Hi, I'm definitely new here but I figured I would ask. One of my coworkers was awesome enough to gift me his old LD-W1 in perfect condition. Everything works great however I'm stuck with a dilemma in terms of audio. I can get rid of this hard to find legendary player and probably trade someone for a player that doesn't have quad playback but does have builtin ac-3 audio or I can modify the player to have ac-3 out via rf.

I would much rather modify the laserdisc player, as I get to get my cake and eat it too (and also have it ready if I ever want to use a domesday device with it), however I don't really know where to start. I'm handy with a soldering iron and a bit of micro soldering so that should be no issue but I more am best at following directions rather than poking and prodding and hoping to God I did something right so any help would be appreciated,

Thanks!

The soldering is easy, but unless someone has already figured out where to add the RF-out tap, you will be challenged to figure it out without schematics and studying other players to see where they’ve been tapped.

The other three taps are easy: 5V, -5V, and GND. I want to do the same to every player I own (add AC-3 and the digital output).

I also want one of these players.

I’m still researching it myself for my LD-W1 mod.

I more or less have the information for a digital output but haven’t looked at RF points yet. It should be similar to the CLD-1030 / 3030.

I’ll look at the service manual and see if I can provide some info. Also, don’t sell this player as it is so rare you’ll never find another one again (especially for free).

Thanks so far, yeah my coworkers a good guy so I'd also feel kinda bad swapping it out. But yeah once you guys figure out more about an rf ac-3 mod please let me know. It'd be awesome to make this sytem have perfect audio and perfect playback all in one machine. Adding s-video would be cool too but considering the internals I am not holding my breath.

I have a CLD-1030. Is the AC3 mod I go posted. I haven’t looked, but if you can help, it will help. Otherwise, I’ll start researching

The LD-W1 is great. A totally one of a kind machine and usually reliable. Believe me. Ditching an LD-W1 to get AC-3 doesn’t make any sense.

You don’t really need AC-3, and you really don’t really need Domesday.

Longer version:

AC-3 is neat and all but there aren’t they many AC-3 discs compared to Dolby stereo. Once you have the disc and the AC-3 mod and the RF demodulator you finally have Dolby Digital but you’re going to just be watching something you could get a DTS Blu-ray of. Anything that was sold with a 5.1 soundtrack 30 years ago will still exist as even higher quality sound today. You’ll spend way more to get less the majority of the time. There are nearly zero cool indie movies or killer anime or amazing concerts on LD in AC-3. The AC-3 titles nearly are all then-new ultra mainstream Hollywood stuff from about a four year period at the end of LD. You better really really like…Independence Day, Jerry Maguire or whatever.

Domesday is a non-real time way of requiring a ton of time and a computer to watch a laserdisc. Unless you’re archiving something nobody has ever archived before Domesday is just a pointless waste of electricity. You end up generating TB of massive files nobody but you can view and the LD just sits.


Gets some cool movies for cheap, locally if possible, and invite your friends over. That’s what this thing is for. Have fun.

I did find this guy on reddit who claims to have two units that are ac3 modded, but considering how sparse documentation is on ac3 mods I kind of think he's bsing
https://www.reddit.com/r/LaserDisc/comments/1u55lwz/ldw1/

I see no reason to doubt that guy. AFAIK it’s as doable as it is on other players.

Keep in mind that there was a time when people actually knew stuff instead of looking it all up online and pretending they know stuff. A competent electrical engineer or technician could have figured it out 25 years ago and simply not give out the documentation.

I posted it here…..

[CLD-3030] Dolby AC3 Mod

.... updated the posting w/ re-uploaded pics.

I might have some time to look today but no promises.

As for adding S-Video, that’s never necessary. LD is composite video and always looks better with the composite output routed to a good external comb filter (or a TV with a good internal comb filter). S-Video on players were mostly a compromise and never made sense.

All LD players can had AC-3 added, the issue is can you fit it in the player. The W1 is pretty packed inside and I cannot remember if the VSOP board is sandwiched inside the player and that is what you need to access.

I had a chance to break open my W1 today since I needed to check on something regarding my future mod to it.

Anyway, I will concur with Kurtis that this player will likely be one of the hardest mods to perform for exactly what he said; space. For a digital output, the good news is that the points for it are all right on top so that’s not going to be an issue (but the MD pin will need to powered to turn on the output). The AC-3 points unfortunately are likely sandwiched below the board for the digital output and it’s secured very well with these plastic rivets that usually aren’t difficult to remove but in this case it is (gonna need a special angled tool to push them up). Also, any AC-3 RF board that would need to be installed will likely need to be a pre-fabricated version with surface mount components to keep it as thin as possible.

Either way, it’s doable but it’s gonna be one one those jobs that will take time and patience to ensure everything is ran precisely to reduce the chance of damage and avoidance to the mechanism.

I may crack it open again soon once I find a tool to raise those rivets so I can identify the AC-3 tap points.

This is purely my opinion, so please no-one flame me - but if I had a fully working W1 I'd treat it as a museum piece, and would want to keep it running in its original form. If I had some classic car I'd restored, I wouldn't want to make holes in the dashboard for USB sockets...

Sorry, not at all helpful to the original enquiry in the thread...

I totally get the opinion; no flaming necessary .

Part of me does totally agree that modding a W1 should be avoided due to its unicorn status and thus could legitimately be more valuable in its stock form. Especially if there could be a museum of vintage consumer electronics devices, I can see a pristine un-modified W1 being very sought after for display.

On the other hand, I also can see that if a mod is done very professionally both inside and out, it can still maintain its value or even be looked upon as more valuable due to its upgraded capabilities. And that is where I stand right now as I work toward figuring out where everything would go. Especially in respect to the back panel, I don't want to do some of the things I have seen others do like take away an analog audio jack to re-purpose it for AC-3 or even in some cases remove the entire RF Modulator section for the same reason. My goal is to keep every connector intact and still add to it w/o defacing (no holes drilled on areas with inscriptions on it). And believe me, I have considered some really wacky space saving ideas that in the end I won't do because of possible signal quality concerns.

I'm likely a number of years away from starting the project so time is on my side to iron out the challenges.

I’d say it’s a bit different. A properly done AC-3 mod looks like the factory did it. It will have one extra socket on the back panel. The user facing panel is totally untouched. It’s more like adding MIDI to a Mini Moog which only the squarest of collectors would be turned off by if done properly.

Found some more evidence of this being a possibility from old usenet posts. Apparently even a company provided a service where they would install it for you and even some kits too. Sad thing is I cannot find a single picture. Also the one redditor I asked about the ld-w1s he had with the ac3 mod in it has still not gotten back to me. Least its a tad relieving to see one of the usenet posters state that its an easy mod to do.

https://web.archive.org/web/19990421171836/http://206.228.252.175/Precision/new/index2.html
Associated usenet group I found this page advertised on:
https://groups.google.com/g/alt.video.laserdisc/c/hzaDmoOjtsQ/m/tZx6ZmnzJ3cJ
Heres the other one who stated it was an easy install
https://groups.google.com/g/alt.video.laserdisc/c/ZjMm7sSK_wI/m/qpi3qKQK604J

Though this other user claims kits go for 40$
https://groups.google.com/g/alt.video.laserdisc/c/7Y5y1YB0sww/m/FCfypszUPM8J

There was never any doubt that an AC-3 mod wasn’t doable on an LD-W1. There is simply a lack of detailed information on how people have executed the mod.

So I guess we’ll see who gets it done first and hopefully will have it documented for all .

In the meantime, when I do get around to finding those points (for both AC-3 and Digital), I’ll provide details on this posting with pics.

So I found this guy selling ac-3 kits stated as usable on around 50 laserdisc players, including the w-1. I found out the guy selling them was the youtuber Laserdisc Repair Bench, the guy responsible for making the 1 yen ld-w1 video.

Coincidentally in the time I asked him about his ld-w1 modkit he apparently was working on a tutorial video on how to set it up which in the time I now am posting this comment seems to have been up for over a day now.

Ah.... so Pat finally got around to it .

I guess I will take a view of it myself.




Addendum......

I do have some thoughts on the mod.


1) The digital output not working is likely due to the need to give MD3 (pin 57) of the CX-1135 IC a 5vdc trigger to turn on the digital output. Here is a pic I had made up some time ago regarding it...



I did comment on the video and Pat was already looking into it. Possibly, MD1 and MD2 might need to go to GND as well or maybe they can be left floating. I guess we'll find out later.


2) Around 18:57 into the video, you will hear this sudden sound pop up and then disappear. This is due to the AC-3 board not having a "mute" point added to the circuit. I discovered this issue early on with my Sony MDP-455 AC-3 mod that also lacked a mute control and "to me" it was irritating watching a movie and then suddenly hearing a shot of loud noise that would come out of my speakers during side changes and even @ the beginning of the disc. It doesn't happen all the time because it depends what is recorded at the start of a disc but it was irritating enough that I never modded another player without mute control. Finding a mute point on the W1 shouldn't be an issue (probably the same as the CLD-3030) and there are AC-3 boards that are offered w/ the mute control circuit.


3) In my consideration for the placement of the AC-3 board, I already decided to sandwich it between boards and in an open section near the location of all the points. My thinking of doing it this way is because I would just need to run a single coax cable from that area which would make wire routing much simpler and overall hide most of the work I will end of doing (the only thing exposed to giveaway that a mod was done would be the digital output wires and the newly added jacks). Also, I do have a leftover AC-3 board from my days of buying the pre-made units from Precision LaserDisc and they are very small and easy to mount for a challenging mod such as this (my homemade AC-3 board could fit but they would be taller). In any case, there is no right or wrong way to approach this and Pat's method is sound.


4) I agree completely on the punch out locations for the new jacks. There really is no other place on the back of the unit and unfortunately the US version of this player kind of makes it harder due to excess amount of writing on the back due to the typical warning labels required by law. This is where I currently stand on where I intend to punch out holes for the new jacks....



I did actually consider something totally radical if I was unable to find two locations for new jacks and it was to utilize a 1/8" stereo mini-jack where I would place the AC-3 RF on the "left" channel and a Coax Digital on the "right" channel but I could never convince myself to find that acceptable due to the need to maintain a 75 ohm impedance for both signals and the potential issue of sharing GND connections. I ran this by Kurtis and he agreed as well.


Anyway, it was nice to see Pat get that beast open and helping us to see what the challenges are going to be. Since he already documented most of the points needed for AC-3, I guess the only thing left for me to is identify "mute" and I'll start planning my mod.