Pioneer CDJ-1000 MK3

[RichardP 0]

C'mon guys, don't take it too seriously - this is just pub talk, isn't it?

 

I mean, you wouldn't really go and video it & turn up with the heavies on a busy day to be extra emphatic, eh?

[superstardeejay 0]

I suppose the best thing for Sapphs to do would have been to have simply swapped the CD player for another new one first time round, thereby at least proving that it's actually a faulty unit rather than a design issue.

 

I have some sympathy with Pioneer if they say they can't get a fault to appear, after all, I get alot of that: CD players/Amps/Mixers which dont show any fault even after weeks of testing, banging and shaking, despite the customer stating the fault is always present!

 

 

 

One example: An Arbiter Karaoke player which I fitted 3 different lasers in, the customer kept returning it saying it froze the graphics on the TV on certain songs and sometimes skipped. I eventually persuaded him to bring all his CDG's in as samples and found that every one had pinprick holes in the reflective layers! He'd got into the habit of wiping each CD across his trousers before playing them and had been catching them on his wedding ring.

 

Another example was a Studiomaster 1200D where the complaint was that it was overheating. I couldn't get that to happen, I fitted a new fan, drive chip and temp sensors, ran it flat out with a blanket over it and all to no avail. When asked about the speakers, the customer said he was using them on a friend's amp and gigging them fine. Eventually, he brought his speakers & leads in to me and I realised that he had a 4-ohm Peavey Hisys 4 cab system; he was using Speakons with all the wires on 1 to 1, 2 to 2 etc, so was presenting a 2ohm load to the poor Studiomaster: his loan amp was rated 2 ohms and the Stud is not!!

 

 

So please dont go in with all guns blazing, it rarely gets you anywhere, the small claims court is a real pain if you go down that way, (and rarely gets results...believe me I've been there many times...as a claimant I should add) life's too short to be angry, you already know your statutory rights under consumer law and maybe it's best to walk away with a full refund (plus your travel/postage expenses) and put it down to life's rich tapestry.

 

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[transeurope 0]

Hey Super.

 

Hope it's going fine your end.

 

The small claims court can be a pain, but you will find the suits of the business rarely can endure it. They don't like dealing with "little people" and once they discover that they can't arrive late, blurt everything out to the judge in one-minute-manager speak and leave early, they tend to just give up.

 

I always find that a little reminder, real friendly, that anything said in court can be republished ad nauseum with the aid of a photocopier helps to focus the mind also.

 

However I must query your Arbiter story. I don't know about CDGs, but aren't CD players supposed to be able to handle dodgy discs? Didn't we all hear stories back in the late 70s that you can cut them into 1,000 pieces and Judith Hann and her magic CD player would hoover them all up and play the recording at better quality that the original?

 

Well, something like that anyway.... http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html//emoticons/headphone.gif

 

However, I believe and have been told by a technician, that a CD player to meet spec is supposed to be able to play a disc with a hole punched in it. I wouldn't have believed this, but he demonstrated after he had "tweaked" one of my machines.

 

So, in the case of CD players, yes...they should cope with pinprick holes no problem.

 

 

[superstardeejay 0]

I assume that the bit about Judith Hann was a mickey-take?

 

 

I did have a CD with a complete radial stripe scored away (like a bike spoke) as a sort of test disc, results were variable between CD player makes and it's certainly not in the Red Book spec that a CD player should be able to read through holes.

Certainly small pin pricks are ok, but not when several lie across the line of the track. The laser not only has to read the data, and make up certain loss or error, but the servos have to keep 'on track' at all times. If there's no track there, they can't! The focus servo must keep locked to the reflective layer to combat warped discs. The tracking servo must stay locked to the track in order to correct for off-centre discs and to advance the sled to follow the music along. It's a bit like a train on a track, they will usually cope with small gaps in the tracks (rat-a-tat) but lose a complete section and you get a de-railment...and depending on how fast you're going. (eg where in the CD the hole or scratch is). Nonsensical / invalid / missing data has pretty much the same effect.

 

There are time constants built into the servos to try and combat reading errors like holes and scratches, but if they're too long, the laser won't advance properly or keep up with disc 'noise'...if they're too short, it will tend to scoot off at the slightest fault, or else oscillate or take ages to land on a specific track when searching.

 

In fact the 'hiss' you hear from a laser is the tracking and focus coils being constantly corrected by the circuitry. A laser lens not only hovers up and down but also side to side on a sort of magnetic 'cushion'. They move so fast that the hissing is the coil drive waveforms working.

 

There are a thousand and one different CD player circuits around, they cope with error with varying degrees of success. CDG players are particularly sensitive to disc errors because the output remains digital from the decoder all the way through to the TV and large errors will always show up as glitches in the graphics/ spurious characters/pixels. And the real cheap muck that made up those early CDG machines in the mid-90's was truly disheartening.

 

CD player technology at its basest level is still remarkable in that it works at all when you examine it in depth! How would you go about doing it?

 

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Regarding the Small Claims Courts (in England at any rate) the procedure is this: Notify the defendant of your intention in writing, get proof of delivery and wait 2 weeks. Go to the court, get body searched, enter, wait an hour to see the attendant, obtain the relavent forms. Submit a claim form to both them and the court, pay your fee and wait 2 weeks, obtain evidence that the forms were delivered and signed for. Wait weeks for your hearing date. Attend court or apppoint a proxy. In default of the claim, the magistrate will award you your claim and costs...it's up to YOU to get the money off the defence if they fail to cough up or indeed don't turn up. You then have to pay the county sherrif to arrange a bailiff to collect your money....you have to pay the bailiffs their fee upfront. Only if the bailiffs are succesful in getting your claim, expenses etc do you get anything. If not, the judge will issue a county court judgment and file the case. You then have to appoint a solicitor and that will go into 3 figures....Believe me don't go down this route.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[transeurope 0]

QUOTE

I assume that the bit about Judith Hann was a mickey-take?

 

Yes, a reference to the sadly-defunct Tomorrow's World, which was very popular not just elsewhere in Europe, but worldwide.

 

QUOTE

it's certainly not in the Red Book spec that a CD player should be able to read through holes.

 

Look, chap, I REALLY don't know much about the Red Book. But...I have seen this done. A tech drilled a hole in a disc to demonstrate what good work he had done on a CD player of mine that wouldn't recognize discs because...because...oh you know...all the usual Polava you get from DJ CD companies...wrong type of snow..that kind of thing...

 

So a quick google...brings up this

 

ctrl-f the following phrase "drill a 2 mm hole" on this really long learned-looking page to find what we are talking about and voila!:

 

QUOTE

"The digital encoding for error detection and correction is called the Cross Interleave Reed-Solomon Code or CIRC. To describe this as simply as possible, the CIRC code consists of two parts: interleaving of data so that a dropout or damage will be spread over enough physical area (hopefully) to be reconstructed and a CRC (Cyclic Redundancy Check) like error correcting code. Taken together, these two techniques are capable of some remarkable error correction. The assumption here is that most errors will occur in bursts as a result of dust specs, scratches, imperfections such as pinholes in the aluminum coating, etc. For example, the codes are powerful enough to totally recover a burst error of greater than 4,000 consecutive bits - about 2.5 mm on the disc. With full error correction implemented (this is not always the case with every CD player), it is possible to put a piece of 2 mm tape radially on the disc or drill a 2 mm hole in the disc and have no audio degradation. Some test CDs have just this type of defect introduced deliberately."

[my emphasis]

 

 

 

So there! Isn't the innernet wunnerful???

 

 

QUOTE

How would you go about doing it?

Well, that ain't my job. My job is to present music to the crowd by ensuring that I have working CD players. I earn a nice pile doing that, they earn a much larger one making CD players. That's their problem. http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html//emoticons/smile.gif

 

 

As regards your small claims point:

Yes, similar tedious procedures here, but no body search. However you rarely have to go to a hearing, they don't contest most of the time. And a company like Sapphires would die before having a CCJ. That's serious.

 

Regards...

[Gary 0]

Well, from talking to a certain poorly treated (that's my opinion anyway) owner of 2 non-identical CDJ-1000mk3's the other week, I think he has one or two bits of hidden "ammo" about the Mk3 - which I'm certainly not going to burst the bubble on, this side of his refund of both units, since I would imagine Sapphires (who are, normally, pretty good when it comes to customer service - apart from when their strings are being pulled from higher up the chain), probably read DJ forums.

 

Hopefully, he'll be able to leave his Black'n'Decker and 2mm drill bit in the shed.

Edited July 7, 2006 by Gary

[Dukesy 0]

Had a laser replaced in a CDJ500mkII years ago.....and it was out of allignment which stopped me playing some original discs (even though it was repaired by an authorised dealer!)

 

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[superstardeejay 0]

Yeah the CDJ500's used the PEA1179 hologram laser, it needs careful mechanical and electrical adjustments but gives good results when done properly.

 

QUOTE

With full error correction implemented (this is not always the case with every CD player), it is possible to put a piece of 2 mm tape radially on the disc or drill a 2 mm hole in the disc and have no audio degradation.

 

Yes, I know how the data is laid down on a disc, the quote is wishful thinking indeed and very few brand new players of any type will cope with this...I dont know where the author got this spec from but as it's on the internet it must be true. A perfectly radial scratch as put on deliberately is usually ok, but 2mm is pushing it, and how many scratches occur to such specific parameters.?

 

My pinhole reference was regarding data dropout from a CDG disc, but nontheless many decent CD players won't even play over a genuine greasy fingerprint or hairline scratch or certain shaped pinholes. And once a pinhole starts on the reflective layer, it usually spreads in time, 'growing' as the foil flakes off or damp gets in ('rust'). It's no use quoting these internet statements, if I had to reject every CD player that skipped over holes or scratches, I'd have to toss out 75% of the CD players I see in the workshop! And I see scores every year. (!)

 

If in doubt, try it! Get a bit of black tape, put it over an old CD and try it. (Dont blame me if the tape falls off inside your machine....)

 

Error correction due to a scratch or hole generally sounds like a 'ticking' noise that repeats at the same rate as the disc rotation speed....when the error is bad enough. It can be heard both over the speakers and from the laser mechanism noise. No doubt that DJ players that buffer complete tracks into memory cope differently, the laser still has to read and error-correct before buffering. Some anti-shock players will 'stick' over a scratch, just playing the buffer over and over until the laser can track again along the disc.

 

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[otronics 0]

Any further outcome to this?

[superstardeejay 0]

Yes we're all waiting with excitement at the outcome!! RU there, Jon?

 

[otronics 0]

Bumpity Bump..

[superstardeejay 0]

Pioneer have just issued a firmware upgrade for the CDJ1000/3. The new firmware (version 2.00) is only applicable to the CDJ-1000MK3 to upgrade units running older firmware versions (1.20, 1.40 and 1.50).

 

Pioneer can either email the upgrade which has to be burned to a CDROM and put in the machine, or else genuine Pioneer dealers will carry the CD's in stock from the 20th August (UK) and will usually do it for you free whilst you wait if you bring your player in.

 

The link for download is here: (European UK customers)

 

upgrade

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[milhouse 0]

QUOTE (superstardeejay @ Jul 27 2006, 09:06 PM)

Yes we're all waiting with excitement at the outcome!! RU there, Jon?

Not had chance to go down yet so I'm still with my dodgy deck! Next week or two I will be paying a visit to the dealer.

 

Where on that software page is the new firmware? I cant see it anywhere?

[superstardeejay 0]

Not available until 20th Aug.

 

 

[Gary 0]

QUOTE (superstardeejay @ Aug 12 2006, 01:35 PM)

Pioneer have just issued a firmware upgrade for the CDJ1000/3. The new firmware (version 2.00) is only applicable to the CDJ-1000MK3 to upgrade units running older firmware versions (1.20, 1.40 and 1.50). Pioneer can either email the upgrade which has to be burned to a CDROM and put in the machine, or else genuine Pioneer dealers will carry the CD's in stock from the 20th August (UK) and will usually do it for you free whilst you wait if you bring your player in. The link for download is here: (European UK customers) upgrade

I wouldnt hold out too much hope about the Pioneer firmware upgrade.

 

A couple of quotes from the Pioneer service sheet state:

 

QUOTE

The key improvement of this upgrade is to the stability of playback BPM display accuracy.

 

QUOTE

The new firmware (version 2.00) is only applicable to the CDJ-1000MK3 to upgrade units running older firmware versions (1.20, 1.40 and 1.50).

 

Makes you wonder what happened to versions 1.6, 1.7, 1.8 and 1.90.

 

Maybe one of those other versions had something in it to aid CDR/Promo disc reading and will be included in this upgrade.

[brianmole 0]

Anyone know how to check the FW ver of a CDj1000 MK3?

[Gary 0]

QUOTE (brianmole @ Aug 25 2006, 11:22 AM)

Anyone know how to check the FW ver of a CDj1000 MK3?

previous MK's of CDJ1K have required the Loop exit button to be held down for 10 seconds or so, in order for the display to show the Firmware version. That might be the same for the MK3's.

Edited August 25, 2006 by Gary

[brianmole 0]

Thanks Gary, works on the MK3 too, mine are MAIN V2.00. So far everything works as expected. I'll report back any issues from tonight.

[milhouse 0]

Im going to upgrade the firmwares on mine later this week and see if it has any joy.

 

Failing that i'll be in london next week at Decks.co.uk.

 

Bit late i know but ive not been able to go down and argue with them yet!

[Gary 0]

QUOTE (superstardeejay @ Jun 17 2006, 12:10 AM)

QUOTE Pioneers 19inch rack mount CD-decks also didn't escape firmware issues - the Pioneer 5000 suffered an official recall of two and a half thousand units due to the Auto-mix function taking full control of the keys and, if it couldnt get a mix working right, it froze out the controls on both sides of the dual deck - the only button that carried on working, was the power button.   I've just asked Pioneer about this and they deny any recall of any CMX. Thats because their forum moderators may have conveniently short memories, not drifting back to 2001... http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html//emoticons/biggrin.gif   http://img159.imageshack.us/img159/4237/image1bq0.jpg

Edited September 12, 2006 by Gary

[superstardeejay 0]

Pioneer US remembered this recall after all! I think current owners can rest assured none of the unmodified units are out there, after all it was 2001 and a US market thing.

[Gary 0]

I'm aware of one UK player that was sold on by a venue, to a mobile DJ, and the unit was one of the first few thousand Pioneer units with this problem. In the case of that unit, it played normally most of the time, but occasionally dropped into "R2D2 karaoke mode", making staggered whistling and bleep/blip noises over the sound systems.

 

But definately isolated - thankfully.

[superstardeejay 0]

The last CMX5000 I had in for repair occasionally locked up on the right hand side, and occasionally made strange digital noises from the audio (like a ZX Spectrum loading a tape!!). It was the drive PCB on the right side, it ended up being sent to Videotec (Pioneer service agents) and I dont know what happened after that. It looked like a rather tired, elderly example, it had been traded in via a dealer in part-ex for a couple of new CDJ1000's.

 

I dont get Pioneer in very often, just the odd CDJ500 with tarnished push buttons, CDJ500S with knackered loading belts or the domestic CDJ100 with the common sled screw follower buckled.

 

The CDJ100's dont like Celine Dion BTW but don't know why...maybe not a fault, just good taste..??

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[spinner 0]

QUOTE (superstardeejay @ Sep 15 2006, 11:20 PM)

The CDJ100's dont like Celine Dion BTW but don't know why...maybe not a fault, just good taste..??

Couldn't be anything else!!

[milhouse 0]

Have tried updating my firmware on my 1000's but the player won't let me. I have followed the instructions on the Pioneer site. When I insert my disc with the firmware on, nothing happens.

 

Display says "No Track"