advertisement


Old Philips CD player - any info..?

Funk

pfm Member
Having a bit of a clear out this weekend and stumbled across this old Philips CD player. I don't even recall where it came from but plugged it in and it fired straight up! There's no model number on the front, can anyone shed any light?

gQiLAJv.jpg


0knZSRo.jpg


The powered motor drawer needed a little helping hand to open but now it's spinning a disc it sounds rather good; a real surprise! Lovely warm sound, probably typical of what (from the design) I would assume is an 80s or early 90s device?

Edit: I've just spotted the tiny 'CD460' on the front... *doh*. Also now get that that's the model number on the sticker on the back. Guess I've answered my own query. Would still be interested to know a bit more about it though!
 
Sorry can't help you with your question, however, Look around for a list hosted on a Ukrainian website that includes many CD players and identifies their chip and their transport. That might help you to determine what kind of a chip is in that Phillips player. It could be a tda1541 a which is a very highly regarded chip.
 
It’s a CD-460 (as the label on the back says!). It dates from around 1986 and the instruction and service manuals are available on Hi-Fi Engine.

The mechanism is either a CDM-2 or 4 and the drawer issue will probably just mean it needs a new belt which should set you back £6 or so.
 
Ha - I didn’t zoom in enough!
It's OK, I appear to be an unobservant dolt...!

Now 8 tracks in and the midrange is opening up nicely. I love that the manual (from Hi-Fi Engine) has instructions on how to remove a CD from the jewel case. :D
 
Unfortunately not a flawless outcome; as the album got toward the end I started hearing distortion which wasn't present on the earlier tracks. Switching back to them, the distortion goes away... Very strange.

Also it got slower and slower switching between tracks, sometimes not playing at all. Probably in need of a good service or overhaul and not something I'll ever get to doing if I'm honest.

If anyone is local to the Sussex area and would like to have it to bring back to former glory then PM me...
 
Leave it running on repeat for a day or so. If the mechanism is a bit gummed up then this will often get it going again.

I had a 160 (I think) that I picked up cheap, decent enough player.
 
Yeah, this is all stuff I know I'll never do. I've been all-in on FLAC for years and years, won't go back to CD.

As I say, if anyone wants it they're welcome to it, otherwise it'll head to the tip...
 
Yeah, this is all stuff I know I'll never do. I've been all-in on FLAC for years and years, won't go back to CD.

As I say, if anyone wants it they're welcome to it, otherwise it'll head to the tip...

the TDA1541 chip might be worth a tenner or two o_O
 
MM perhaps not - the 1541 is a 14-bit dac; the 1541A is the full-fat variant that is liked by many, also available selected for better performance (S1 and and S2 grades : the single and double-crown versions.

(and duffers like the 'R' - a lower-quality selection for mass-market, i.e. the bucket for all the marginal QA production parts...)

ETA: important to note there was only one production design of the TDA1541A - all the different grades you might read of, were simply tested/binned-by performance selections from the one production line; and there's some evidence, as the process got older/ esp once moved to taiwan (1) yield quality became higher anyway and (2) the selection for esp S1/ S2 grades, being based on original TDA1541A production spec, was met more readily.

When you look at how the thing works internally - lots of precision emitter-scaling etc - that makes a lot of sense: what was nearly-impossible to deliver in silicon as an essentially-analogue part in 1980, was made very-nearly trivial by c 1995, just because of the endless learning from the requirements of other large ASICs, the massive reductions in features sizes, etc. - the whole effect of Moore's law and demand for high yield from a step-change in silicon foundry output full-stop. A "So you need several thousand transistors scaled all the same - yeah, and ..?" sort of a change in what was possible, and reliable.
 
Don't know that that would address the distortion issue...?

If it hasn't been run in years, even decades, it's likely that the 'distortion' could just be an artifact of the radial tracking mech being impeded by sticky grease; or ancient electrolytic caps everywhere needing to recover most of nominal value to do the job properly - all kinds of simple analogue stuff!

The fact it worked at all at first call after such a long slumber is good. Do leave it powered up for a day or two or three, then re-assess: as posters above suggest.

No, not the greatest thing - but interesting and fun all the same - say, like finding an ariston rd-80 or Rotel 820 amp in its box: if you don't want it, someone will :)
 
It wouldn't be the worst thing you ever did if you left it on repeat for a few days then took it to the charity shop. I'd have an RA 820 too, they're a neat looking amp, work well and imo sound better than a nad 3020 for loose change.
 


advertisement


Back
Top