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My PC Engine cdrom is starting to act up, sometimes it hangs during loading and during certain cutscenes there's no sound with a strange buzzing noise coming from the unit itself.

Like in Popful Mail, the first two intro movies, the in between levels cutscenes, as well as the ending has no sound, but during gameplay it streams audio fine (for the most part).

One time it hanged after I'd cleared a level, it wouldn't load the world map. I restarted the console and it wouldn't load the game at all, so I thought I'd give the lens a quick clean up using a qtip to see if that'd help. The lens felt loose, it moved a good couple of millimeters in all direction, is it supposed to do that? Anyway the game started to work again after that. It happened again a few hours later, and nudging the lens with the qtip worked again. What's up with that?

Any idea what the problem might be, is the laser dying on me or what?

Thanks,
Issun.

Yes the lens is supposed to be loose like that.

Quote from: Issun on 10/08/2012, 07:28 AMMy PC Engine cdrom is starting to act up,

Any idea what the problem might be, is the laser dying on me or what?

If you have a look around the forum's stickied threads you'll see there are a few problems that exist and can cause these issues, bad caps, bad cdrom gear, and failing laser.

ahh but the buzzing is missing teeth on the gear

Quote from: Drakon on 10/08/2012, 11:11 AMYes the lens is supposed to be loose like that.

Thanks, good to know!

Quote from: thesteve on 10/09/2012, 01:49 AMahh but the buzzing is missing teeth on the gear

Yeah, I suspected the gears as well because of the noise the cd makes, but since it only makes the sound during cutscenes and it loads the game and streams music/dialogue fine I thought it must be something else. Perhaps it's the laser grinding back and forth trying to read the disc.

If it is missing teeth i think keith courage as the solution for you. if its not, you might need to grease the gears and there is a guide here to do that. If you just don't know, send it to steve and he will make it work :)

Quote from: HercTNT on 10/09/2012, 01:48 PMIf you just don't know, send it to steve and he will make it work :)

Do you mean "thesteve"? Does he offer to replace the laser as well?

Quote from: Issun on 10/10/2012, 01:07 PM

Quote from: HercTNT on 10/09/2012, 01:48 PMIf you just don't know, send it to steve and he will make it work :)

Do you mean "thesteve"? Does he offer to replace the laser as well?

yes he means thesteve.  Steve will do whatever it needs and or you want done to it.  :)

Quote from: Bernie on 10/10/2012, 01:20 PMyes he means thesteve.  Steve will do whatever it needs and or you want done to it.  :)

Thanks, I'll send him a PM.