| redk9258 |
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An MP3 player story...
#271768 - 12/30/11 09:06 AM
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In our family of four we have four 4GB Sansa Fuze MP3 players. We got them in December 2008. They have all been used quite a bit.
One day my 12 year old daughter comes to me with her player. The screen was completely white. She said she did not drop it or anything. It just happened. I popped it apart to make sure the ribbon cable was still plugged in and it was. I read online that it might be fixed if I update the firmware. So, I tried that. Screen still white. Me, being the great dad that I am, gave her mine. A couple of weeks later she tells me that it got squished when someone pushed a piece of furniture into her bag containing the MP3 player. The headphone jack got screwed up pretty bad. I was able to take the LCD from that one and put it in her original player and it now works.
Unfortunately this left me with a player that had a bum LCD and headphone jack. So I went on eBay and found an 8GB player that was listed as-is with the buttons not working. I won the auction for $1 + $5 shipping. I got it today and sure enough the scroll wheel and buttons did not work. At least the LCD did work. I popped it apart and found the ribbon cable for the scroll wheel was either loose or not plugged in at all. I plugged it in, which BTW is a real bitch. It is about 1/4" long and there is no room to hold it in place and close the latch. Anyway it sort of worked but was intermittent. I was able to play music, but there was something wrong with the headphone jack. It didn't seem to have a ground connection. I took a screwdriver and touched the metal part of the jack to the metal part of the 30-pin connection port. The sound came alive and it sounded like it was supposed to. I ended up soldering a small jumper between the 2 metal parts because I couldn't figure out why the ground was bad. Headphone jack fixed!
Now back to the scroll wheel connector. After screwing around with it for a while, I realized there was a small adhesive backed rubber insulator that seemed to be pushing up on the ribbon. I took a flat blade screwdriver and pushed it down to compress it into a corner. This gave just a little more clearance for the ribbon cable. It reconnected the ribbon and the scroll wheel is now working! Yeah!
I basically got an 8GB Sansa Fuze for $6. Now, I need to find another one to donate a headphone jack and LCD for my original Sansa Fuze!
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Good on you.
[Re: redk9258]
#271786 - 12/30/11 05:19 PM
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I wouldn't have had the knowledge nor the patience to pull that off. I can remember a time when I wanted to be able to do such things, but that ended when I tried to put clear-colored replacement shells on my two original white Nintendo DS's. Frakked up both machines. 
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Re: Good on you.
[Re: Mojo2000]
#271788 - 12/30/11 05:57 PM
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I did something similar. I tried taking two broken DSs and putting the pieces together to make one good one.
Ended up with two piles of tech trash.
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| Tomu Breidah |
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No Problems, Only Solutions
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: redk9258]
#271790 - 12/30/11 06:05 PM
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One day... I'll get a flash drive for that RCA Lyra, or get one to work in place of the bad disc drive. 
I can dream.
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| redk9258 |
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Re: Good on you.
[Re: Mojo2000]
#271795 - 12/30/11 08:03 PM
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My daughter has DS Lite. The hinge broke so I watched a video on YouTube explaining how to replace the housing. The guy made it look so easy. I figured since it took him about 20 minutes, it would probably take me an hour or an hour and a half tops so I ordered a replacement case online. It took me almost 5 hours total. I fucked up the ribbon connector to the touch screen so I had to order one of those too. It worked fine for a while then the touchscreen stopped working in a couple of spots and will no longer calibrate. Either the ribbon is not in all of the way or the touchscreen is bad.
She got a DS Lite XL and I haven't had the motivation to try to fix the DS Lite again.
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| redk9258 |
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: Tomu Breidah]
#271796 - 12/30/11 08:06 PM
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I Googled RCA Lyra and there must be 1000 different types!
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| redk9258 |
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By the way, I got the motivation to try to repair this from here...
http://anythingbutipod.com/2008/03/sandisk-sansa-fuze-disassembly/
I've attached a photo that shows the ribbon connector and where this insulation was. In the one this guy tore down, there isn't any insulation. You can also see the short distance where I jumpered those two metal shields together.
[ATTACHED IMAGE]
Edited by redk9258 (12/30/11 08:17 PM)
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| redk9258 |
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And a view of the ribbon cabled plugged in. Whatta bitch!
[ATTACHED IMAGE]
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| Tomu Breidah |
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No Problems, Only Solutions
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: redk9258]
#271802 - 12/30/11 09:20 PM
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I've posted about it in the Bin before, many moons ago.
The one I have/had (when it worked) was this...
http://www.amazon.com/Remanufactured-RCA..._lp_edpp_ttl_in
I'm certain it's biggest weakness is the mini hard disc. They're just too touchy. That's why I believe if a flash drive memory could be put in (and I'm sure it would require some software tweaking as well so it could recognize it -maybe) then it would be a LOT more stable.
I loved the wheel on that thing for menu navigation and volume control. The center button - I never had problems with it... that I can recall. 
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| redk9258 |
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: Tomu Breidah]
#271807 - 12/30/11 10:13 PM
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| Tomu Breidah |
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: redk9258]
#271815 - 12/30/11 11:20 PM
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Stiletto |
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They're always after me Lucky ROMS!
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: redk9258]
#271823 - 12/30/11 11:37 PM
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> I popped it apart and found the ribbon cable for the scroll wheel was either loose
> or not plugged in at all. I plugged it in, which BTW is a real bitch. It is about
> 1/4" long and there is no room to hold it in place and close the latch.
That one time years ago I broke a connector plugging a teeny-tiny laptop cable back into place on a client's computer, and they had paid extra to expedite the service to pick it up the next day.
THAT ONE TIME.
It was like 2mm or less.
*shudders*
Never again.
- Stiletto
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: Tomu Breidah]
#271834 - 12/31/11 01:22 AM
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> I'm certain it's biggest weakness is the mini hard disc. They're just too touchy.
> That's why I believe if a flash drive memory could be put in (and I'm sure it would
> require some software tweaking as well so it could recognize it -maybe) then it would
> be a LOT more stable.
I have a 1st-gen iPod Mini with the 4GB microdrive - spinning disk has never been a problem in it.
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| Tomu Breidah |
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: Vas Crabb]
#271886 - 12/31/11 05:46 PM
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| grobda |
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Tank with very high rate of fire plasma weapon and Quantum shield.
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: redk9258]
#271888 - 12/31/11 06:04 PM
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Had some fun like this with a heatsink mod on my Nvidia 9800GT. The fan is replaced with a huge heatsink with individual heatsinks for each memory chip glued to them with a pad. Probably due to my hot running old motherboard (now replaced) the little memory chip heatsinks had started falling off. You would not imagine the trouble it is getting these little pads off. I used high strength alcohol and toothpicks to pick them off each chip a little bit at a time. It took me about a week doing some of it each day. A major job  .
I did eventually manage it.
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Playing for keeps in Arcadia
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| redk9258 |
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: grobda]
#271891 - 12/31/11 07:25 PM
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I wonder if acetone would have worked better. I don't have any, buy my wife and two daughters to in the form of fingernail polish remover.
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| grobda |
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Tank with very high rate of fire plasma weapon and Quantum shield.
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: redk9258]
#271898 - 12/31/11 07:55 PM
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Possibly. Alcohol is much safer because there is little chance of potentially corroding any plastic or other materials. I use iospropyl alcohol 99.9%.
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Playing for keeps in Arcadia
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Re: An MP3 player story...
[Re: Tomu Breidah]
#271932 - 01/01/12 08:04 AM
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> > I have a 1st-gen iPod Mini with the 4GB microdrive - spinning disk has never been a
> > problem in it.
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> Even after (accidentally) dropping it?
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> (assuming you have, at least once, at some point)
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>
> eta: Otherwise, I'm happy for you. It's probably a better product anyway.
Well, I'd hope your Lyra had a better battery. 1st-gen iPod Mini had terrible batteries. Mine ceased to be useful in less than a year, so I only use it as an audio source in the car, where power is available.
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An MP3 player story...
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[Re: 
It's probably a better product anyway.
. 