Blu ray player will play Blu Ray and CD, but cannot load DVD

[Bob F]

Samsung BD-P3600 was intermittent for a while on DVDs but now always
shows "The disc can not be played" when a DVD is loaded. CD's and Blu
Ray disks work perfectly.

I tried holding "PLAY" or "PAUSE" for 8 seconds to reset to factory
settings with no effect. (Does nothing)

Any ideas about getting it working would be appreciated.

[ohg...@gmail.com]

Your red laser might be getting weak. The red laser reads both conventional DVDs and CDs (blue laser for blu discs), but often weak lasers have trouble reading DVDs first, usually when cold.

You can try cleaning it, but there's a good chance the laser is getting weak.

[Bob F]

On 11/7/2022 1:15 PM, ohg...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Monday, November 7, 2022 at 3:46:53 PM UTC-5, Bob F wrote:
>> Samsung BD-P3600 was intermittent for a while on DVDs but now always
>> shows "The disc can not be played" when a DVD is loaded. CD's and Blu
>> Ray disks work perfectly.
>>
>> I tried holding "PLAY" or "PAUSE" for 8 seconds to reset to factory
>> settings with no effect. (Does nothing)
>>
>> Any ideas about getting it working would be appreciated.
>
> Your red laser might be getting weak. The red laser reads both conventional DVDs and CDs (blue laser for blu discs), but often weak lasers have trouble reading DVDs first, usually when cold.

I just tried playing a CD on it for several minutes, then quickly
changing to a DVD, with no improvement.

>
> You can try cleaning it, but there's a good chance the laser is getting weak.

That makes sense. Since it still works with Blu Ray's, for the moment I
will set it up along with an old DVD player for the DVD's unless someone
can make suggestions for getting it working for those.

[Peter W.]

On Monday, November 7, 2022 at 3:46:53 PM UTC-5, Bob F wrote:

There are adjustment pots on the laser drive (VR1, VR2, VR3). You will need the service manual to know which one does what, but it has been my experience with standard discs that yes, lasers either go out of focus or get weak, and in many cases can be adjusted.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/363537162096

Peter Wieck
Melrose Park, PA

[Bob F]

I found the service manual for the BD-P3600

https://elektrotanya.com/cgi-bin/download2.cgi?dk=jvlafopokc3doxjn9arlkq26fl155ebgeylnz7pwatf5juoa&fid=205786&file=samsung_bd-p3600_sm.pdf

I can not find any reference in it to the VR 1,2,3 adjustments.

Would there be a separate manual for the internal drive? I find no
reference to it in this one.

There are some "deck adjustments" in the manual (page 4-25 to 4-27)
which are accomplished by entering numbers at certain time using the
remote control. They only seem to make a bong-bong noise when entered
soon after powering up, and do not display what the manual says they will.

The laser assembly seems to be a BDP5G-MAIN Rev 2-3.1 . I cannot so far
find any service info on that to suggest waht the VR1,2,3 adjustments are.

[Peter W.]

> The laser assembly seems to be a BDP5G-MAIN Rev 2-3.1 . I cannot so far
> find any service info on that to suggest waht the VR1,2,3 adjustments are.

That is the one pictured, yes. I expect that you will have to find a service manual for that specific device - or, as I am fond of suggesting, if the alternative is landfill, a little bit of careful experimenting is in order.

NOTE: You are adjusting the DVD (red) laser!

https://www.techwalla.com/articles/how-to-adjust-the-laser-in-your-dvd-player

When the alternative is landfill, extraordinary measures are acceptable.

[Charles Lucas]

You would need to know the laser power measure of the infrared (red) laser. With multi-format read devices or lasers,
they have to be calibrated to their specifications. It would be helpful to acquire the owner's manual for that. I stated
this because for the laser to be calibrated you need to know what you are doing, the laser has to be calibrated to a
very narrow range and there are several things that affect laser performance. If the laser power is good, check the
spindle motor and the spindle. Does it "spin" up correctly. You can use a strobe light to check this.

How about the sled motor? Is the load and eject mechanism in time? etc...

Provided the detector circuits work and the other electronics work correctly, and the laser is clean, then... we can
get to the laser adjustments, but you must be extremely cautious and careful with this.

When we get to the adjustments, you have tracking gain, focus fain, focus offset, tracking offset-- just to name a few
and you need an oscilloscope to "measure" the wave when doing these adjustments. Infrared can go out of calibration
very quickly if not done properly (and there is a point of "no return" or "beyond redemption" with these). Similarly, you
still have to check the blu ray (ultraviolet) too. CD's read linearly. DVD's and Blu Ray's do not. Other formats like .mp3 do.
Different media do different things and perform at different rates.

Sometimes replacing the laser pickup is a better alternative and dialing it in (on the calibration) with the same methods
and equipment indicated prior is a better idea, if you can get the laser pickup inexpensively.

Best wishes.

From,

Charles Lucas

[Bob F]

Update:

I just received a replacement laser unit from Alibaba in China for $15.
Hopefully, I can just remove the old one and replace it and it will
work. Or will the replacement still need calibration adjustments that I
still have found no service manual for.

The order was made 11/8, promised for Dec 2, and receive Nov 19. That
surprised me.

[ohg...@gmail.com]

It's been *many* years since I played with DVD players (when they became uneconomical to repair), but I recall many lasers being shipped with a solder blob jumper on the ribbon cable to prevent static damage. The blob had to be removed after the laser was installed. If the laser doesn't work at all, see if there's a blob jumper on the ribbon. There also might be a trimmer adjustment on the kapton ribbon, but I wouldn't try adjusting that until every option is exhausted. I recall tweaking that a bit as the laser got older to improve readability, but pushing it too high would also damage the laser diode IIRC.

[Bob F]

Excellent advise. The rains are coming, so I will have more indoor time
to spend on this project.

[Bob F]

I tried this replacement today. It would not load cd's, DVD's, or Blue
ray discs. Maybe needs adjustment, but I do not have much info on that
process. Since none of the disc types works, I don't have much hope for
that. I did not find any kind of jumper to remove. It looks just like
the origional.

I put the old one back in with the previous problem continues. I did
find that it hardly moves the disc at all on DVD's, but spins up CD's
and BluRay's quickly. Even blank CD's and DVD's do not change the
results. The DVD's still do not spin, the CD's spin and search for awhile.

How does the player detect the type of disc? It seems like for DVD's it
is very quickly giving up on spinning the disc.

I did find a youtube on a very similar disc player that includes what
looks like the same laser head unit. SOH-BDP5G
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bXWrO9CLDs

From that, I learned the the VR1 is for BD, VR2 for DVD, and VR3 is CD.

I guess the next step is to get out the scope for adjustment.

[ohg...@gmail.com]

I admit I'm confused by your original symptom of the machine not giving the DVD more than a brief sniff before bailing. My only guess is that it's not reading any reflection back with the DVD. Maybe DVDs are a bit less reflective than CDs?

As far as the "new" drive, I think it's very likely that the drive you received is junk probably pulled from a defective machine that arrived in one of the thousands of containers of scrap electronics that get shipped back to China every year.

[Bob F]

On 11/25/2022 6:50 AM, ohg...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Thursday, November 24, 2022 at 8:50:21 PM UTC-5, Bob F wrote:
>> On 11/19/2022 10:40 PM, Bob F wrote:
>>> On 11/7/2022 12:47 PM, Bob F wrote:
>>>> Samsung BD-P3600 was intermittent for a while on DVDs but now always
>>>> shows "The disc can not be played" when a DVD is loaded. CD's and Blu
>>>> Ray disks work perfectly.
>>>>
>>>> I tried holding "PLAY" or "PAUSE" for 8 seconds to reset to factory
>>>> settings with no effect. (Does nothing)
>>>>
>>>> Any ideas about getting it working would be appreciated.
>>>
>>>
>>> Update:
>>>

>>> I just received a replacement laser unit from AliExpress in China for $15.

>>> Hopefully, I can just remove the old one and replace it and it will
>>> work. Or will the replacement still need calibration adjustments that I
>>> still have found no service manual for.
>>>
>>> The order was made 11/8, promised for Dec 2, and receive Nov 19. That
>>> surprised me.
>> I tried this replacement today. It would not load cd's, DVD's, or Blue
>> ray discs. Maybe needs adjustment, but I do not have much info on that
>> process. Since none of the disc types works, I don't have much hope for
>> that. I did not find any kind of jumper to remove. It looks just like
>> the origional.
>>
>> I put the old one back in with the previous problem continues. I did
>> find that it hardly moves the disc at all on DVD's, but spins up CD's
>> and BluRay's quickly. Even blank CD's and DVD's do not change the
>> results. The DVD's still do not spin, the CD's spin and search for awhile.
>>
>> How does the player detect the type of disc? It seems like for DVD's it
>> is very quickly giving up on spinning the disc.
>>
>> I did find a youtube on a very similar disc player that includes what
>> looks like the same laser head unit. SOH-BDP5G
>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bXWrO9CLDs
>>
>> From that, I learned the the VR1 is for BD, VR2 for DVD, and VR3 is CD.
>>
>> I guess the next step is to get out the scope for adjustment.
>
>
> I admit I'm confused by your original symptom of the machine not giving the DVD more than a brief sniff before bailing. My only guess is that it's not reading any reflection back with the DVD. Maybe DVDs are a bit less reflective than CDs?

Or, the DVD LED has failed

>
> As far as the "new" drive, I think it's very likely that the drive you received is junk probably pulled from a defective machine that arrived in one of the thousands of containers of scrap electronics that get shipped back to China every year.

The could well be true. I notified ALIExpress. It will be interesting
to see what comes out of that. Shipping the old one back would probably
cost me a good chunk of what I paid.

[ohg...@gmail.com]

I was under the impression that they use the same laser to read CDs and DVDs and a separate laser for the Blu.

Maybe yours uses three..

[Charles Lucas]

> I was under the impression that they use the same laser to read CDs and DVDs and a separate laser for the Blu.
>
> Maybe yours uses three..

Interestingly enough, with few exceptions, most devices use just two lasers (one infrared and the other is ultraviolet), based
upon the wavelength and bandwidth involved of the frequency range to operate the laser. DVD's actually have a high frequency
band in the infrared range than audio cd's do. Of course, Ultraviolet is another much higher range altogether to operate the
Blu ray media.

The focus of the laser light depends upon what the media does and the media used, especially with the infrared laser. Since
DVD's read non-contiguously (and non-sequentially), as they are not linear in their reading of media, and yet CD's are very
linear and sequential, the laser treats these media (the CD and the DVD very different). MP3's are even falling into this
category with "multi-format read" devices (however mp3's are much more compressed audio than an audio CD).

With the help of the sled motor and the spindle motor.... The machine does its thing.
Anyway, the laser spot has to read according to what the machine identifies as a type of media in its tray within
the load/eject mechanism. Then the detector system and the comparator determine correct focus. Based upon
the detection system's compensation, the wavelength it reads at, and the frequency its reads to, it determines
whether it is a CD, a DVD, an mp3 or a blu ray disc. The output follows through based upon what the machine
says it is. If not, you get an error. Either way, the machine answers you- based upon what you put into it on the
basis of the standards for each media the machine performs on.

Hope this helps. Good Luck.

Sincerely,


Charles Lucas

[Bob F]

I had to send ALIExpress a video showing the player ejecting discs with
the "cannot load" message on the screen, and they refunded my money
after receiving that. I will try adjusting my original after
re-installing it.

[Peter W.]

> I had to send ALIExpress a video showing the player ejecting discs with
> the "cannot load" message on the screen, and they refunded my money
> after receiving that. I will try adjusting my original after
> re-installing it.

When the alternative is landfill, heroic and/or desperate measures are acceptable.

[ohg...@gmail.com]

Well, that's good at least. I have the same problem with buying some used boards from ebay. I carefully watch the seller's feedback rating and won't buy from any seller that isn't high 99 percent positive.

They all say they come from working items but the reality is that they're being parted out mostly because something is wrong. About 20% of parts I buy from ebay are defective, but better sellers will just refund.