My f#^$%k$*#(##@(*&&@#$#$ DVD player keeps skipping

[SETEC_Astronomy]

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to fix a DVD player with a chronic skip problem? The DVD's skip whether the player is hot, cold, off all day, on all night, on-off-on-off, new disc, old disc, burned disc, purchased movie, etc... Some days it skips some days it doesn't. What can it be? I have opened up the unit and everything seems fine. I can also say that no matter what the outcome here I will never accept, buy or go near a Daewoo ever again. The player is barely a year old. This thing has me on edge I'm seconds away from pulling an Office space on it. This has to be more frustrating than a fax machine. Please help!!!!

[philba]

welcome to "walmarted" electronics. I'd just go buy a new one and take the warrantee extension if it's reasonably cheap. today's mass market electronics are pretty much all crap.

[haklesup]

For older generations of CD players this was often caused by the laser diode wearing out but for a 1 year old DVD this seems unlikely but plausable.

It could also be something haywire in the focus feedback circuit. In any case unless you can actually finger the problem to a passive part or findable IC. the cost of repair will probably exceed the cost of replacement.

I haven't tried this but you should be able to see the laser with a cell phone camera etc. you might get some additional clues about whats going on but I'm not sure what those might be without trying it myself first. Maybe flicker or you might see the focus ramping in and out. Its a tight angle you're not meant to see so I am not too sure it will help.

[Craig]

I'd say buy a new one. For the $20 for a cheapie, or $100 for a decent one, it's not worth your time totry fixing it.

[SETEC_Astronomy]

Well I took it apart and checked everything I could think of. I looked for loose parts, touching parts, burnt parts, hot parts, etc.... I found nothing suspect. I opened up the drive within the player and inspected the lens and all associated parts with a jewelers loupe and found a few things that seem like a big deal. I found strands of hot melt glue stretched all over inside. I found lint trapped within the glue that holds the magnet wire attached to the lens. The wire that goes to the coils to focus the laser. That seems like a real bad defect to have lint in the glue not to mention that close to the laser and it's other parts.

I would like to do something about it but wouldn't you know the warranty is up. Big surprise. If you can sue over coffee being hot can't I sue for emotional distress + pain and suffering? Maybe I owe them more money now for the therapy received by means of smashing the DVD player.

This brings up a thought I had awhile ago. Every big company has copiers and fax machines. Every company always has problems with these machines. The companies that make these types of machines no doubt also use them. Do the employees ever think man our products bite? What do the people who make these cheap products use in their own homes? It all makes me very mad, if you hadn't already noticed.

</Rant></Rave></Bitch_Session>

On a side note does anyone want to buy a slightly used DVD player?

[Janitor Tzap]

Well I took it apart and checked everything I could think of. I looked for loose parts, touching parts, burnt parts, hot parts, etc.... I found nothing suspect. I opened up the drive within the player and inspected the lens and all associated parts with a jewelers loupe and found a few things that seem like a big deal. I found strands of hot melt glue stretched all over inside. I found lint trapped within the glue that holds the magnet wire attached to the lens. The wire that goes to the coils to focus the laser. That seems like a real bad defect to have lint in the glue not to mention that close to the laser and it's other parts.

I would like to do something about it but wouldn't you know the warranty is up. Big surprise. If you can sue over coffee being hot can't I sue for emotional distress + pain and suffering? Maybe I owe them more money now for the therapy received by means of smashing the DVD player.

This brings up a thought I had awhile ago. Every big company has copiers and fax machines. Every company always has problems with these machines. The companies that make these types of machines no doubt also use them. Do the employees ever think man our products bite? What do the people who make these cheap products use in their own homes? It all makes me very mad, if you hadn't already noticed.

</Rant></Rave></Bitch_Session>

On a side note does anyone want to buy a slightly used DVD player?

Ah,
the throw away society we live in.

This reminds me of the two year old UNISYS monitors I got in.
I tried to get a schematic from UNISYS.
But they said they don't keep schematics or parts on equipment that is over two years of age.
If it was under the 2 year mark they would gladly replace it.

Out of the six monitors.
I was able to get four working by gutting out what usable parts from the two worst monitors.

As for this Daewoo...
Sounds like a bad laser head.
They run from $7.50 to $50, depending on the manufacturer.

Thou, you could try some Isopopyl Alcohol on a lint free cloth, and carefully wipe the lense off.
Let it dry, then try it.
I've seen a few players that had smoke, tar build up on the lense.
This would block the laser beam enough too cause some skipping.


Signed: Janitor Tzap

[dacflyer]

everything is now a trash can model..

rember the mottos big companys used to have..

one comes to mind.. "Zenith" quality goes in , before the name goes on.
"GE" we bring good things to life,, ya right .
i am sure theres a lot more that i cannot think of right now

[Timothy Rasch]

Hi , a Friend of mine that works on dvds says the motor that spins the dvd has a high failure rate which can cause startup ,playing problems. Matt Electronics sells the motor for about $7.00 plus shipping. I don't think the laser head being about a year old is the problem unless you damaged the coils at the glue seals that you talked about. If it is damaged the laser assembly is about $80 and tough to install .Must be done very carefully.Try cleaning the lens with denatured alcohol and the traverse gears of debris. Also the motor that drives the traverse gears[another high failure part] would cause the skipping problems . Hope this helps . Tim Rasch [email protected]

[bigkim100]

I would like to do something about it but wouldn't you know the warranty is up. Big surprise. If you can sue over coffee being hot can't I sue for emotional distress + pain and suffering? Maybe I owe them more money now for the therapy received by means of smashing the DVD player.

This brings up a thought I had awhile ago. Every big company has copiers and fax machines. Every company always has problems with these machines. The companies that make these types of machines no doubt also use them. Do the employees ever think man our products bite? What do the people who make these cheap products use in their own homes? It all makes me very mad, if you hadn't already noticed.

</Rant></Rave></Bitch_Session>

On a side note does anyone want to buy a slightly used DVD player?[/quote]


Well, as far as pain and suffering nobody is going to award you anything because you are wound up too tight.

Man, where have you been the last couple of years...living under a rock?
This is nothing new, and has been endlessly discussed in this forum a million times.
The outcome that I have gleamed from all these postings is:
-Brand names now mean NOTHING (they are sold, traded, and liscenced out to any other company, at any time)
-VERY FEW consumer items are now meant to be serviced, unless you want to go to a 3rd party supplier...and HOPE that the kludge works. Most units will have only a handfull of parts in them to fix anyways, with custom large scale integration ICs.
-USUALLY THERE ARE NO PARTS/SCHEMATICS available. As far as parts go, if 200,000 DVD players are produced...200,000 cases are made, 200,000 remotes are made, 200,000 motherboards are made....etc, etc.
WHY-because it costs money to keep a infastructure of parts inventory, and repair info.
-WHY because the average item is marked up over 200% of what it costs to build....so why the hell is a manufacturer that pays $6.00 to build your DVD player, going to pay someone $15.00 an hour (I dont know the going rate for home unit repair) for a unit that retails under $50.00.
-AND ultimatly (even though I could go on with a couple of thousand more points), the average consumer only keeps their electronics for a couple of years, instead of 20 years that our parents used to. Why-because every year, a whole new crop of consumer electronics come out that are smaller (except for TVS,)more powerful, cooler looking,etc, etc...but most importantly CHEAPER!!

And as far as I know, I really dont think that the average employee overseas spends a hell of a lot of time thinking about the produact they are manufacturing. Most employees are just happy to get $3.00 a day for their 16 hours of work, that will just barely feed their children hot food, and put a roof over their head.

[haklesup]

I disagree that brand names mean nothing. While some brands do mean nothing (bell & howell for example) other brands are very proud of their reliability record and efforts. As someone who travels to semiconductor and equipment factories worldwide, I work with reliability and failure analysis engineers and can attest that some companies (brands) do in fact spend a great deal of money and effort ensuring the reliability of their products. Other companies however do not try as hard.

As a savvy shopper you can find out who is good and who is not if you care to take the time to research on the web and avoid being an early adopter. In my experience most Korean brands are quite high quality, its built into the manufacturing community if you have ever been there. Daewoo is rather newer to the US market and originally a car and industrial equipment manufacturer so I doubt DVDs are their core competancy. If you had bought a Samsung or LG product, I think you would have been more satisfied.

In the end, it comes down to "you get what you pay for" That DVD was probably very inexpensive when you bought it and you probably passed up several other similarly featured but more expensive brands when you chose it. When I do that I say to myself "I can buy 3 of these cheapos before I paid for this quality one" and if it fails a year later, I am OK with that (though I do hate when it fails immediatly). I do this every time I buy a tool, bit or blade at harbor freight.

DVDs and progressive scan DVDs are very mature technology and thus companies probably don't put a lot of effort into development or reliability efforts thinking thats already done. If you want cutting edge, look at the HD DVD or Blue ray (actually a combo player is the best bet)

[SETEC_Astronomy]

Well the other day I was bored and quite calm so I decided to look at the DVD player again just for something to do and as it turns out the DVD drive motor was the problem.

I disassembled the entire drive and rebuilt it and now I have a working DVD player again. I'm trying to find a good replacement motor as the drive has three the same and if one failed they all might. I don't plan on putting anything other than time into it though. I have a few old and broken CD-ROMs (that the motors weren't the problem obliviously) that I'm hoping to get a good motor from. So if anyone else has a Daewoo DVD player a few years old with a chronic skip check the motor as a cause.

Thanks to whoever suggested that as the problem.

[jwax]

I attempted a DVD repair- got down to the drive motor. After its disassembly, I was amazed it ran at all. Bent wires on the commutator for brushes, plastic bushings, thinnest wires I'm seen since microelectronics wire bonding days.
Made to work- a few times.

[jollyrgr]

Thanks Mr. Rasch for the motor tip. I ususally figure since the speed of the motor is variable that it would spin slow for a reason. I'll pull some of these apart and check for lack of grease/oil on the motor.

I have several DVD players. ALL HAVE HAD PROBLEMS! These can be GE (my first DVD player), KLH, "Wal-Mart $40 special" (when most were in the $100+ range), Apex, Sony, and even Denon. Many owned by me, some owned by friends. One friend had an early DVD player that had an actual COMPUTER 5.25" drive as the DVD hardware. He repaired it using a drive from a computer store. I've seen some DVD players with a laptop DVD drive inside them with motorized sled.

But the BIGGEST problem I've seen with these is HEAT. When I first got my very first DVD player I put it in the entertainment rack right on top of my Amp. I could get through about 1.5 hours of a two hour movie before the skipping took place. I moved the player to another location and it worked fine for a few years. Now it is acting up again. I have the "specials" that will play fine sometimes and not work at all others. I have cheap recorders that worked perfectly the first disc. Now they don't even want to play a disc.

The sad truth is you can get about as much life out of the $30 specials as the $400 high end models. You DO see a much better picture on the more expensive models. But what good is this if the player skips.

(If someone knows of a player that does not skip, let me know aobut it.