OK... 3+ months later, I am back on CD players !
I have run out of luck selling them. The first 3, the 5 CD changer Sony players sold extremely well, in a matter of days and for top money, 50/60 Euros... then and bit later I managed to sell the crappiest of all my players, the Philips CD720 IIRC, for 35 Euros, a miracle.
But the Philips CD824 that I spent 10+ euros to replace the gear/belt kit for the tray... doesn't want to sell, even though I advertise it half the price they go for on Ebay. So I might try to sell it on Ebay instead...
But well. I have run out of luck. There is just no money to be made with these things, can't find parts, and when you can it still doesn't make any financial sense to buy them...
So I got rid of an entire pile of them. All those that were not economically repairable, ie all of them...
Salvage all the circuit boards of course, a box full of them now, and scrapped the rest.
Makes for some much needed room.
So other the CD824 which I will sell one way or another, those that are left I am going to keep I think. Still, that's half a dozen of them !
- Philips CDC 486 6 disc changer, of course, since that's my youth/family player, that I fixed for my dad last X-mas and that he gave to me. It's my daily driver that plays every morning when I shower and every time I work at the bench.
- Another of the same : stumbled upon it, 50 Euros, like new, lower miles than mine, works perfectly and even came with the original remote. Dad lost our one. So that's super. So I bought that one for parts, to make sure I can keep mine going for a long time.
- My two old rebranded Philips CDM11/4 + TDA 1541A : the Radiola CD371 and the Toshiba XR-9128.
Then a couple outsider that I may keep or not in the long term, but will keep for now :
- Technics SL-PJ25 (non working) because of its cool and exotic engineering : its linear pickup motor, and its robustness, built like a tank.
- Thomson LD300 (non-working). Again luck of the draw. Found it cute and looked weird at the front. Looked more like an industrial or professional bit of kit than a consumer grade device... though I am sure it's consumer stuff... I guess. Upon receiving it, that impression was reinforced. Weights a ton despite it's small size, and the back of the unit tells you about the power and wavelength of the laser inside with a big yellow "caution" pictogram... I have yet to see a consumer player that tells you about the wave lenght of the laser inside...
IIRC when I powered it up, didn't work and display was showing garbage. Popped the hood to have a quick look. Found that there was a massive crack/physical damage to the main board ! So obviously many traces must be broken... So this player is also a little challenge : can I manage to fix the circuit board ? Can I fix this player ?...
Will give it a try. if I fail it will probably end up being scrapped like all the others...
So now all I needed to be done with my CD player saga, was to button up the little Radiola so I don't have tons of parts spread all over the shelves, so I can frees some space and tidy things up in the lab.
I did buy the big DI shift register chip and proto board to try and play with that, see if I could revive the LED display. But I gave up on that. Too much other stuff to do, I am moving on. So I ordered the turn-key replacement you pointed me to on Ebay. 37.5 Euros shipped. Just received it today.
Well made. doesn't use the MM54XX big shift register though. Instead the guy used an 8 micro an Atmel AVR and a couple standard shift registers to assit it. He mus be programming them in situ because you can clearly se the foot print for the programming header...
Soldered it, works just fine now, except for the discrete LED corresponding to the " REPEAT "button, which refused to light up. I have not bothered to probe around to see whether the diode had failed or if the module was at fault, because I had more pressing matters to deal with : tried playing a CD. Worked at first... for 10 seconds, then stopped. Works erratically. Sometimes detects teh CD, sometimes not... well you get the picture, same as before.
I tried tweaking the laser trimmer but it was already to the max. I remember now... the player used to work only when the trimmer was at 99M. 100% would not work, 98% neither...so you just had to fart it to stop working.
Now I remember I swapped swing arms with the Toshiba and we concluded it was not the swing arm at fault, IIRC.... so I tried swapping the swing arm from a CDM4/19 IIRC. Can't remember what was the outcome, was so long ago.
Anyway this player doesn't work so I wasted 37.5 Euros on that display module. I am done with it, lost patience, moving on.
Well I will keep it anyway, can't sell it like that, or for so little money it's not work it. Plus I grew fond of it anyway...
So I think I will keep it for parts and am thinking of "upgrading", to a CD400 series, it's bigger brother, the one you've got and modified. IIRC I saw one that had a retractable keypad you can use to key in the track number you want and jump straight to it. I like this feature a lot as it's a pain otherwise to to " long jumps " so to speak. So one day might get one of these players.
Anyway, thanks chaps for teaching me about CD players, learned a lot it was fun.
Think I am done with trying to repair consumer stuff, it's waste of time and no money to be made. I woud still do it to fix my OWN stuff of course, or have a QUICK look at stuff friends bring me, but no more.
For example I would like to find me a nice amp to go with my CD player. Following Shakal's advice I bough the cheapest broken half decent amp I could find, that bottom of the barrel Sony, for 15 Euros shipped... and it does the job. But now I would like something nicer. Better quality front panel/controls/plastics, more stuff inside : Sony is pretty much empty... just a single chip STK design... wold like one with a nice toroïdal transformer and lots of power output transistors....
Don't know about brands models so might look for an old Yamaha "natural sound", and go from there. Of course a defective unit for 30 Euros max !
Anyway. Gonna give that little Thomson a quick go then that will be the end of my journey in CD player land. Was fun, I don't regret it...