Well, I hate to tear it apart again but i might and give that a try! Thanks!

Hi,

I have the same problem you did.  The first 30 or 35 disks go in okay, then it starts getting tight, then it gets down right impossible to insert.

The alignment dot on lines up just right too.

Can you be a little more specific about your fix, perhaps I have the same issue.

Also, loctite corp makes a bazillion kinds of adhesive.  What exactly did you use?  Was it no the motor pully underneath the chassis that you applied it to?  You said "not keyed, grooved, or flat on one side", did you perhaps mean it was flat on one side, not keyed and not grooved?

Thanks for any help!

-rr

I used the "red" stuff.  The plastic pully that drives the belt is on the left rear, on the top looking from the front. The shaft on the stepper motor is smooth. There is nothing to lock the pully on the shaft. Before you pull off the pully, you will need to remove the belt guide. It is just on with double sided tape.

BTW: theese units are no longer being made. So now is a good time to buy them up. Ihave seen them as low as $187 (new) I am going to buy 1 or 2 for spare parts. Considering sony wants almost $400 to reapir them, and it takes them about 4 to 6 weeks.

Ouch, you know it sucks when you have to take to a retail product with a screwdriver and glue :(  Maybe an indication why these are no longer being made..

$400 to repair...jeezalu !!

good luck with that

astro

Hi there Ted,
It looks like you had exactly the problem I have just encountered - when scanning a bunch of new DVDs, one refused to eject from the actual reader and now I cant scan any new discs (naturally, because they can cant get in the reader...). I can eject all the discs by pressing eject twice, but it will not eject the disc in the reader. I can play the disc in the reader, but that is it - there seems no way to eject it with software, as the MC software doesnt know its in there, and "eject" under explorer doesnt work either.
How did you get the disc out manually? I have taken the cover off, but there is no obvious lever or "pinhole" to eject a troublesome disc and the disc looks like it is pretty jammed in there - I wonder if there is a safe way to get it out?
Tony.

I have seen that happen before. The disk in the reader istelf is a tricky one. I have opened supposedly empty units before and fuond that there was a disk in the reader.
The only way I know to safetly eject the disk, is with  the "EJECT DISK" button , after selecting the disk in "Manage Disks" in VISTA Media Center.
With MCE2005 you must have the SONY "Changer Add In" installed .

Windows explorer will show the disk in the drive but, can not eject it.

The eject button on the changer will only eject disks in "known occupied" slots in the carousel.

Well I got it out by taking the cover off and rotating the white plastic gears on the bottom left and top right of the drive so that the disc was ejected mechanically as it normally would if it were under power. Dont forget to leave the drive fully "open" when you apply power again or the unit will not work... guess how I figured that one out ;)
Also, I think you will generally have less trouble in this situation if you do NOT turn off power to the unit.
I have had several hangs since while scanning discs, but restarting MC or rebooting the PC has always sorted things out and all discs have identified ok eventually. If you power off the unit I think that can cause it to forget about an unknown disc in the drive and then you have no option but to take the cover off.

I have done the alignment, applied Loctite and tested loading.  It all works fine except that the changer still thinks there are 190 discs in it.  I've tried leaving the power unplugged and removing the battery overnight.  Still thinks those discs are in there.  I can only load in 9 new discs for some reason.  I've tried this with the changer not connected to a computer at all.  Then also connected to  MCE2005.  MCE sees there are 190 discs in there too.  Does anyone have an idea of how to clear the changer memory? 

Got any ideas?

I think I have found the design flaw with the VGP-XL1B.  The reason that it gets out of alignment again and again is related to the stepper motor creating heat that is transferred through the shaft and makes the plastic pres-fit gear expand.  Thus loosens the press-fit and spins.  I found this out after applying loctite. I had thought I solved the issue of alignment. 

I was working on solving my last mentioned issue of not being able to erase the changer memory of discs.  I was using the mange discs application in MCE to eject each disc (yes, I actually did this for 190 discs).  It would fail on each one and give an error that it couldn't eject.  I then clicked eject (yes a second time for each disc) and it would fail again but would also minus the disc count by one.  After 1.5 hours of clicking and waiting for the carousel to spin, the stepper motor was really hot.  It was completely spinning inside the gear.  Touching the shaft revealed that it's so hot I burned myself. 

I plan to fix by removing the stepper motor, drilling the gear and shaft and installing a roll-pin.  this can be done on the lower part of the gear where the belt never rides. The alternative is to buy or have a machinist make a metal gear.  Then, it could be tapped and a set screw installed. 

I'll post my results if anyone is interested.

I certainly am.  Please keep us updated.  Thanks!

Ted

I have a second device so I thought about adding my audio CD collection.  They seem to add okay in trial but they do not show up in Music Library. I can see them in Manage Disks but that is it.  Any ideas?  Is there a missing piece of software pehaps?
Ted

TMG01:

I certainly am.  Please keep us updated.  Thanks!

Ted

 

Me too,

I'm not sure if I'm having the same problem or not - one of my changers shows all disks as "blanks" - I took the cover off and it seems to be loading them ok - so I don't think I have this alliment problem.

I have problems with my 3 month old XL1 - as it tries to rip or read a CD it gets about 65% of the way through and than makes a lot of noise. This happens in both Vista Media Centre and in just Media Player. A quick look inside and it looks like the tracking arm on the laser DVD drive just keeps resetting and won't go beyond this point. So I'm guessing the DVD Drive has bust.

As I live outside of the US (Ireland) there is very little sony "Customer Care" will do as it's not on their script. Does anyone know the part number and a place that will ship me a replacement bit ?

If anyone figures out a way to replace the drive with a Blu-Ray, Don't care about writing.

I have already cheched into the the Bitrate and the interface.
It will support it! 

Since Sony has discontinued the DLS line. I doubt that they will come out with a new model.

Hi,

 

   If your needing to reset your 'dvd library' contents, dont let Sony con you into bringing it for 'repair'. They have a 'changer diagnostic tool' buried deep in their support system that resets the ROM or whatever database thats causing missing DVDs to be displayed in MCE.

 

Paul