I was wondering if anybody had any input on a very strange issue I noticed when playing a laserdisc yesterday. Prior to this I have played hundreds of laserdisc without any problems and there has been no change in my setup. It seems my CLD-97 suddenly stopped responding to only certain remote control commands.

At first, when the tray and play buttons (on the remote) didn't want to load the disk I thought the remote's batteries went down but I changed the batteries, and tried a backup remote and same thing. The remote power button will turn on and off the machine, also the jog dial will adjust the play speeds, I can also switch audio channels, but most of the buttons including, play, stop, pause, eject/stop, etc... don't seem to function. On the player, the manual buttons for these functions work perfectly. I don't think it's the remote as the same issue is present with two seperate remotes.

Any ideas would be welcome. Thanks in advance.

I am also curious what this could be. I hope its nothing major.

The remote outputs a code that is a serial bit stream and how the bits are flipped tells the controller chip in the 97 what button was pushed on the remote. So your problem is normally the remote or dirty remove lens or receive window. If some work and always work correctly then that is normally a remote issue. You could have an issue in the decode chip in the 97 but your problem has been the remote or the SR jacks in the back not making good contact with nothing plugged in.

Thanks for the input. So the plot thickens....

I took some Staples brand electronic wipes and wiped down the front of the CLD-97 as well as the IR transmitter panels on both remotes. So it seems like with my backup remote it works fine after wipe down, all commands. The original remote still only some function (but same functions as with the original issue). What I don't understand however, if it's the original remote that is broken, why did the backup remote exhibit the same problem prior to the wipe down?

So status, backup remote working 100% after remote/CLD-97 wipe down. Original remote still only limited commands.

Questions:
1) Any way I can fix/diagnose the original remote without testing on another CLD-97?
2) Why the heck would wiping down cause 2nd controller to work suddenly? If the CLD-97 IR receiver was dirty, then the first remote should work after cleaning, if the IR transmitter of the backup remote was dirty, what is the chance that both remotes originally had the same issue at the same time?

Well you can test the 97 remote on almost any other Pioneer player (the majority of the functions).
What you have are the kind of problems that every technician HATES
Sure sounds like you've lost some functions on the 97 remote though

Hi Duncan,
I have a backup CLD-97 all nicely packed in the basement, I was trying to figure out the situation without taking that out for testing purposes. I may end of pulling it out and doing more testing although currently I'm thinking it is the remote. Frustrating as remotes for the CLD-97 go for close to $100.

so that means the chip inside the remote has lost is program??
will this only happen with newer remotes or special ones?


as another note, i always use a cheap pioneer LD remote and keep my original one on a shelf with a cover so no dust
gets inside to damage it.
i don't get all the functions but enough to play, change audio etc.

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the rein-o official signature:

I tried a third remote and all functions seem to work with that as well.

It looks like certain commands on that first remote just stopped working. I have never had a remote loss "half it's functions." I would think that it is very uncommon. I'm thinking of maybe opening it up and taking a look inside, although I'm not sure what I would be looking for.

only thing i can think of would be dirt, oil from fingers or broken contacts that the rubber buttons are missing?

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the rein-o official signature:

Hey invenio you have a complex ht system that deserves good automation. Grab a used URC from ebay for $100-200. Harmony and such are not sophisticated enough for your setup. Urc stuff retails $800-1600 but due to urc only releases programing sw to pro installers(therefor average joe cant get it) used ones are dirt cheap. I have complete urc ccp sw. I can also asist with programing

Dirty circuit board, or broken traces, or corrosion of the board due to bad batteries would be my guesses. If it was the microcontroller or any part of the ancillary electronics, I'd expect all the functions to be equally affected.

Thanks for the comments. I am going to try and take the remote apart today and see if cleaning it out helps anything. Hopefully I don't break the remote! I'll keep you updated on my progress.



I actually have thought of that. Is there any ones you recommend, I did a search on ebay for "universal remote control" but I get a bunch of cheap $10 remotes pop up. How do you go about narrowing the search for the more high end setups? Thanks.

Ok, great news. It seems like I fixed it!

I tried posting a guide to the fix as I took a few pictures as I was working on the repair. Unfortunately, LDDB doesn't seem to allow me to upload more than one picture at a time for some reason. That's ok, I just posted it on my site. Here is the link if interested:

http://www.conradjohnsonowners.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=358

Mx-5000 and mx-6000 are great. These are 2 way feedback remotes. So when you send the command it gets a feedback from device that command has been understood. You can mate with a master controller for rs232, relays etc..

I just did a search on ebay, they look really nice, but the price is kind of steep, looks like they start around $400.