believe these, which would suggest the load fault has existed pretty much from new. There is no disc stuck in the deck. I've had the lid off and replaced the load belt. I've had a look round and the drive is immaculate - no apparent missing parts, nothing broken, no dirt, no bits of plastic rattling around in the bottom of the case So the symptoms: - On power on, the screen lights up (perfectly), with the MDS-E10 logo and the L/R meter -INF points lit. The drive seems to try to go through a series of initialisation attempts. The L/R -INF points go briefly off a number of times as it goes through a number of cycles. The laser sled moves cleanly, and does some hunting. The laser can be seen trying to focus. The sled ends up on the outer edge of where the disc would be and does a few cycles of end-stop bouncing. There is no disc in the machine. It's as if the machine thinks there is a disc in there. - The drive won't load a disc. On inserting a disc (drive lid is off), it can be seen to activate the slide lock pins as expected. However it won't "grab" the disc and pull it into the machine. Having had the upper frame of the drive off to replace the belt, the rack and slider system that would carry the disk into the loaded position are clean and move freely. I'm at the point of thinking the load switch on the BD board is not operating. However this is on the "A" side of the PCB and is thus not at all accessible. However from the schematics it seems like the 4 switches on the BD board (load, limit, play, rec) are commoned to ground on one side and then go to the ribbon connector to the main board on the switched side - so in theory I could get the Fluke or a scope on there and see if these switches are operating. I haven't done this yet. - During these initial "cycles" on occasion you can hear a motor run for a few seconds (a different one to whatever servos are moving the sled and doing the laser movement). Looking inside, I've never seen the disc motor spinning (well there isn't a disc in, so that would be ok) so the only other motor is the load motor, but since this is much deeper into an assembled drive it's harder to see. - So after the drive has done this 3 or 4 times, it "gives up" and the screen changes to the "IIC STOP" message. However the drive does then go on to "try again". sfbp has suggested there is a fault in the IIC control bus: However I think at this point I'm more hopeful as I've seen the drive go through a number of "control based" actions (sled move, laser focus) that hopefully means this isn't the case. However IIC (or I2C as I more usually know it) is a fairly simple 2-wire serial protocol, so should it really come down to this then I think I could take a look at this - I think my 'scope has an I2C protocol decode on it too. However for now I think I want to check some of the other "simpler" mechanical functions and switch sensors. Anyway, thanks for listening thus far! If you've any ideas, please post them. I'll update with what I find. Thanks to Jim on the previous thread for posting the video on the "rear release clip" for getting easy access to the load belt. Thanks also to sfbp for posting about the IIC Stop. I'm sure we'll be having more dialogue on this one! Given the excellent state of this deck I'm really hoping there is some daft simple problem that is stopping this deck working! Regards, Kevin

Jim - thanks for sharing that video! I just replaced the load belt on my "new" eBay rescued MDS-E10 in about 5 minutes! (5/16" ortho band, seems tight enough). However I'm still having load problems. The deck still won't pull the disk in. Can't see any obvious problems in the disk mechanism - nothing apparently broken, missing or springs unattached, everything smooth. Seems the disc mechanism won't initialise properly either - it tries for a bit then ends up with "IIC Stop" message when it gives up. It's an eBay rescue deck, but it's in immaculate condition, seems hardly used - probably because of this issue! Sorry, not intending to hijack the thread, just sharing the "pain"! Kevin

Thoroughly enjoyed watching that, thanks for posting! Kevin

Thanks guys, interesting... I'll have a play with the settings when I get a few moments after our run of shows is finished in a couple of weeks.

Slightly incomplete info and only 14 years late to the thread, but hey, I'm back in the "MD game" as it were... I have just acquired an MDS-E12, UK spec. The Setup menu has a Copy Bit setting. This is not described in the User or Service Manual. It has options: PreRecorded, Inhibit and Permit. I haven't yet determined what each setting does, but it looks interesting for SCMS. It's possible SCMS is only forced on US-spec machines as it was that juristiction that forced the implementation of SCMS in the first place (so I understand).

Hurrah, at last I've found the correct connector for the IOP/measurement port. JST SH1.25 6 pin. Only took me 3 goes... https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/5-PAIRS-6-PIN-Micro-JST-SH1-25-Connector-Plug-Socket-1-25mm-150mm-Cable-/272781618226?hash=item3f830d2c32

Hurrah, at last I've found the correct connector for the IOP/measurement port. JST SH1.25 6 pin. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/5-PAIRS-6-PIN-Micro-JST-SH1-25-Connector-Plug-Socket-1-25mm-150mm-Cable-/272781618226?hash=item3f830d2c32

Hey fella, it's not your fault! I looked up the spec on the thing and thought it just might fit. "Nice" though it is, it just aint gonna go! The whole head is just too large to tuck in under the OWH and get close to the OP. It's got a bendy bit to the shaft but that doesn't help in this instance. That Sanwa LP1 looks quite cute - and annoyingly not that much more than I paid for the BC20... :-( It's a shame I can't seem to raise NGY - I bet he's got some of those PCBs he made lying around...! We'll get there in the end!!! Quite interesting if a little frustrating (and costly...!). Kevin

Brief update... my 530 is still playing up. Fiddling with the LDPWR for read up and down by 3 clicks is not helping. The LPM I bought from eBay has a sensor head that is just too big to get anywhere near the OP what with the OWH in the way and all that. So I'm now looking at building an in-disc LPM like NGY did: Unfortunately there is not much detailed circuit info I can glean from the otherwise excellent set of photos that NGY posted. However I have bread-boarded a design using a BPW34 photodiode and a LTC1050 op-amp configured as a transimpedance amplifier (TIA). This is working nicely on the bench with an LED torch, but this is of course not 780nm light and nor do I know how much the laser light will impact the PD surface. Thus I don't really know what gain to set the TIA at! On the bench with the torch, a 1M feedback resistor gives a nice voltage range with a 5V PSU but I've no idea how the MD's LD will compare! I guess I'll have to make a PCB with a number of options for selecting/paralleling resistors and "suck it and see". I've also been trying (in vain so far) to get the correct connector for the IOP socket on the MDM-5 drive. It looks like a JST connector but the 1.0mm SH series is too small, and the 1.5mm ZH series is too large. Having tried to measure the pin pitch, I've found a 1.25mm version, that the eBay sellers are suggesting is GH series - although when I look into this on the JST website, it looks completely the wrong style of connector! There's a similar Molex connector series, but no-one on eBay is selling any pre-made leads, and I'm not getting into buying crimping tools! This is starting to feel like a "principal of" job now. I could have bought 3 machines at the current rate of spend.... :-( More updates in due course... sigh...

Where are you geographically? eBay in the UK has plenty of Sony machines going for a reasonably low price (~50GBP). Is this not so wherever you are? Kevin

Oh heck, it's 2018 and I've (re)joined this strangely addictive club. Can I hold back at 5 machines (4 of which I use, 1 I'm trying my best to repair)? Now I'm panic buying new blanks. There's no hope. How many addicted members are still active in this area in 2018? I see from eBay today that full-size machines are still selling well - lots of bids and pretty decent prices on the good-condition machines. I must stop looking...must stop...must stop...!

Hi, Looking at the SM p55 CN701 (which mates to CN800 on p43).I don't know what type if loom this is, but as it looks to be double row from the PCB layout, maybe the connector is pin-in-body type. If it is, is it possible to swap around pins 7 and 9 in the CN701 mating connector? This will swap JOG0/JOG1 and possibly could correct your rotation direction issue. I've recently replaced a similar encoder in my Tascam MD-CD1, and also had to use a Bournes part because the Alps part with the correct shaft length is discontinued. Fortunately the Bournes was pretty much an exact replacement and works correctly (if maybe a little stiffer). Regards, Kevin

Stephen - I don't mind either way, your help has been invaluable, thank you. When the LPM arrives I'll see if I can fathom that out and piece together more of the puzzle! Thanks! Kevin ETA: Nope we're not playing "read the TOC" any more on the 11 setting (or the 10 setting!). Disc reads fine in the '520, but the '530 he say C13 at the moment! Back to the drawing board...!

So tonight, ye olde MDS-JE530 decided, from "cold" (room temperature) that it didn't want to read discs. Aha, here's my chance to have a tweak of the laser read power! (I don't have an LPM yet, so just nudging one step as per Stephen's suggestion). Starting point: LDPWR 0.9mW$10 (for reference/comparison LDPWR 7.0mW$91) Try one click down to 0F -> NG. Go back to 10 -> still NG. Go two clicks down to 0E -> NG. Try one back up to 0F -> NG. Try back at original value 10 -> NG. Let's go crazy and go one click up, try 11 -> TOC reads and is still doing so with a few more loading trials... So is this real or just concidence, or maybe it's warmed up a bit - ok the whole sequence only took a couple of minutes, but who knows! Let's test again some more now, and try again "from cold" tomorrow! Is it possible that this machine has so few running hours because the factory setup was just a touch too low for read making it unreliable for the original owner with the C13 Read Error problem? I can't see that the laser output power would have deteriorated with the recorded use it's had. Cosmetics don't suggest the machine has had heavy use and thus might have been "clocked". Maybe a little early to judge or draw conclusions, I guess only time will tell! OK, so just for interest I adjust back to the original value of 10 -> surprise, surprise, TOC reads! I think I'll go back to the 11 setting and test again tomorrow. Who can tell! I've just had a look at the settings on my fully-functioning MDS-JE520. I get: 0.9mW$11, 7.0mW$96, 0.7mW$0D, 6.2mW$85, IOP=55.8/55.4. I think this leaves me a little more comfortable trying the 11 setting on the 530, although I realise all of the lasers have the drive tuned to match their particular characteristics.

Ok, job done! Cheers. I’ll let you know...! Kevin

Sorry for the late nudge on this one. NGY, can you remember the part number/style of this 6P plug for the IOP measurement jig? The SM does not identify the manufacturer/series number. It may well be a JST part as is common with Japanese kit - certainly my Tascam MDs seem to use JST PCB connectors, but a tiny variety! Also the PCB inside the MD shell - is that one you designed/etched yourself? It's very neat! Thanks, Kevin

Hmmm, interesting. What sort of device would I be looking for (sorry it would be "on eBay"...), makes, models to look at and to avoid, and does it need any "attachments" such as a "remote" sensor that can be positioned close to the OP with the OWH in the way? What sort of money would I be looking at (any currency I can convert to GBP!). Needs to be able to sense 780nm light, clearly! So as an example does this look appropriate? Handles 780nm and power range to 20mW. The sensor looks a little on the large size for MD access but seems to be "the right sort of thing". https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/OPHIR-laser-power-Meter-Monitor-USED/253314347677?hash=item3afab6329d:g:xeIAAOSw-jFaM-V3 http://www.ophiropt.com/laser--measurement/laser-power-energy-meters/products/Laser-Photodiode-Sensors/Special-Photodiode-Sensors/BC20 Thanks!

Hi Stephen, Well this had me completely foxed the other day when I was trying to find the IOP value. Everything I read online suggested I was looking for a pen-written number. On the top of the OP there was a printed number in blue, but this did not have the format I expected for the IOP. However... when I was inspecting the mechanism for broken teeth etc I spotted the edge of a label on the underside of the OP sled. By winding the sled gears to move the sled to a mid-track position I was able to move the label into a small window/cutout in the transport metalwork. And this label was the ID information as shown on p27 of the SM: a computer printed 3-line label showing KMS260B/19X91/H0564. So in the end not a number scribbled on with a permanent marker, but a proper printed label! The testing regime must have come along a step or two! So back to the machine, and of course by writing this I will doom things, but today I've not made the JE530 fail at all. I played with it this morning and it was fine, I left the machine on all day whilst I was at work, I came home this evening and had a play and it's behaving. Maybe the new grease has soaked in a bit! So I'm going to hold off on the IOP tweak just for now. I will however report back if the desk gets up to mischief again! Thanks and regards, Kevin

When you say "one notch" is this "one notch" of the tenths value (viz change down from 56.4 to 56.3) or the units (56.4 to 55.4)? I will presume the tenths for now as a "small" change! Thanks for the help.

As I understand it, it's supposed to contain the value on the label on the laser which I presume is some measurement made at the factory to set the drive current required for the laser to emit a specified intensity of light. I then presume (!) that the IOP value is used by the controller to set the laser current used - how this is translated for reads and writes I don't know, as the two values will be quite different to achieve the low-power read and the high-power write (Curie temperature) requirements. I don't think the SM gives much background, but I'll have a read again tonight to see if it makes more sense now I'm considering "having a fiddle" with it! I've not got any pre-recorded MDs; all of mine are MO type. I quite fancy getting Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds on MD though! Thanks for the LDPWR info.