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 Post subject: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 04 Mar 2018, 17:11 
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Hi! New laserdisc owner here. Picked up a CLD-S315 last week, including 170+ Laserdiscs (both PAL and NTSC discs) for about 350 euros and I’m very happy with my decision. Always wanted a Laserdisc player, but was never able to afford one back in the day. I just love the size of the shiny silver and gold discs and don’t get me started on the LP sized sleeve art. :-)

I have a question about the picture quality of the CLD-S315 in particular. Now, from research I’ve done I have learned that the European players aren’t as good as most of the US and Japanese players, and, this being an entry level European player, I shouldn’t expect miracles, but I have noticed the picture quality is very mediocre. I’m not really bothered by (light) smear or ghosting, but there is one aspect to the picture that this player outputs that really stands out and I can only describe it as noise.

It is the same type of noise that you would get on a weak UHF channel signal on your RF input of a CRT television. It is especially noticeable in the black bars of widescreen movies. I’ve taken a couple of photos of the noise to illustrate what I mean. Taking a photo off a CRT screen is not easy and I do have to stress that the noise in the photos is exaggerated compared to what I see in real life, but it is definitely there and noticeable.

This noise is visible with any disc I put in the player: PAL, NTSC, both CAV and CLV. The CLD-S315 is hooked up to a Sony Trinitron CRT using SCART. I’ve also tried the composite output (RCA) directly, but there is no visually noticeable difference in quality. This TV produces an excellent picture with other video sources, so I know the TV is alright. Something else I’ve noticed is that when no disc is playing and the CLD-S315 just outputs its blue or black screen with OSD, the picture is crisp and clear with zero noise. As soon as I hit play and playback starts, the noise appears. I have also noticed that when I pause the player, the noise is still there, but it is static, for lack of a better term. When the disc is playing the noise is dynamic in nature and jumps all around the screen like crawling ants.

Long story short, is this normal for a player of this type, i.e. is this what I should expect? Did these players always output such a noisy signal or is it perhaps due to this player’s age? Is there anything I can do to improve the picture quality other than lowering the brightness or contrast on the TV? I did read that cleaning the lens is not really something that is necessary with LD players, but the previous owner is a smoker and the player still reeks of smoke and I’ve read that cigarette smoke might ‘cloud’ the laser lens.

I have zero regrets buying this player and I was planning on upgrading to a better quality player in the future anyway, but until then, if there’s anything I can do to reduce or eliminate the noise in the picture that would be great. Any suggestions or tips welcome!

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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 04 Mar 2018, 17:14 
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No, not normal.

Can you see this when the black/blue screen is displayed or just when discs are played?
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 04 Mar 2018, 17:25 
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If that picture is anything like what you see in person then you are boosting the brightness way too much.
Also I would try another cable, it seems like there is interference of some kind and should not be the case.

And as posted above, do that too.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 04 Mar 2018, 17:38 
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signofzeta wrote:
No, not normal.

Can you see this when the black/blue screen is displayed or just when discs are played?

The noise is only visible when discs are playing. When the black/blue screen is displayed the signal is near perfect.

rein-o wrote:
If that picture is anything like what you see in person then you are boosting the brightness way too much.
Also I would try another cable, it seems like there is interference of some kind and should not be the case.

I turned up the brightness slightly to make the noise appear on the photo (it's hard to make a proper photo of a CRT screen). The noise is nowhere near as prevalent as in the photo, but it is definitely there and very much noticeable.

Thx guys, at least this confirms what I suspected and that this is not normal for this player.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 04 Mar 2018, 17:44 
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Try changing cables. A poor cable can also do this, even if it looks fine.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 04 Mar 2018, 17:52 
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rein-o wrote:
Try changing cables. A poor cable can also do this, even if it looks fine.


Thx for the suggestion and, sorry, forgot to mention in my last reply: I tried two different SCART cables and they both gave the same noise.

I also tried the RCA video output of the LD player and hooked it up to the composite RCA video input on the front of the Sony Trinitron and it gave the same noisy picture.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 04 Mar 2018, 22:50 
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Have you tried hooking it up to an LCD?
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 04 Mar 2018, 23:08 
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takeshi666 wrote:
Have you tried hooking it up to an LCD?


While it would and should look fine on an LCD that's not really a help.
It should look much better than it is, so something is wrong with the setup.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 04 Mar 2018, 23:18 
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True, but CRT doesn't photograph as well. It looks really bad in the photos, but I feel like half of that is because of the CRT.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 05 Mar 2018, 08:25 
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takeshi666 wrote:
Have you tried hooking it up to an LCD?


I've had it hooked up to an LCD TV a week ago and the noise was there as well. It actually looked a little worse than on the CRT. :D

Edit: Yes, it definitely looks way worse on the photos above than in real life. It's actually quite tolerable if you don't sit too close to the TV. However, it's present enough to notice and I cannot imagine this being acceptable picture quality in the 90s for a product like laserdisc, so I'm reasonably convinced the player is faulty somehow.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 05 Mar 2018, 13:42 
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In my opinion what that looks like is the signal from the laser is getting weak.

The signal from LD is transmitted through analog RF so its not too surprising that you find it looks like a poor analog tv signal.

When the player is idle with the OSD being displayed there is no signal from the laser, hence why it looks clear on the screen, also that is a sign that your connection to the tv is probably good.

I'm not surprised it looked worse on an LCD since those usually upscale the picture and show more defects.

An attempted fix you could try opening up the player and first visually inspect the laser lens, if it looks very dirty you could try to clean it, but I've never had luck doing this, generally just playing a disc keeps the lens pretty clean.

Next the would be to locate the RF level pot and try to turn it up and see if that changes anything.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 05 Mar 2018, 19:58 
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sjoerg wrote:
An attempted fix you could try opening up the player and first visually inspect the laser lens, if it looks very dirty you could try to clean it, but I've never had luck doing this, generally just playing a disc keeps the lens pretty clean.

Next the would be to locate the RF level pot and try to turn it up and see if that changes anything.

Thx for the suggestion! I spent an hour and a half this evening trying to improve the picture quality. I opened up the player. There was no visible dirt on the lens, but I cleaned it very carefully anyway. This had no noticeable effect on the noise, as you already predicted.

I could not find the RF level pot anywhere. Maybe the S315 doesn't have one? The pots I could find were: Tracking Gain, Focus Gain, Video Level, Tilt Side A, PLL, Mod Y, Mod C.

I took photos of the pot positions before I started tweaking. I did manage to bring the brightness of the picture down using the Video Level pot, because I always felt the signal was too bright. Now the level of brightness is more in line with other sources hooked up to this TV so I don't have to constantly adjust the brightness whenever I switch between sources. This has also somewhat decreased the visibility of the noise, but it is still very much there. Tweaking the Y and C pots individually in combination with video level did not eliminate the noise, neither did any of the other pots, so I returned those all to their original position.

While I wasn't able to eliminate the noise, it is a little less noticeable now and I'm happy with the video level adjustment so that the signal is a little less bright. All in all, definitely not a waste of time. Thanks again!
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 06 Mar 2018, 00:07 
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Sounds like you made some progress, there most definitely should be an rf level pot, the trick is finding it, most often it is early in the signal chain, look where the ribbon cable first connects to the video board, it should be in that area, also it is usually close to the focus/tilt/tracking pots.

Fortunately the site has the service manual for your player here.
skimming through I found the adjustment chart on page 44, Under rf level check it says "Mother assy CN06-3 (RF)" so that is what you want to look for, you should be able to get an exact location if you go over the diagrams.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 06 Mar 2018, 17:01 
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The later model players don't have an RF pot.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 07 Mar 2018, 03:32 
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Well that's news to me, I don't think any of the players I've worked on are without some kind of rf level control.
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 Post subject: Re: Noise on a CLD-S315
PostPosted: 07 Mar 2018, 08:03 
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Thank you very much for the link to the service manual! That will come in handy.

I reopened the S315 last night and looked everywhere for the RF level pot, carefully lifting ribbon cables to make sure I didn't miss a spot, but was not able to locate it. Just to be sure, the RF level pot looks the same as all the other pots (white, with a screw in the middle)? If so, the afforementioned pots are all I can find on the motherboard and the PAL daughterboard.
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