Trash to Treasure | Pioneer Laser Active | Megadrive, PC Engine, Karaoke, it does it all!
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- Опубліковано 9 січ 2019
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The Pioneer Laser Active was a games console for the richest. Vastly more expensive than the systems supported it offered a convenient entertainment hub with a price tag to brag about. Commercially it was a failure, technically it was flawed and many of the 10,000 systems produced have been destroyed by that flaw. We discover why it has a reputation for terrible capacitors and just what it's all about while attempting to repair it. - Наука та технологія
Had a great time working on this. A fairly rare beast and so happy to see it working again. Some more work to do, and looking forward to making it even better, perhaps in a future RMC episode :)
Are you calling Neil a rare beast? ;)
Good to see you again, mate, even if it's via pixels.
(not the Adam Sandler movie, of course, that was a bit pants.)
You look like Chadtronic's father. I like that.
And good job with what you've done! You seem pretty awesome.
@@mikeyandwho
He's a big fan of Bowie.
Also, Labyrinth is life. :p
The ULTIMATE '90s entertainment machine! Megadrive, Mega-CD, PC-Engine, PC-Engine CD-Rom2, LD movies - are you kidding me??? Imagine having this back in the day
Here is my "dinosaur" sized entertainment system. What were they thinking. I guess it was so heavy where anyone wouldn't wanted to steal it when running of with both a VHS player and movie collection right next to it.
@@obsidian9998 They were probably thinking "people wealthy enough to afford this have the space, and they probably want it to match the rest of their home theater components"
This looks about the width of standard home theather equipment. Personally, I really like that. I'd love a game console that was 17" wide to match the rest of my home theater kit. All the consoles right now look so out-of-place. For all the crap the original Xbox One got for looking like a VCR, I kind of liked it for that.
@@Blustride Actually, Commodore aimed for the same kind of integration with CDTV.
Also, consumers, with such a budget, could probably afford a piece of TV furniture with tinted glass to keep the dino in (you should see the media servers available in that segment today, they're not small either).
The LaserActive really wasn't that great of an entertainment machine when it was new. It wasn't even a good value. For the price of this unit plus a Sega PAC module, you could have purchased a Genesis, Sega CD, and a decently high end dual-side-play LaserDisc player. Same deal with this unit plus the TurboGrafx/TurboDuo PAC module. About the only thing that set the LaserActive apart were its small library of Mega LD and LD-ROM² titles, which you'd find weren't really that great if you took the time to play them. The hardware and software are awesome collectables, though, if you can find them in working condition at a reasonable enough price. It's even better if they have been properly serviced, including a recapping and repair of any PAC modules that it comes with.
@@Watcher3223 in otherwords, it's a headache to even get running.
Thank you for watching us repair this absolute unit of a console, what a whopper. Did you own this first time around? Did you launch a singing career using the Karaoke PAC perhaps? I'd love to hear your stories.
As always links are below to support and follow The Cave and be sure to check Marks channel out, thank you for watching. Neil - RMC
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Its a good feeling when you bring life back into things.
necromancer!
I've been a laserdisc 'guy' for about 25 years now, and would like to offer that in lieu of adding small bushings to raise the clamp, I'd like to suggest getting a full belt replacement kit and removing the shims you'd added. I'd enjoy seeing a T2T update video of the belt replacement - especially if it's successful. You may also want to verify the few lubrication slides here and there have suitable grease on them and aren't dragging. The motor whirring sound you hear is the lift belt slipping, which I expect you'll find all of them are slack at this point since they're 25 years old. Great find, great T2T post - I eagerly look forward to seeing what all you do with this machine in the future. Thanks, good luck, and cheers to you both.
I agree the whole mechanism deserves a service much like a good floppy disk drive service. Belts, grease and head cleaning.
+1 on the belts, we had the same issue with the tray not lifting LaserDiscs and a belt replacement fixed it
@@RMCRetro Let me know if you need a Pioneer Laserdisc Calibration disc for the optics / tracking and colour balance. (Im in the UK)
www.lddb.com/laserdisc/40585/GGV1069/Pioneer-Reference-Disc
Can I ask why the clamp was applying to much pressure? There were no washers there originally so what caused it to begin forcing down on the laser disc like that, is it just age or over/under use?
@@Monkey_SK It's more that the lifting mechanism can't generate enough force to overcome it (at least in my two examples it was)
I love these Trash to Treasure videos. They're so immensely satisfying. Amazing job
Thanks Cameron, when things go well they are satisfying to make too!
I'll take my cap off to you lads, great video!
6:53 - white man fingers a black japanese 25 year old hole
11:42 - hunky bear gives a cheeky reach around to turn it on
10 innuendo points to you, we have a new high score
The LaserActive takes it’s cap(s) off to you too with a little help.
It's a great looking thing Neil and I'm glad you got it up and running.. nice to see Mark Payne getting his fingers dirty...can't wait for pt2 😁😁😁 Kim 😁😁😁
Thank you so much for another great video. Very nice choice of music too, not just the intro and outro but really all of it.
Pioneer made absolutely massive kit. My first DVD player was a Pioneer 717 and it was ridiculously big.
Massive but generally solid
Captain Capacitors save us all!
With his trusty sidekicks Commander Ceramic and Ensign Electrolytic. Not sure what happened to Lieutenant Tantalum...
@@johnrickard8512 Please don't spoil the ending of the upcoming Avengers movie.
Oh my god. @3:50 I worked on that CGI movie when I was just out of college (although it's either very low rez or very zoomed in). I had heard it was used on a LaserActive title, but wasn't 100% sure. Amazing!
Great video as always. When I was repairing my laserdisc player I had a similar problem. In the end I loosened it up a bit inside and applied lithium grease to the gears and metal bars inside. Worked a treat!
I love that this channel brings us cool things to see that aren't shown by every other channel out there. Keep up the good work guys!
Thanks!
I love the video mate. It's always relaxing watching your T2T videos. & it was cool to see the other cd based 32-bit consoles. A little foreshadowing perhaps?
I love the atmospheric soundtrack behind the repairs. I just got my speakers sorted out again and it was a lovely listen.
I'm always amazed how many obscure bits of tech I've never heard of. Mega LD!?!?!? Awesome!
Thanks for this video, I really enjoyed it. Looking forward to part two! Hope you had a wonderful holiday.
Glad you got it workig, it was a interesting video! Can't wait for part 2.
What a strange but fantastic machine! It was fascinating watching you fix it, I love these restoration vids. Looking forward to part 2 :)
Not bad idea in theory (in practice, the packs were too expensive but that's the price you pay for being an early adopter of any new platform). I mean, the savings in wall warts and video hookups for the Sega CD alone almost make this a major convenience. If you were looking at buying a Laserdisc player anyway, and you were thinking of getting a Sega CD, this actually saved a lot of space an wiring. It is also amazing Pioneer got rivals NEC and Sega to agree to this. It's like the Who Framed Roger Rabbit of game consoles.
I had a laserdisc player with the same disc loading issue. I fixed it simply by replacing the belt on the pulley that closes the tray. Amazing that you got this working. Great stuff!
I'm still kicking myself for not buying a laseractive for $50 when I saw it at a thrift store. At the time I thought it was a laserdisc player and didn't collect that type of stuff....sigh....
Thank you SO MUCH for this! I have a laser active desperately in need of repair, but I was really intimidated by it. I can't wait to see the rest of this series.
You're welcome! Pt2 is nearly finished
Great work fixing it. Well done!
Really love your vids. I've got two laserdisc players to repair at sometime, so found this really interesting. Great job.
Never mind that gorgeous hunk of opulent loveliness... You had me with the shots of the 'top loaders' (the Saturn, PS1 and the CD-I). Like an afternoon shot of gaming console soft porn!
These are very rare. Thanks for getting this cool piece of history working again!
I've heard Electronics guys say that the more wiring and interconnections, the more expensive the product. Not seen such complex internals since watching Shane McRetro restore several SEGA Saturn Dev Kits. Layers upon layers of PCBs.
Totally true. Wiring is a PITA - especially compared to all the surface mount components that can be installed by pick-and-place machines. Those board to board interconnects all have to be done by hand - and connectors are relatively expensive. Probably any one of the 20+ pin ribbon connectors would be more expensive than the CPU that controls the machine. At least today it would be.
10:34 „Pasta do lutowania” 😊🇵🇱
Such a perfect video of amazing retro gear! I love anything laserdisc!! :D
I actually had the Laseractive back in the early 90s I remember seeing how expensive they were in EGM and there was an electronic store going out of business that had one new in box for $300 so I emptied my bank account and brought it home and then scoured the classifieds for the modules. I mostly used it for movies though. Really wish I still had it lol.
Great video. Well done for getting the beast to work again!
As someone who is set to repair one of these lovely beast it was a really instructive video to be prepared for the repair ! Cheers
18:05 - tray open; 18:08 - tray closed - He already powered it on, closed tray and knows its working.
Happy to explain that for you sir. I wanted to make sure I had allowed clearance for all the cables running to the PSU board under the tray so manually closed it to check we were all clear. The last thing I wanted was a crunch when I power it on and the tray catches on the cables potentially damaging them.
Cool console. I'm glad you got it working.
All that hard re-capping... and a power supply that works.... most people would have stopped there! ... great to see you both getting your hands dirty in electrolytic fluid! ... your team determination is exemplary! ... and then Dr Neil nails it with serious surgery! Amazing work on a very complicated electro mechanical device!
Electro mechanical? It's solid-state.
Sorry to be pedantic... You are correct... but.... It has electronics in it and mechanics in it, therefore it is electro-mechanical. Solid-state means it has transistors and integrated circuits rather than valves... you say tomatoes, i say tomatoes... aluminium vs aluminum? - Just a note for future reference! - All the very best... Howard --|> [Solid-state refers to electronic components, devices, and systems based entirely on the semiconductor . The expression was especially prevalent in the late 1950s and early 1960s, during the transition from vacuum tube technology to the semiconductor diode and transistor.]
SO many caps, uhhg. I admire your patience and persistence.
Great movie, great job! I’m full happy see that such a rare system is back to work!
These videos are so satisfying.
16:47 Priceless moment.
Lovely stuff. Thanks for the upload!
Hello dentist :D Very, very cool episode! Loved every second of it! Glory to the cave and all hail Mark Fixes Stuff!
Great episode. I hope 2nd part comes soon because I really want to see the innards of the Mega Drive module. The Laser Active is an amazing piece of tech.
What a wonderful machine! Really looking forward to part 2!
Good work on that. It looks like a complete viper's nest in there.
Great video. Never even know Megadrive games on LD was a thing! Look forward to the next episode.
Urrg, so many electrolytics! Nice restoration though, there was a fair amount of dust on that LD that was in the machine, it must have stopped working a looong time ago.
Oww. You saw it already.
Perks of the Patreon. lol
lovely machinery(japanese's love for combos is still kicking even now!) but looking inside it's essencially a box full of capacitors :D good job for bringing it up to life again guys! cheers
Awesome video, I love laserdiscs, can't wait for part 2
Another great machine in the cave, lovely to see it brought back to life! :D
What a great episode to kick off 2019!
I remember these things ! Ah! Great video! Can't wait to see it fully functional. I have this sneaky feeling you'll be practicing your soldering skills in the near future. ☺️
Tell me about it! I've ordered over 80 more caps today
really great video. in depth. interesting. well made. thank you.
Huge fan of Pioneer of this vintage. I just picked up a Pioneer cassette changer for 25 bucks and it worked for five minutes. I’ll watch some of your friend’s videos to learn how to fix it.
I love these trash to treasure episodes
So many components for expensive manufacturing costs! But job you guys did! Kudos!
I've oft yearned for one of these bad boys. Nice sleuthing fellas!
You guys never cease to amaze me!
Epic fix! Can't wait for ep2 👍
A little backstory about MY Laseractive experience: I used to have one of these; but I got a defective unit because holy crap (the price)! I didn’t think much about getting it fixed for 3 years. I only got it for the novelty of watching laserdisc movies, rather than playing Geneses games (I only did that as for like an added luxury). Laseractive for cheap, I thought I hit the jackpot! But I needed to find a good repairman. One was into rather shady crap; being under the jurisdiction of one of my friends, so much for its condition of the faceplate. When I tried to get it fixed, the one who tried to get it fixed said that this unit was beyond his comprehension. It wasn’t just capacitors, and the tray. It was much worse. So, I got rid of it to another friend of mine to sell. I believe that she could have used the money, and she got a healthy $570.00 from it. I didn’t want to fully discard it. This is a gamer’s treasure, and scalpers and “Retro Collectors” are all over this thing like the Neo-Geo, and Super Nintendo. I got into collecting retro video games for the sake of having fun, the history, and meeting great people. Unfortunately because of how many scalpers love ruining things for everybody, With some of the things I purchased over the years going higher and higher in value I cannot help but to feel guilt, and shame. I just don’t think it’s right reaping all the benefits while the prices grow higher and higher as the days go young! :(
A brilliant start to 2019, I think I would have been in Heaven with the Pioneer Laserdisk system back then. Thank you again for a great Caveman setup.
You're welcome, thanks for watching Wayne
nice job ... another electronic oddity on the way to being rescued ... I've still got to get me one of those de-soldering pumps..
"fine british dentistry..." Das ist Humor mit Weltklasse! :D
Das ist gut ja?
@@RMCRetro Is the Doctor anglophilic? :D
+1 for Emergency Gary
"Pasta do lutowania", soldering flux from Poland :)
Great video as always! I wish to see this Laser Vision in real.
Cheers!
Nice score & great vid, when I had mine it was £350 with both game packs over 10 years ago gawd know what fully working set ups go for now. Again by the time I sold it on the next person mentioned the PCE sound had gone wonky so suspect the caps had gone even then, maybe 2009ish! Such a cool system but shame it doesnt really excel in any of it's operations....tho Triad Stone is prob the best version around on it!
Amazing video 😎 nice to see the Saturn off the shelf 😀 looking forward to next episode
Cheers Ted!
This just made me happy and gave me hopes that someday someone can revive my Pioneer CLD990, so I can work on getting some LD only titles where I can watch them again.
Great video, very informative
Great Video Sir,I actually like watching you replace the capacitors...
Brilliant solution using the washer-shims. Great video.
Brilliant episode Neil, and great work bring it back to life guys. I love these trash to treasure type episodes. P.S The size of those discs man! 😆
Would have loved one of these as a kid! A big ass disk player with a Mega Drive and could play Mega CD games to boot, sign me up. But they were expensive then and they are expensive now. Oh well.
Well done! Good fixing job. :) I think, I wouldn't even look at it on a flee market, because it looks so much like an early 90s VHS-recorder. Nice find.:)
If the video had ended at 0:58 I still would have given it a thumbs up. A cartridge that goes into a cartridge that goes into a LaserDisc player?! I must be having some sort of dorky fever dream.
Awesome fix
Anything laser-disk related gets an automatic like from me. Great video!
I had this exact player with the game adapter, a pair of wired controllers with joysticks, a karaoke adapter which I never used... I might still have it somewhere.
Nice repair!
What an interesting machine, I've always wanted a LaserDisc player. Reminds me a bit of a Nuon.
Nice, I have a Laser Active whit the same problem. This video is very helpfull! Regards
Great to hear Freddy, let me know if you fix it up
Another great episode! Out of interest, given that the system came assembled like that, why was the head applying too much pressure now? Had the springs become stiff with age, or has the motor become less powerful? Or some other reason? I love the solution though, there's something very satisfying about fitting washers!
That would be my guess that the motor has less torque than originally, those laser discs are pretty heavy things really and the motors often wear out on CD players in a similar way. There's also a bearing inside the top section which could be greased to help it along its way a little more. Hopefully my motor will live on for some time yet.
I have this device and I love it! I also advise you to change the capacitors of the PAC modules. I have the Sega module and the NEC, I had to change the capacitors also because they leaked almost all, unfortunately they are SMD and are very annoying to change. Apart from these problems the device works very well and provides a lot of fun.
Thanks Sergio. I ordered caps for both the PC Engine and MD today... nearly 90 caps! It's going to be a big job
Lots of 80s Japanese synths have caps that leak on the bottom like this
I recall seeing these at malls back then.
Great video, really enjoyed it and success! I've been thinking about getting a vacuum desoldering gun as the manual one I've got is a pita. Could you let me know if you have any recommendations or which one you are using?
Thanks! Here's a short review on mine ua-cam.com/video/r5_xY12j4Og/v-deo.html
Nice, we got a couple of non-working ones from Japan (one fixed, one requiring a video decoding chip that is proving hard to get hold of). We only bought it to make a video but sort of fell in love with LaserDiscs, they just look lovely as a collectable medium (not so much in video quality). We also got the 3D Glasses btw, ok - nothing special.
great episode
Bloody hell. That was a big intro for a posh megadrive!
Or is it a posh PC Engine? 😁
@@RMCRetro only if it's got a copy of splatter house!
Good work champ 👍
Another awesome vid! I just wondered if you would ever do a video on the recapping process, the do’s and don’t? I have a lot of ageing temperamental hardware, but not the confidence to go commando with a soldering gun.
We could do that some day sure. In the meantime my advice is to find an old board from a radio or some other electronics with no value and get stuck in. You'll soon get the hang of it after you've lifted some pads. Remember flux is your friend to get that old solder flowing again
Seeing that LD spin up after that awful noise was so satisfying.
I always wanted one of these. Stupefyingly expensive for me. I remember seeing a few on various electronic stores. I think my Mom saw me checking it out. She caught my eye and had ‘that’ look.
There are a few good videos about these consoles. I was disappointed when I learned they are composite only. I don’t think they can be modded to do even s-video.
Great video as always! Do you have the music list of the video? I don't know if it's because I'm drunk, but they are delightful.
Very intresting machine,there was tons of these combo-machines in Japan,never to greet western eyeballs,back in the day!
Nice video. I have thought about getting one of these, but here in USA they are very expensive and as you shown, the same can of worms.
I have one of these but none of the special Mega-LD games. So I just use it as my upstairs Genesis/Sega CD and to watch movies...
I Will - The Story of London, a Mega LD title, was technically possible on the Atari ST and Amiga 1000 in the late 80s thanks to Microdeal and their Laserdisc interface (which allowed you to play the arcade version of Dragon's Lair and included the original Laserdisc). Prior to that around 1984 or 1985 he Pioneer MSX came fully equipped to play Laserdisc games like Astron Belt etc with a suitable Pioneer Laserdisc player. It's an odd beast designed to sell into the living rooms of 'home cinema' group of people in the early-mid 1990s.
I have this very title, it will be appearing soon on the channel :D
Very good video
great video! what an interesting device!!. the concept is cool, too bad it was too expensive.
I can imagine an amiga module, and a ps1 upgrade module too.
it could have been amazing!.