Yep. Real Denon gear, like their AVRs, do not have those stupid board-to-board interconnects. The connectors they do have are either on the ends of cables or they click into place, and they don't have any stress on them.
I have a Denon dedicated CD Player that's over 20 years old and it still works incredibly well and sounds better than my other CD players. But when Denon stickered other products with their name, as many companies did with their lower end non-audiophile products, they were usually limited life units or non-repairable crap.
Not gonna lie: that modular design -- the entire amplifier module out using a few screws and a few minutes -- not bad, actually! I fully expected you to have to strip the thing down to nothing to access that STK module!
The big problem is the plugs. every company that is used modular type plugs have had major issues. Started with zenith back in the early '70s with their chroma color too televisions with modules that you would just unplug and replace and they were always causing intermittent problems RCA had problems with modules Phillips had problems with modules. Anytime you've got a plug and a connector that's a point of failure especially as the unit gets older and a little springs that make contact with the plug pins start to get weak.
The Sony that I worked on earlier is a prime example of how to build these units. Edge connectors with interconnect cables between the circuit boards not these flimsy little connectors like this Denon has that fall apart
@@12voltvids What made computer slots and boards that much more robust? I never see connectors giving old computer enthusiasts any issues (old applying to either noun!). 20-30 year old computers can still be in service. Is it survivor bias?
They did have problems too. ISA connectors were known to crack and go intermittent. Back in the car and 286 days I had many motherboards fail. the thing is with most computers is the cards are held in place by a screws or latches that hold them in place on this they're just sitting there so any bumping around they're going to get knocked loose
I’ve an m38 pretty much same apart from slight change in button placement. I had to strip it down as I had a channel drop out. Once you figure them out as they are so compact they’re not that bad Reseated All the connectors and hasn’t put a foot wrong in two more years. Also these are excellent for sound quality with reasonable speakers
I have repaired a number of the current model units RCD-M41DAB. Not seen connector issues on those yet, but other component faults, such as diodes, cracked pcb's, IC's, bad generic SF-P101N lasers (who'd believe it?), belts, dim displays, even a mains transformer. Other than that nice reliable units 😘
I've got the M30 with a pair of Optimus 7 Woody's and the Klipsch SB-350 as the basic sound system for my living room TV (I don't like surround systems). Other than the tray belt and having to clean the rotary encoder, I've had no issues with it other than the remote crumbling to pieces. It fits under my table top TV mount and works great to this day.
B&o is quite a premium and excellent brand. Very little issues. But as always. You got what you paid for. If you welt for the cheep stuff you got to feel you are on the low end. But yeah. Some repair guys call everything crap. Just because they never learned how to read b&o schematics and see how easily repairable their good stuff really are! :-D
Parts impossible to get they always were. Used to service lots of B&O gear back in the 80s avd 90s avd yes it did blow up. Teenagers having a party blew their parents stuff up all the time. Yes we did call it crap back then too. We called it all crap. There are very few pieces of gear that techs like. The only stuff techs like is the stuff that doesn't break down. Some are more trouble prone than others, but generally the consensus was once a device started breaking it was crap. Since the only time techs see this stuff is when it's broken technically it's all 💩crap
Ive had the m39 for many years, i now have the m41, always used them as bedroom hifi and the one that people forget is these systems need to breathe as they get very hot! But i have always rated denon for having the best mini hifi as i never had any issues with them
For a Denon that's really not bad at all. Try working on the CD player of a UD-M5, you have to strip the entire unit down to get any access, the CD mechanism is an incomprehensible nightmare, and you can't test anything without putting the whole thing back together. TEAC were even worse as instead of using edge connectors they liked to use little single-core wires to solder the boards together. Great for reliability, horrible for servicing as you have to remove every single one or risk stress breakages.
Those fall into the category of not economical to repair. Actually know someone that I told them a couple years ago with that their piece of crap mini system was not worth putting money into. They took it somewhere else and the guy charged them more to repair it than the unit would have sold for a new. It worked a month and then broke again they brought it back to me to see if there was anything I could do. it wasn't that the other guy had bought something it was just a completely different problem and they told me how much money they paid to have it fixed which was $180. When the unit was new it sold for about 250. When it was brought back to me to look at it was the power transformer had failed parts were not available.
@@12voltvidsThat charge seems excessive. Sure they are no fun to work on, but if you're competent and work on them fairly regularly it shouldn't add a great deal more time to the repair, it's just frustrating. Maybe if it's one of the units with a CD changer and the mechanism gets out of alignment, as those can be a nightmware to retime, but that doesn't usually happen unless it's abused. I'm sure too many techs just add a 'frustration tax' to these thigns when at the end of the day fixing something is better than throwing it in landfill, and if you get on with it and get it done it's not too bad. My only exceptions are some of the modern stuff that is entirely plastic and glued or clipped together. If you build something compact like this Denon, some compromises have to be made. But there is absolutely no excuse for the way some of the modern stuff is built.
I have one exactly the same as that, and it has a dodgy encoder type volume control, I also have a couple of models up from that one which has the DAB tuner.
Did the same kind of video on my channel except about the changer mechanism. Drove me nuts for days trying to sort that bloody thing out and it eventually just broke again. Wanted to throw it out the window...
It looks like a very low-end unit designed mainly for people to buy to have a little stereo system in their office at work rather than for being a serious unit to use at home. I remember when Denon was a well-thought-of brand but this is not the type of component that comes to mind that would have that name. They really cheapened their brand name image by slapping their name on this. Of course, the context I'm talking about is the 90s and not the current era of cheap Chinese-made components (like this unit fits into the category of). A friend of mine has a full-sized Denon A/V receiver than has no sound output and it's one made after they stopped putting quality into mass-market units.
I think I have a passion for vintage turds, a whole Hi-Fi in the space of a DC power supply: I'd need one for my bench. I usually solve those edge connector problems by cleaning the contacts with de-oxidant and a brush both socket and card, they don't typically need reflowing as the temperature doesn't change that much. The connection point on the contact is just one tiny little strip, any other place should be considered dirty, re-inserting might fix-it or might just break it again making the contact slide over old dirt. Even if doesn't seem obvious dirt vintage electronics have a patina of off-gases, atmospheric particles and other elements deposited everywhere even where the eye doesn't normally see. Laser not lighting up... it might be another edge connector problem.
Somebody was in it. Was at another shop before it was sent to me. I wouldn't be surprised if the flex pcb between the laser abd lower board is damaged.
I always dreaded seeing one of these mini Hi-Fi units on the repairs rack. As is the case with this one, most were made in China, the brand name meant very little. You run out of naughty words trying to stop them cutting out when you move the connectors. I feel your frustration Dave.
I hated them. My audio guy at the shop hated them. I have one here that was one of my kids units and it's still broken. even if I have absolutely nothing else to do that one has got up on the bench. I think if I ran into a day where I had nothing to do and that was the only thing sitting here to work on I would probably take the day off.
@@12voltvids We were the same, often they were left until they were the only item left on the shelf or the customer would be calling to find out why it was taking so long! I was the "Hi-Fi" guy so guess who had to fix most of them. Cramming the same amount of parts that were intended to fit inside a standard size case into to a much smaller one was asking for trouble, heat just built up until they failed. Happy Days, Not!
The happiest day I had at Jack's stereo and tv was a Wednesday morning at 9 am precicely when i walked through the door and the prick that owned the joint jumped all over me for not charging extra for the second part I had to order for the TV and only marking up the cost of the part by 45% instead of 50%. The difference was coming on my pay cheque. I made a 180 and walked out. Got to my car and called the guy that had been offering me a job to install satellite dishes for him and told him i no longer worked for the shop. Grabbed my tools and started slapping up satellite dishes. Did that for about a year and heard a rumour that the phone company was planning a mass hiring so tried for the second time with them and after months of tests and interviews got on board. I actually applied back in 81 while I was still in high school hoping to land a summer job but the quota was filled in April 81 and I didn't graduate till June 81. Had i got on then i would have been retired 5 years ago with a nice pension. Oh well I did get to go through the big rebuild where copper is retired and fiber rolled out. In the 80s and 90s would have been all copper and then adsl build.
@@12voltvids As a young spotty faced teenager all i wanted was to be a TV engineer, until reality hit home and i discovered that been treated like a slave and sworn at by customers was no way to make a living. I ended up working for the RAF as a civillian doing avionics, then guess what, as soon as they discovered i could repair tape decks they landed me with them, but no more nasty customers or worrying about the cost of spares. Strange how so many left the trade after a few years, it was not a dream job for anyone.
You got that right! (Sounds like a catchy hook for a tune) no respect for anyone in the business. Everyone's grumpy because the equipment that they bought that they expected would last in 20 years was broken in two. Everyone expected that it should be covered by warranty and when it wasn't they were mad. Every customer expected you to pick it up taking it to the shop and return it for a little or no cost because after all they did buy it from the shop so they figured that the shop would cover it. Even VCRs with dirty heads caused by damaged rental tapes nobody wanted to pay to have that done especially when you just cleaned it for a $30 the day before and now the machine was out of commission again it had to be under warranty. I stuck around far too long I should have left within a year or so but I didn't because I had obligations. I actually went to school for television production and wanted to do that but there were no opportunities locally and I did not want to relocate to some small town up north. I have a friend that spent his entire career in broadcast and he started at a small station up north for a year then he moved to another small station a Little closer for several years and then he ended up in the big city where he did a career there only to get thrown out with cutbacks. I hear him on the radio once in a while now filling in for hosts that are off for whatever reason but he's not doing it full time. That's a tough gig with all the layoffs in that industry but that's what I initially wanted to do. I kind of got shoehorned into the repair business only because I had shown an interest in electronics at a young age and I had worked in local TV shops when I was in high school. I don't know where my applied at Sony and I was hiring at Sony and took their in-house training course on betamax. That landed me a job in a service center which I again stayed at far too long. one was the customers but the big one was the owner who was a real piece of work. I finally got fed up and walked and that was the best thing I ever did. There certainly is no money in repairing any consumer electronics today there was in the 80s and that is probably one of the reasons I stuck around as long as I did was because I was making a comfortable living but that all ended around 2000 when everything became disposable there was no money in it anymore and I got out. I know many that stuck around thinking that things were going to reverse and they ended up losing everything including the guy that I work for he ended up losing everything with his shop on but that was 9 years after I left
I don't take anything in for repair these days that has an STK module in the output. Nine times out of ten they have failed, and genuine replacements are NLA as you know. Nothing but china fakes now and even if you can find a good used pull, there's no guarantee it will last. You were lucky with this one that the STK was still ok and it was just bad joints.
When I was in the industry, Dave the Japanese components were far superior to the Chinese produced ones. We probably can't blame it entirely on China, as they are forced to manufacture products as cheap as possible for bigger profits. I purchased a Denon CD Player in the mid eighties that skipped or would not read a disc from day one. It took two attempts to fix the problem under warranty to play perfectly. Perhaps an alignment or laser replacement. It still plays perfectly today! I used to swear by Denon products in their heyday...........
I'm talking the 60s. When i was in the business the Chinese manufactures were just coming online in the late 80s and the stuff wasn't very good but it got good in the following years. Same with Mexico. Many companies moved their assembly to Mexico and there was a noted increase in troubles.
The Denon AV receivers are just as bad to work on. Same as the Pioneer AV receivers. All of the circuit boards that have jacks on the rear panel are stacked, inside with the same types of interconnect connectors to tie everything together. If you want to operate the receiver, and trace a signal, you have to use the kit of extension cables and boards that are supplied to the authorized service depots, something not available to anyone else. Whenever I get one of these receivers in, I tell the customer that it isn’t possible to fix, for that reason. That includes Onkyo units, too. They’re all junk.
I'm sure it does. This one sounds fine now that it's together. The way the cover locks on it imobilizes the boards but the laser is dead. Client said it played but as you saw the CD was dead before i started working on it but the owner may have been mistaken as i believe he just bought it on eBay.
@@12voltvids Evil Bay, I call it. Once the pickup dies, good luck repairing it. Most of this crap you cannot get parts for. "Oh, it's pretty simple, it doesn't read discs". Yeah, that's because the laser is (starts with an F and ends in a K plus and ED).
What was it about the China made gear that made them inferior to Japan made gear? It's a genuine question, does anyone know? Poorly maintained factories, lower quality control, cutting costs and corners? What was it, does anyone have a genuine answer, I am just curious that's all.
It's not bad. Most is on par. People have short memories or are not old enough to remember when it was crap coming our if Japan. I remember my parents sawing that. Then Japan for good and it was Korea that was crap, then Korea got good and ur was tiawans turn then China and Vietnam. The routers we use at work cone from China and Vietnam. Rarely have any issues with any of them. Seems to be mainly the Trump supporters that have a problem with Chinese made devices. Now are they building back doors into equipment for spying? The government thinks that could be the case with state owned companies like hauwei and has banned them from the cellular network where packet switching us involved. We are installing Samsung equipment at work. Quality wise i have not seen anything to suggest poor quality on higher end devices. Just look at all the capacitor failures on products that were made in Japan. I just fixed an 8mm VCR yesterday that had a bunch of failures. It was made in Japan.
Late 90's / mid 2000's, Japanese companies started using Chinese factories for production of low/mid range units because China seemed to have the ability and Japan was getting too expensive. However, the Chinese firms often over-promised and did not have the expertise to design and assure quality control. In fairness, it was early days for Chinese electrical assembly for western markets, and they ran before they could walk but this was almost certainly in part due to greed (how cheap can we make this). Skip forward to mid 2010's and China could make exquisite products if the right company and factory is involved. That said, any japanese company that licensed out they're name and signed of on rubbish deserved the backlash. Further: Toyota had the same issue. They began setting up plants outside Japan in 2000's. It took a decade for the non jap toyotas to reach a decent level of quality. I had a 2004 Jap corolla, 'upgraded' to a larger corolla verso made in Turkey... it was great car but not a patch on the Jap one.
You’re not exactly making yourself look that good here you’re bitching that you can’t receive Radio yet you have him got an antenna plugged in. Can’t play CDs yet you try two different formats of pre-recorded but don’t try a standard audio CD and then claim it can’t play CDs but you’ve never tried a standard CD and the fact that the wobbles about when you move the switch that’s just a dirty and coda that could be sorted out why just increase in attention on the forks that do the encoding on the rotary wheel cleaner as well
I tried a stamped audio disk. I just didn't show it on camera. It's called editing. I did show that the laser is not emitting light. it doesn't matter what dish you put in if the laser is not a bidding any light it's not going to spend simple as that. As far as testing the am on the Brit radio that was not a complaint the complaint was the CD player wasn't working. I don't have an a.m. handy and I didn't feel like going in the house and taking one off my stereo in the house. That Saudi radio would have been set for 9 kilohertz channel spacing. Could it be switched? That i don't know as i don't have the manual. As far as receiving FM, i have a lpfm transmitter sitting next to me that one I shouldn't need an antenna for as the antenna is only a few feet away.
It depends. Like most brands, some of their gear is ok, some is junk. The Denon gear that was made in the 1980s and came out of Japan was pretty good. I have seen and worked on quite a bit of it, including some large integrated amps that are absolute killers in build and sound quality. Unfortunately, like many manufacturers in the 1990s they tried to capture all ends of the market by producing cheap junk like this that was made by a third-party supplier and just had a DENON badge added to it as it rolled off the assembly line. It was a move that proved the undoing of many companies and eventually resulted in quite a few going bust.
Fun fact: these stereo weren’t made by Denon themselves rather by third party companies but Denon just sticked their brands into it.
Nippon Columbia
I believe made by Inkel the same company that owns and manufactures Sherwood gear.
Yep. Real Denon gear, like their AVRs, do not have those stupid board-to-board interconnects. The connectors they do have are either on the ends of cables or they click into place, and they don't have any stress on them.
I guess they knew the end was near and just didn't give a sh*t.
I have a Denon dedicated CD Player that's over 20 years old and it still works incredibly well and sounds better than my other CD players. But when Denon stickered other products with their name, as many companies did with their lower end non-audiophile products, they were usually limited life units or non-repairable crap.
Yes i have an old Denon CD player too. It's on my bedroom system and it sounds great. Has a 1541DAC if i remember.
Not gonna lie: that modular design -- the entire amplifier module out using a few screws and a few minutes -- not bad, actually! I fully expected you to have to strip the thing down to nothing to access that STK module!
The big problem is the plugs. every company that is used modular type plugs have had major issues. Started with zenith back in the early '70s with their chroma color too televisions with modules that you would just unplug and replace and they were always causing intermittent problems RCA had problems with modules Phillips had problems with modules. Anytime you've got a plug and a connector that's a point of failure especially as the unit gets older and a little springs that make contact with the plug pins start to get weak.
The Sony that I worked on earlier is a prime example of how to build these units. Edge connectors with interconnect cables between the circuit boards not these flimsy little connectors like this Denon has that fall apart
@@12voltvids What made computer slots and boards that much more robust? I never see connectors giving old computer enthusiasts any issues (old applying to either noun!). 20-30 year old computers can still be in service. Is it survivor bias?
I never liked the Sanyo STK modules. One reason is, now, you can't get a genuine one. All of them are Chinese knock-off crap.
They did have problems too. ISA connectors were known to crack and go intermittent. Back in the car and 286 days I had many motherboards fail. the thing is with most computers is the cards are held in place by a screws or latches that hold them in place on this they're just sitting there so any bumping around they're going to get knocked loose
I’ve an m38 pretty much same apart from slight change in button placement.
I had to strip it down as I had a channel drop out.
Once you figure them out as they are so compact they’re not that bad
Reseated
All the connectors and hasn’t put a foot wrong in two more years.
Also these are excellent for sound quality with reasonable speakers
I have one of these units, dry joints was my problem and had to clean the volume control as it was erratic
I have repaired a number of the current model units RCD-M41DAB. Not seen connector issues on those yet, but other component faults, such as diodes, cracked pcb's, IC's, bad generic SF-P101N lasers (who'd believe it?), belts, dim displays, even a mains transformer. Other than that nice reliable units 😘
I've got the M30 with a pair of Optimus 7 Woody's and the Klipsch SB-350 as the basic sound system for my living room TV (I don't like surround systems).
Other than the tray belt and having to clean the rotary encoder, I've had no issues with it other than the remote crumbling to pieces.
It fits under my table top TV mount and works great to this day.
Also got an M30 but haven’t used it in about a year. Plugged in today and when I put a CD in, the display shows 0 tracks. Any idea why this could be?
Bang & Olufsen, it's what the Swede techs would say when it failed: 'It went Bang then Olufsen to Heaven! ' 😂
B&o is quite a premium and excellent brand. Very little issues. But as always. You got what you paid for. If you welt for the cheep stuff you got to feel you are on the low end. But yeah. Some repair guys call everything crap. Just because they never learned how to read b&o schematics and see how easily repairable their good stuff really are! :-D
Parts impossible to get they always were. Used to service lots of B&O gear back in the 80s avd 90s avd yes it did blow up. Teenagers having a party blew their parents stuff up all the time. Yes we did call it crap back then too. We called it all crap. There are very few pieces of gear that techs like. The only stuff techs like is the stuff that doesn't break down. Some are more trouble prone than others, but generally the consensus was once a device started breaking it was crap. Since the only time techs see this stuff is when it's broken technically it's all 💩crap
Ive had the m39 for many years, i now have the m41, always used them as bedroom hifi and the one that people forget is these systems need to breathe as they get very hot! But i have always rated denon for having the best mini hifi as i never had any issues with them
Well, it is Denon branded, but who manufactured the dammed thing? Sanyo, Funai, Foxcom or Shin Shimamura Electric?
Just wondering if it would play a commercial CD.
No laser light it won't see any CD. This was broken by another "tech" that was into it before it was sent to me.
For a Denon that's really not bad at all. Try working on the CD player of a UD-M5, you have to strip the entire unit down to get any access, the CD mechanism is an incomprehensible nightmare, and you can't test anything without putting the whole thing back together. TEAC were even worse as instead of using edge connectors they liked to use little single-core wires to solder the boards together. Great for reliability, horrible for servicing as you have to remove every single one or risk stress breakages.
Those fall into the category of not economical to repair. Actually know someone that I told them a couple years ago with that their piece of crap mini system was not worth putting money into. They took it somewhere else and the guy charged them more to repair it than the unit would have sold for a new. It worked a month and then broke again they brought it back to me to see if there was anything I could do. it wasn't that the other guy had bought something it was just a completely different problem and they told me how much money they paid to have it fixed which was $180. When the unit was new it sold for about 250. When it was brought back to me to look at it was the power transformer had failed parts were not available.
@@12voltvidsThat charge seems excessive. Sure they are no fun to work on, but if you're competent and work on them fairly regularly it shouldn't add a great deal more time to the repair, it's just frustrating. Maybe if it's one of the units with a CD changer and the mechanism gets out of alignment, as those can be a nightmware to retime, but that doesn't usually happen unless it's abused. I'm sure too many techs just add a 'frustration tax' to these thigns when at the end of the day fixing something is better than throwing it in landfill, and if you get on with it and get it done it's not too bad. My only exceptions are some of the modern stuff that is entirely plastic and glued or clipped together. If you build something compact like this Denon, some compromises have to be made. But there is absolutely no excuse for the way some of the modern stuff is built.
If I'm not mistaken! They made some pretty good turntables!
I have one exactly the same as that, and it has a dodgy encoder type volume control, I also have a couple of models up from that one which has the DAB tuner.
Volume rotary encoder is crap, too. And, what the heck is that high-pitch whistle when selecting different function inputs?
Yes I know. I cleaned it, got that working but the CD is toast.
Did the same kind of video on my channel except about the changer mechanism. Drove me nuts for days trying to sort that bloody thing out and it eventually just broke again. Wanted to throw it out the window...
It looks like a very low-end unit designed mainly for people to buy to have a little stereo system in their office at work rather than for being a serious unit to use at home. I remember when Denon was a well-thought-of brand but this is not the type of component that comes to mind that would have that name. They really cheapened their brand name image by slapping their name on this. Of course, the context I'm talking about is the 90s and not the current era of cheap Chinese-made components (like this unit fits into the category of). A friend of mine has a full-sized Denon A/V receiver than has no sound output and it's one made after they stopped putting quality into mass-market units.
Kitchen or bedroom system.
i have 2 different Denon and both will not play home Recorded CD media.
I think I have a passion for vintage turds, a whole Hi-Fi in the space of a DC power supply: I'd need one for my bench.
I usually solve those edge connector problems by cleaning the contacts with de-oxidant and a brush both socket and card, they don't typically need reflowing as the temperature doesn't change that much. The connection point on the contact is just one tiny little strip, any other place should be considered dirty, re-inserting might fix-it or might just break it again making the contact slide over old dirt. Even if doesn't seem obvious dirt vintage electronics have a patina of off-gases, atmospheric particles and other elements deposited everywhere even where the eye doesn't normally see.
Laser not lighting up... it might be another edge connector problem.
Somebody was in it. Was at another shop before it was sent to me. I wouldn't be surprised if the flex pcb between the laser abd lower board is damaged.
I always dreaded seeing one of these mini Hi-Fi units on the repairs rack.
As is the case with this one, most were made in China, the brand name meant very little.
You run out of naughty words trying to stop them cutting out when you move the connectors.
I feel your frustration Dave.
I hated them. My audio guy at the shop hated them. I have one here that was one of my kids units and it's still broken. even if I have absolutely nothing else to do that one has got up on the bench. I think if I ran into a day where I had nothing to do and that was the only thing sitting here to work on I would probably take the day off.
@@12voltvids We were the same, often they were left until they were the only item left on the shelf
or the customer would be calling to find out why it was taking so long!
I was the "Hi-Fi" guy so guess who had to fix most of them.
Cramming the same amount of parts that were intended to fit inside a standard size case
into to a much smaller one was asking for trouble, heat just built up until they failed.
Happy Days, Not!
The happiest day I had at Jack's stereo and tv was a Wednesday morning at 9 am precicely when i walked through the door and the prick that owned the joint jumped all over me for not charging extra for the second part I had to order for the TV and only marking up the cost of the part by 45% instead of 50%. The difference was coming on my pay cheque. I made a 180 and walked out. Got to my car and called the guy that had been offering me a job to install satellite dishes for him and told him i no longer worked for the shop. Grabbed my tools and started slapping up satellite dishes. Did that for about a year and heard a rumour that the phone company was planning a mass hiring so tried for the second time with them and after months of tests and interviews got on board. I actually applied back in 81 while I was still in high school hoping to land a summer job but the quota was filled in April 81 and I didn't graduate till June 81. Had i got on then i would have been retired 5 years ago with a nice pension. Oh well I did get to go through the big rebuild where copper is retired and fiber rolled out. In the 80s and 90s would have been all copper and then adsl build.
@@12voltvids As a young spotty faced teenager all i wanted was to be a TV engineer, until reality hit home and i discovered that been treated like a slave and sworn at by customers was no way to make a living.
I ended up working for the RAF as a civillian doing avionics, then guess what, as soon as they discovered i could repair tape decks they landed me with them, but no more nasty customers or worrying about the cost of spares.
Strange how so many left the trade after a few years, it was not a dream job for anyone.
You got that right! (Sounds like a catchy hook for a tune) no respect for anyone in the business. Everyone's grumpy because the equipment that they bought that they expected would last in 20 years was broken in two. Everyone expected that it should be covered by warranty and when it wasn't they were mad. Every customer expected you to pick it up taking it to the shop and return it for a little or no cost because after all they did buy it from the shop so they figured that the shop would cover it. Even VCRs with dirty heads caused by damaged rental tapes nobody wanted to pay to have that done especially when you just cleaned it for a $30 the day before and now the machine was out of commission again it had to be under warranty. I stuck around far too long I should have left within a year or so but I didn't because I had obligations. I actually went to school for television production and wanted to do that but there were no opportunities locally and I did not want to relocate to some small town up north. I have a friend that spent his entire career in broadcast and he started at a small station up north for a year then he moved to another small station a Little closer for several years and then he ended up in the big city where he did a career there only to get thrown out with cutbacks. I hear him on the radio once in a while now filling in for hosts that are off for whatever reason but he's not doing it full time. That's a tough gig with all the layoffs in that industry but that's what I initially wanted to do. I kind of got shoehorned into the repair business only because I had shown an interest in electronics at a young age and I had worked in local TV shops when I was in high school. I don't know where my applied at Sony and I was hiring at Sony and took their in-house training course on betamax. That landed me a job in a service center which I again stayed at far too long. one was the customers but the big one was the owner who was a real piece of work. I finally got fed up and walked and that was the best thing I ever did. There certainly is no money in repairing any consumer electronics today there was in the 80s and that is probably one of the reasons I stuck around as long as I did was because I was making a comfortable living but that all ended around 2000 when everything became disposable there was no money in it anymore and I got out. I know many that stuck around thinking that things were going to reverse and they ended up losing everything including the guy that I work for he ended up losing everything with his shop on but that was 9 years after I left
I don't take anything in for repair these days that has an STK module in the output. Nine times out of ten they have failed, and genuine replacements are NLA as you know. Nothing but china fakes now and even if you can find a good used pull, there's no guarantee it will last. You were lucky with this one that the STK was still ok and it was just bad joints.
Yes if it had been popped it wouldn't be good for anything. At least the radio and amplifier works.
Looks really decent for what it is ☝️ good job DENON 👍
When I was in the industry, Dave the Japanese components were far superior to the Chinese produced ones. We probably can't blame it entirely on China, as they are forced to manufacture products as cheap as possible for bigger profits. I purchased a Denon CD Player in the mid eighties that skipped or would not read a disc from day one. It took two attempts to fix the problem under warranty to play perfectly. Perhaps an alignment or laser replacement. It still plays perfectly today! I used to swear by Denon products in their heyday...........
I'm talking the 60s. When i was in the business the Chinese manufactures were just coming online in the late 80s and the stuff wasn't very good but it got good in the following years. Same with Mexico. Many companies moved their assembly to Mexico and there was a noted increase in troubles.
The Denon AV receivers are just as bad to work on. Same as the Pioneer AV receivers. All of the circuit boards that have jacks on the rear panel are stacked, inside with the same types of interconnect connectors to tie everything together. If you want to operate the receiver, and trace a signal, you have to use the kit of extension cables and boards that are supplied to the authorized service depots, something not available to anyone else. Whenever I get one of these receivers in, I tell the customer that it isn’t possible to fix, for that reason. That includes Onkyo units, too. They’re all junk.
I don't touch av receivers unless they are my own.
I have one like this it sounds really good but the CD player is separate and its 35 watts per channel
I'm sure it does. This one sounds fine now that it's together. The way the cover locks on it imobilizes the boards but the laser is dead. Client said it played but as you saw the CD was dead before i started working on it but the owner may have been mistaken as i believe he just bought it on eBay.
@@12voltvids Evil Bay, I call it. Once the pickup dies, good luck repairing it. Most of this crap you cannot get parts for. "Oh, it's pretty simple, it doesn't read discs". Yeah, that's because the laser is (starts with an F and ends in a K plus and ED).
Why is there an option to play a tape when there is no tape bay on it?
The tape unit was separate I guess.
That peace of crap eh
Whats that high pitched noise
That's the Denon. Parasitic oscillation in the amplifier somewhere.
If you think working on that is a pain, try working on a car stereo. Everything crammed in tighter than can be imagined!
That's why i DON'T work on car stereo.
if I see this best not to get one I have defo much higher quality one the Denon D-F101 must have been the last best one made
It is a flimsy design at best .Sounds good ,until you move those pesky boards.
Not a great product
What was it about the China made gear that made them inferior to Japan made gear? It's a genuine question, does anyone know? Poorly maintained factories, lower quality control, cutting costs and corners? What was it, does anyone have a genuine answer, I am just curious that's all.
It's not bad. Most is on par. People have short memories or are not old enough to remember when it was crap coming our if Japan. I remember my parents sawing that. Then Japan for good and it was Korea that was crap, then Korea got good and ur was tiawans turn then China and Vietnam. The routers we use at work cone from China and Vietnam. Rarely have any issues with any of them. Seems to be mainly the Trump supporters that have a problem with Chinese made devices. Now are they building back doors into equipment for spying? The government thinks that could be the case with state owned companies like hauwei and has banned them from the cellular network where packet switching us involved. We are installing Samsung equipment at work. Quality wise i have not seen anything to suggest poor quality on higher end devices. Just look at all the capacitor failures on products that were made in Japan. I just fixed an 8mm VCR yesterday that had a bunch of failures. It was made in Japan.
Late 90's / mid 2000's, Japanese companies started using Chinese factories for production of low/mid range units because China seemed to have the ability and Japan was getting too expensive. However, the Chinese firms often over-promised and did not have the expertise to design and assure quality control. In fairness, it was early days for Chinese electrical assembly for western markets, and they ran before they could walk but this was almost certainly in part due to greed (how cheap can we make this). Skip forward to mid 2010's and China could make exquisite products if the right company and factory is involved. That said, any japanese company that licensed out they're name and signed of on rubbish deserved the backlash.
Further: Toyota had the same issue. They began setting up plants outside Japan in 2000's. It took a decade for the non jap toyotas to reach a decent level of quality. I had a 2004 Jap corolla, 'upgraded' to a larger corolla verso made in Turkey... it was great car but not a patch on the Jap one.
As Doc Brown from the BTTF trilogy would say: "No wonder this circuit failed. It says: 'Made In Japan'."
@@AstrosElectronicsLab yet I have electronics items from the 80s that are functioning absolutely fine.
@@AlexMitchell-sj4sb it was both a movie reference and a joke, dude.
You’re not exactly making yourself look that good here you’re bitching that you can’t receive Radio yet you have him got an antenna plugged in. Can’t play CDs yet you try two different formats of pre-recorded but don’t try a standard audio CD and then claim it can’t play CDs but you’ve never tried a standard CD and the fact that the wobbles about when you move the switch that’s just a dirty and coda that could be sorted out why just increase in attention on the forks that do the encoding on the rotary wheel cleaner as well
I tried a stamped audio disk. I just didn't show it on camera. It's called editing. I did show that the laser is not emitting light. it doesn't matter what dish you put in if the laser is not a bidding any light it's not going to spend simple as that. As far as testing the am on the Brit radio that was not a complaint the complaint was the CD player wasn't working. I don't have an a.m. handy and I didn't feel like going in the house and taking one off my stereo in the house. That Saudi radio would have been set for 9 kilohertz channel spacing. Could it be switched? That i don't know as i don't have the manual. As far as receiving FM, i have a lpfm transmitter sitting next to me that one I shouldn't need an antenna for as the antenna is only a few feet away.
Should change the name to crapon
i was given a few of those i just tossed them your right they are garbage
His right?
@@sw6188 yes
Has cheap written all over it.
Funai and Orion junk with anyones name on it! Junk!
Peace of a junk- still say a regular Home theater receiver is better
They are not better, unservicable as well. Gotta take them all apart to service them. And Onkyo DSP chips pop all the time
Denon is no good,never cared for that brand! Lots of problems !!!
That's not even worth recycling!!!!!!!! Trash it!!!
its realy junk
Wow, what a poorly designed piece of shit. I guess Denon stuff is nowhere near as good as I thought it was.
It depends. Like most brands, some of their gear is ok, some is junk. The Denon gear that was made in the 1980s and came out of Japan was pretty good. I have seen and worked on quite a bit of it, including some large integrated amps that are absolute killers in build and sound quality. Unfortunately, like many manufacturers in the 1990s they tried to capture all ends of the market by producing cheap junk like this that was made by a third-party supplier and just had a DENON badge added to it as it rolled off the assembly line. It was a move that proved the undoing of many companies and eventually resulted in quite a few going bust.