[Chops]

This is "cut-n-paste" from another forum that I posted on. The first part happened a couple weeks ago...

"I was playing a CD today and about halfway through the disc, it stopped. It just froze in place and I had to hit the main power switch on the rear panel. I unplugged it for a few minutes, reconnected it, turned it back on and some gibberish popped up on the display.

I repeated the entire procedure, only this time letting sit for 30 minutes or so. Reconnected power, turned it on, same thing. Turned it back off with the main switch, held down the Eject button, turned it back on and it finally opened the tray so I could get the CD out."


This was a couple days later...

"So it's been almost two full days now, and I have been running CD's through the Stellar one after the other, and not one single hiccup. Not a one. I even turned it off last night for the very first time (in Standby mode actually), fired it back up this morning and all is still going as it should. It's working flawlessly."


And this is from today...

"Alright, so the Stellar has been operating just fine for the past week or so, except for the past few days. It hasn't totally locked up like before, but it will just "click" and stop randomly anywhere on any CD I play. It may stop on one, two or three CD's in a row, or it might run fine nearly the whole day, then crap out on just one CD."


It's my understanding that the Stellar uses the Philips ASD1 transport. I'm thinking if I can find a new, unused Philips transport somewhere for fairly cheap, I'll open this thing up and perform the transplant to keep this thing running, hopefully for a few more years. From my research however, it seems like it might be a dead end finding a replacement transport.

Do any of you fine fellows know where I can source one of these transports? Or do you think it might be something else?

Many thanks in advance!

[poseidonsvoice]

And what has Simaudio servicing dept. advised you thus far?


Best,
Anand.

[Chops]

And what has Simaudio servicing dept. advised you thus far?


Best,
Anand.

Hi Anand,

So far, absolutely nothing. They have not replied to either of my emails which has model #, serial #, etc, etc included. It's been two emails close to 3 weeks. At this rate, they are not impressing me. 

[poseidonsvoice]

Hi Anand,

So far, absolutely nothing. They have not replied to either of my emails which has model #, serial #, etc, etc included. It's been two emails close to 3 weeks. At this rate, they are not impressing me. 

If you are not located overseas (i.e. outside US or Canada), I would be calling all the numbers in this link:
http://www.simaudio.com/contact.htm

Best,
Anand.

[Chops]

If I wasn't so busy with other things today, I would have called. As it was, I was on the phone too much today.

[Chops]

Well, no point in calling now...

I finally got an email back from Simaudio and they no longer have parts for the Stellar. The replacement transports were used up years and years ago on warranty repairs. Imagine that.

So as it sits right now, I have a hunk of scrap metal weighing in at 42 lbs that's worth less than nothing. Unless you guys can come up with an optional, compatible transport that can be used, I'm screwed with this deck and am out 600 bucks.

[poseidonsvoice]

Well, no point in calling now...

I finally got an email back from Simaudio and they no longer have parts for the Stellar. The replacement transports were used up years and years ago on warranty repairs. Imagine that.

So as it sits right now, I have a hunk of scrap metal weighing in at 42 lbs that's worth less than nothing. Unless you guys can come up with an optional, compatible transport that can be used, I'm screwed with this deck and am out 600 bucks.

Looks like it's been a problem for a few others:

https://www.google.com/search?q=Philips+ASD1+transport&oq=Philips+ASD1+transport&aqs=chrome.0.57&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Sounds like a lemon at this point. You should be moving up to a digital server anyway  Hard drives are cheap.

Try e-mailing these fellas to see if they can help, they were distributors of the ASD1 at one point:

http://www.daisy-laser.com/products/products00.htm

Good luck,

Anand.

[Chops]

Hello Anand,

Of course it's been a problem for a few others. That transport was used in a number of different brands, and they all had problems within the first 6 months of their lives, if not DOA straight from the factory. The fact that mine lasted 12 years is a miracle. But who's to say it never went in to the shop for warranty work before? It probably has.

As for Daisy Laser, I can try emailing them, but most likely they don't have any transports since Philips had a short-lived production run on them for obvious reasons.

I sure won't be buying anymore Simaudio in the future. Sounds like they like cutting corners since they had to know about these issues before completion of the Stellar (remember, that transport was out two years before the Stellar). At least, I wouldn't buy anything of their's that has moving parts in it.

[Chops]

Well I took matters into my own hands and opened it up today. I ended up unplugging a bunch of connectors and two ribbon cables, unscrewed four nuts and pulled the entire face plate off. After close inspection of the suspected piece, I pulled up the model number that a member on another forum mentioned on eBay. Turns out, it is the same unit, and only 25 bucks!

Guess what I just ordered?! 

It's a small price to pay if it does the job and keeps this deck running for a few more years. Hopefully it's not the controller board underneath it that's shot. I moved the lens back and forth and everything looks/feels fine to me, but that doesn't mean it is.

Anyway, some pics of the goings-ons today...