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To answer all your questions in one place. Generally, it's not possible to
tell if everything is either above or below the deck, except by experience.
You might assume that with top loaders, everything is below the deck, but
often, they use a conventional deck with most of the mech above, but then
cover it with a thin metal plate, which is the bit you see through the slot.
To service the gears ets on one of these, the deck would have to come out.
OTOH, if this deck type was fitted in a conventional drawer-type player,
then you may need only to open the tray to get at everything. Conversely, if
a deck with all the gears underneath is fitted to a top loader, it may be
possible to get to its underside without removing it. The reverse is true if
such a deck is fitted to a conventional drawer-type mech.
There actually aren't all that many basic deck mechanisms. Many different
manufacturers use decks from Sony, Sanyo, Panasonic / Technics and Philips.
Certainly, there are many others that might be encountered, but in general,
the vast majority of consumer CD players are covered by those few makes.
Probably no more than 12 or 15 deck / laser types total.
As to whether units are worth taking apart to repair, it's really not the
issue as to how cheap and nasty they are governing the deck that's fitted.
You are just as likely to find the exact same Sony deck and laser fitted to
a 30 quid Tesco-sonic (or Walmart-o-matic for leftpondians!) as might be
fitted to a 300 quid Teac. The issue is whether it's worth wasting the time
getting to the deck to see if a 'service' fixes it, bearing in mind that
such action will only get a (lasting) result in perhaps 50% of cases.
I really can't comment on whether or not it is worth it for you. If you are
attempting to learn, and whether or not the unit fixes is of no consequence,
then it probably *is* worth it for you. As a repairer who is in it to make a
living, that's not generally the case for me. There are occasional
exceptions where an item has sentimental value for an owner, and they are
prepared to pay an examination fee that they understand that they might
lose.
As to how to proceed on your Sony, you need to figure first what exactly is
happening (or not). Does it play at all ? If yes, does it have poor
'playability' i.e. sticks, skips, doesn't like some discs etc ? Does it
manage to get through all tracks if left alone, or will it not get past a
certain track ? Does it struggle more to play home-burns than commercially
pressed discs ? Much of the technique of fixing CD players, is down to an
accurate diagnosis, and one of your best workshop tools in this regard, is
the mk 1 eyeball. If you can be a bit more specific about the nature of the
problem that it has, I might be able to offer some more detailed pointers.
Arfa