MDS-JA333ES Relay Clicking

[Timbo Sony]

Took delivery of a faulty MDS-JA333ES won on an auction site.

 

Listed as faulty so worth a look. Quite a heavy beast!

 

With the lid off it was clear someone had been tampering, MD mech had screws missing and ribbon cables left unconnected. On taking out the mech the BD PCB had been unsoldered to get at the laser so it's probably duff. Put that to one side to reassemble to try in another machine. 

 

I've got a spare 20ES with the same MD mech so put that it in. On power up no display with the main power relay RY901 cycling on and off, no display or response to any buttons including test mode. 

 

Checked the obvious for other leads removed- I do know if the micro can't talk to the mech it will click the relay and not power up, but can't see any other evidence of messing around. The service manual doesn't say anything from what I can see about no powering up faults. 

 

Could just be a case of checking all supplies are present but the relay is controlled by IC801 display control IC, so I think it's trying to tell me something.

 

Any ideas anyone? Thanks!

 

PS, is Jim Hogarth still around? Don't want to pester him if he is not part of the forum currently.

[sfbp]

Hmmm.. my ignorance here. Does the IOP value (which is either measured by voltmeter or copied off the OP itself where some kind person usually writes in INK on the top what is printed and inaccessible on the bottom!) get written to the mechanism somewhere, or is it stored in the main board? IE where is the so-called NVRAM? If it's in what's left behind after you took out the duff mechanism (and I think it is), you're going to have to write the IOP value from the replacement mechanism into that machine.

 

Jim doesn't respond these days, but he is definitely around. You could look him up (you'll find it easily) and send him a written letter perhaps.....

 

OK, back to your immediate problem.

 

What does the deck do with NO mechanism connected?

[Timbo Sony]

 

Hi, the deck will not power up with or without the mech connected. Symptoms are exactly the same- no display and constant clicking of relay RY901.

 

So this makes me wonder if there's a problem with one of the ribbon cables, perhaps damaged by the rough treatment of the person who butchered it in the first place. I know these ribbon cables are a bit fragile. If the micro can't communicate it goes into a mode something like this but no mention in the service manual.

 

There must be some one out there who knows!

 

Photos show inside the deck with the donor mech fitted, actually the condition isn't too bad otherwise. The 2nd is the faulty mech as found in the 333ES, suspect someone had a go at either changing the laser and gave up, discovered it wasn't the fault and gave up......or was just poking around........then gave up!

[sfbp]

I'd be surprised if it's anything to do with the mechanism then. You could try seeing what a working deck does with no mechanism at all. Maybe something about it will remind you about what's different from your busted machine.

[Timbo Sony]

Original OPU definitely faulty, got a spare. Ribbon cables are OK, perhaps not a coms issue with IC801.

 

IC280 on the POW board is the Regulator/Reset Gen, need to check around here me thinks.

[Timbo Sony]

Hmmmm, the LA5643 IC system reset is triggered depending on the VBAK condition on pin 11, which in turn is connected to the lithium battery. The battery looked a bit bent out of place and is easily knocked by removing the deck. Perhaps the rough handling has caused damage here. Time to remove the POW board and do some checks. A job for an other day, it's far too late.

[sfbp]

Ah the old "dead backup battery" problem, you think?

[Timbo Sony]

Right, had a chance to do a bit more work on this since coming back from working away.

 

The 20ES MD mech was causing the deck relay to cycle on and off. On closer inspection the ATRAC chip is different. The 333ES uses a CXD2662R (MDLP), while the 20ES employs the earlier CXD2656R. 

 

I swapped the BD boards so the CXD2662R chip is on the working mech from the 20ES. The unit will now power up normally, will load a disc but displays no disc after attempting to read the TOC. The laser does not appear to be focusing. I've checked the 5v and 3.3v rails, and all seem to be present on IC152 the focus/tracking/spindle & sled motor driver. I'm starting to suspect this IC could be the cause. Does anyone know if this is likely to be the case, a known fault or any other checks I should make first?

 

The laser is known to be good and I have entered the laser power into the EPROM using the procedure in the manual, the only thing I have not done is the check with the laser power meter (not got one). But the laser should still pump up and down anyway. Thanks!

[sfbp]

I'm not sure that you can so easily expect MDLP BD boards to read much of anything in a unit designed for SP, I may be entirely wrong though. I have a feeling there's extra (control) circuitry for things like telling the MD what kind of disk - though of course on playback this may well not matter. Did you check the pinouts of the connecting cables against each other?

 

Jim's the only one who really knows things about the details like specific ICs and their function.

[Timbo Sony]

The two BD's boards are identical apart from IC121 which is the main ATRAC and digital signal processor etc. I suspect the firmware would be different too in the EPROM. All connectors match and board architecture match.

 

The fault symptom now is Read Error C13. As the laser doesn't go through the focus routine on loading a disc even though it lights up, I suspect the Driver and/or Focus Tracking Error Amp IC's.

 

Is Jim off limits now on this forum? I don't want to bother him if he's not wanting to be contacted.

[punkrockaddict]

HI there

My own 333ES had Relais clicking too and no display would light up.

I was able to fix it easily by checking the Ribbon cables and just seated them into again.

The one that was bad seated was the one where the flexribbon w cellotape is sticked to the Board. ( right behind the AMS jog )

 

Also considering the C13 i already fixed some Decks.All with the same issue.. a little thing.

I located this by comparing two identical Decks next to each other.

Damn i don´t have pictures anymore. I try to get a picture .. maybe they are left on some usb stick around

It was a bad seated ( too low ) plate on that stick that drives the disc.Just where the disc gets seated into to spin, u know what i mean ?

I recognized the faulty ones with C13 were somehow too low and just pulled them up.That was it ^^

Disc inserted and olá it was working like as if there had never been anything else.

 

Maybe you can compare with another Deck and fix this easily.

 

greets

[MDX-400]

The idea that MD-SP hardware might not read MDLP data is an interesting one, though I don't think it's necessarily true.  If we look at our friend PhillipeC's spreadsheet we can see that indeed the pickups are slightly different between a JA333ES and a JA20ES.  The former uses a KMS-260A while the latter uses a KMS-260B.  However I believe these are interchangeable anyway, though I'm not 100% sure.

Best example I can remember though is the story of a guy that modified his MDX-66XLP to have optical output.  As people might remember the MDX-65 had optical out (this was used mainly for Sony car DSP units back then) and was SP only while the MDX-66XLP was the later model, nearly exactly the same except the chassis colour and the fact that it could play MDLP discs.  The unit also lacked the optical out the 65 had.  These units also have a similar optical pickup dissimilarity--the 65 uses a KMS-241A while the 66XLP uses a KMS-241C.  I remember talking to the guy (email) about how he went about accomplishing the optical output on the 66XLP.  I assumed he had used the easiest route and gotten the optical out components from the 65 and simply put them in the otherwise identical-chassis 66XLP. Funny enough he said he had never thought of that, LOL!  Instead of doing this (which would have been much easier), he did something else.  He had access to surface mount soldering gear so he actually changed the ICs in the 65 to any that were different in the 66XLP!  Instead of making a 66XLP have optical out, he made a 65 be able to read/play MDLP instead!  He never mentioned having to change pickups so if we go by that, it should be the case that non-LP pickups can indeed read LP data.

The second evidence to support that would be the fact that non-MDLP units will play LP discs, but they just ignore the audio data.  They play the discs as if they were mono (IIRC?) and the time counter still increases; they also get the track name header "LP2" or "LP4" displayed along with the track name.  However LP tracks have a bit set so the decks know not to try to decode the data as audio.  

 

So I'm thinking that a KMS-260A should have no problem reading an LP disc in LP hardware, in place of a 260B.  I've never heard of this being done before but I'm at least pretty sure they are interchangeable.  Perhaps someone like Phillipe could chime in and confirm?

[sfbp]

All good information, thanks for that contribution. Very interesting, some of it.

 

Back to Timbo's problem I have a feeling that he's almost there, C13 just means the data isn't being read yet. Probably laser power adjustment - that's exactly what one of my decks did with a new drive in it.

 

BTW: what can/would/should one do with optical out from an MD changer? Is there actually a car-based unit with optical or S/PDIF input?

[punkrockaddict]

Yea he said that already. The DSP´s used in the 90´s had digital in. I used to have one back in the days ...

[Timbo Sony]

Thanks all for the input and interesting comments.

 

Sony released a tech bulletin about the differences in the 260A and B lasers, the glue is a different colour but can't remember the other differences but there is some compatibility I think. I will find it out and attach.

 

Back to the faulty 333ES, what is the disc loading procedure? I think it's once the MD is loaded laser power up for reflectivity, focus to find track containing the TOC then spin the disc to read? Iv'e sorted the ribbon cables, yes can be very troublesome. 

 

I've got no focus, sled or spindle action even in test modes. Laser does light. Would laser power levels cause this? I still suspect IC's on the BD board.

 

Thanks 

[jonathanpotato]

Yes, 260A and 260B are fully interchangeablee.

Even 260E can be interchanged with them but needs to be configurated (calibrated) differently about the laser power in service mode.

 

KMS-xxxx had nothing to do with MDLP or not, the only fonction of the OPU is to read the disk and erase the disk by hot burning in rec mode.

MDLP depends of DSP features (CXDxxxx capability) and firmware (= SYSCON) too of course.

[Timbo Sony]

Thanks Jonathan for that info.

 

Can anyone also confirm the laser parameters are held in the EPROM on the BD board, so in theory if can swap the whole mech with the BD board into a similar deck and it would work? Thanks

[sfbp]

You've got it. The one that is important is the IOP value. See page 8 of the JA20ES service manual.

[jonathanpotato]

Seems to be that something had been misunderstood.

 

Laser calibration values are stored in BD Board yes. But the IOP value is not a calibration value.

The IOP value entered manually in the service mode doesn't help the deck to configure the new installed laser. It doesn't care at all. 

It's just a comfort feature to get the actual IOP value of the installed OPU without removing the whole mechanism to read the tiny label on the OPU itself when comparing what you have on multimeter (connected IOP output pin on the 6P service connector). It's just a value (stored in NVRAM/EEPROM) that you can read and write (when you put a laser in place), but the value itself was not used at all by BD board and circuits to configure/manage the laser.

 

Laser calibration values are stored in BD Board yes, so

 

- If you swap both matched BD-Board + OPU, you have nothing to do.

- If you swap one part of the two, you have to redo all the adjustments to apair new BD-Board + OPU couple. Not just only the IOP. It will works if adjustements are not "re-done"; but both components are just working "out of specs" and some problem can occurs about reading and writing discs like recorded discs can be badly readed on other devices because badly recorded.

 

Hope it was more clear.

[sfbp]

That explains why the earlier decks do not have the "write IOP" procedure. Makes perfect sense, I was always confused by this - but I do know from bitter experience that the IOP value is critical in being able to set the read power without help of laser power meter (since most people don't have one). Writing doesn't matter much, as it uses 10x the amount of current/intensity, but small variations in the read power will cause C13. As you say, this only becomes important when you change the OP itself. This often presents as a "write failure" but in reality I assume there is some problem reading immediately after a write where the servo fails to focus or whatever other fault triggers the C13 or C14.

[jonathanpotato]

but I do know from bitter experience that the IOP value is critical in being able to set the read power without help of laser power meter (since most people don't have one)

 

IOP value is an indication about laser diode degradation. If you want to calibrate the laser a LPM is needed.

IOP value doesn't give a real idea of the light emitted laser power.

 

I have the chance to have one. But I think you can't do a good job without.

 

It's the relation between the laser diode consumption in mA given by the IOP measurement + the laser light measured by the LPM in mW that said if the laser uses the right amount of energy to produce the right amount of emitted light energy on the other side. If there is derivation between the two (more than the 10% tolerance indicated in Sony SM's), is the fact that the laser diode begins to fail.

 

Adjusting record power needs more accuracy than adjusting read power that it can be adjusted roughly (for thoses who doesn't had a LPM) in service mode.

 

• Changing LDPWD for reading (0.7-0.9mW) slightly (increase or decrease by 3 hexa values) can be done by users safely without LPM if it can solve some reading problems, It's dirty but safe for discs and device because the jump was tiny : 0.1mW and the laser is in low-power mode.
•  
• Changing LDPWD for writing (7mW) absolutely needs a LPM because changing the value directly give a jump of + or - 0.3mW on the LPM for each hexa value, and as it run in high-power mode, it's unsafe because it can make the laser works higher that the IOP rated value written on the label, and more near of the limit that the diode can support = life duration shorted and overheated recorded disc more than the 180°C Currie point needed.

[sfbp]

Oh well, we have different views of the same thing. But I do have a laser power meter, and I have played extensively with both read and write power on some units. I agree that changing the write power may affect the life of the laser (one clue is: does the disk get too hot when recording?), but in the SHORT term, the read adjustment is much more critical. Without accurate adjustment of the read power, you will never be able to complete a recording, because the writing of the TOC will fail. Why? Because in order to WRITE the TOC, the device needs to READ it, allowing the new entries in the TOC to be added to what is already there. When it fails to read the old TOC, the unit invariably gives an error message, even if the existing TOC was completely blank!

[jonathanpotato]

It's critical in the way that if the read power is too low the disc will not be detected / TOC not read well / music dropouts and bad mecha noises. But you know if that the read power is sufficient already when you but the disc in at start : if the TOC is read when you put the disc in, why it cound't read again at the and of a recording process ?

 

Anyway, TOC is not read at the end, TOC is not "modified" on disc, old TOC is just fully erased and replaced (overwritten) by the complete modified one from the RAM of the deck, no need to re-read it.

 

In case of bad read power laser you can get "Retry" or "Retry Error" messages during recording.

[sfbp]

I think perhaps what you neglect is that if the read power is TOO HIGH (sorry for shouting, please don't be offended!) the read will fail just as badly as when the read power is too low. This can easily happen when the overall power to laser is too high (such as when a new OP that is not needing so much power to drive it, is installed). Writes almost never fail.

[jonathanpotato]

Read will never fail if you increase the hex value only by 3 in service mode as I said before.

It begins to be a problem for circuits (RF amp) much further in hex values. RF signal will be higher but very far from the saturation level of the RF amp input.

 

Anyway, It's not a good solution to solve the real cause of a bad disc reading but it's clearly safe if it can help someone to back an unit to life if doesn't have a LPM, in my opinion, but like said before it's dirty. You are not have to be agree with me.

[sfbp]

I don't think we disagree.

[Timbo Sony]

This is very interesting stuff and helping me to work out how the whole loading process of an MD disc works. Is there a "black book" for MD like there is for CD? 

 

I did go on a Sony MD training course in 1999, but have forgotten a lot of the theory. 

 

Back to my faulty 333ES: I'm trying to source a small number of BF6511FS and CXA2523AR (BD board motor driver and processor) which is where I think the fault lies. I haven't scoped the pins of the IC's yet, just check the correct supplies are there because of time.

 

Jonathan, I notice on your YouTube video of the 20ES resurrection you replaced these two IC's for a very similar fault. Did the faulty 20ES not have any focusing/sled or spindle action too? Thanks!

[sfbp]

You have mail; check your pm box

[jonathanpotato]

Jonathan, I notice on your YouTube video of the 20ES resurrection you replaced these two IC's for a very similar fault. Did the faulty 20ES not have any focusing/sled or spindle action too? Thanks!

 

I repaired this deck for someone.

 

The CXA2523AR was replaced because unable to switch between read and write laser power. Always stuck at 4.5 mW on my LPM (APC pin shorted to ground)

The BH6511FS was replaced because partially broken : focus/sled/tracking OK but the spindle motor does not turn, PWM commands from CXD DSP arrived to it but no power given to motor. Motor was tested OK with an external PSU.