Hi All,
Here goes my first post.
I have a 1986 Philips VP415 LV-ROM player with SCSI that was originally used with the BBC Domesday Project in 1986 and it has a few problems!
I will first point out that there are only about 20 of these in working condition around the world and the majority of them are in Museums.
This specific PAL only player has many faults of which some have been fixed and some need extensive work which I will now list.
Drawer - (Minor)
One of the Micro Switches is broken so the eject on the drawer does not work.
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If the player is powered up with a Disc in then it will start spinning but if eject is pressed then the drawer is pushed in then it just ejects it again. I have checked the dimentions of quite a few modern switches with no luck on being able to find a replacement.
Stand By - (Major)
When taking the player out of standby it flashes the standby light - this should only happen while it is spinning up the disc and does not mention in the diagnostics portion of the service manual.
Rotation
Rotation is stable and when the laser tracks off the end of the readable disc the RPM changes (hints to reading something from the disc and works with PAL CAV and CLV)
No Video out - (Major)
There is no video output on either composite or RGB output but there is some SYNC.
Cant see the OSD and therefore cant enter the diagnostics mode to test and follow the service manual further
PSU - (FIXED)
Originally there was no power out of the PSU but this has been fixed due to a few Zener Diodes and a few Caps!
Voltages now stable on the scope!
Testing
I am looking for an 8" PAL test disc with calibration images, as this player is computer controlled via SCSI or RS232 I am looking to display a specific frame on pause and trace the video signal. This can only be done with a 8" PAL disc which is a pain.
Not tested
This player can sync the rotation speed of the disc to an external video input and apply image overlay and video mixing on the fly.
I do not know if this functionality is one of the causes of no video output as there is about 40 separate cards within the player of which video mixing and sync is about half of them!
I do also have a working one of these machines that I can test as a reference if needed but I do not want to upset such a temperamental and rare machine unless needed.
Hope people can help restore another one to working order!