noisy dvd-drive, please help !

[elfredo]

I recently bought a secondhand dvd-drive. It´s a Cretive DVD5241E. It reads any media without problems, except: dvd-Video doesn´t play smoothly from the dvd itself, only if I copy the files to harddisk (shame on me...)

But the main peoblem for me is its noise when running at higher speeds. with software i can limit the cd-reading speed, for example to 8X, then there is almost no noise from the drive. But from 10X to maximum there is a vibrating noise increasing to maximum speed.

I expected a disbalance but I couldn´t find anything when I opened the drive: when i put a disk on the motor and turn it I cant see any deviation.

So where could the problem be ? Might it be possible that the disbalance is within the motor itself ? Please help me.

Friedrich schneider

[Paulr]

It's the CD's & DVD's themselves - they are so very rarely manufacturerd at the very best quality.
It's like having an out of balance wheel on your car.
Up to 50mph you don't know your tyre is out of balance, smooth as anything.
Then, you get upto 60mph and everything starts bouncing around and the whole car vibrates.

Some CD-ROM / DVD-ROM drives seem to be better at compensating for this non-totally flat CD's & DVD's, others vibrate a lot.
Try fixing the drive more tightly into the case, this might disperse the vibrations more.
At the computer company where I used to work, when 16x CD-ROM's first appeared, the rails used to fit the drives were padded with a thin layer of foam - this almost totally stopped the vibrations.

[az]

Does anyone know the more expensive Pioneer HiFi CD players? They have (or at least had some years ago) something called "stable platter mechanism", where you put your CD with the blank side facing upwards, like a turntable. Wouldn't this minimize vibrations with CD ROM drives, too? (I know you might need double height, but I'd be willing to spend that space)

AZ

[Greebe]

Flipping the CD over makes no difference in vibration. Pioneer did this to gain the space needed to add a harmonic dampening mechanism (can't right off hand remember what they called it).

[elfredo]

Mmmh, I don´t think it´s the medias itself.

Besides: I hadn´t built in the drive till know. Instead of I tried to put it somehow it wouldn´t build resonance. I found a weird position which almost doesn´t produce any noise, but it would be a problem to build it in my case with that direction.

Thanks anyway
Friedrich Schneider

Sorry about my bad english

[az]

*LOL Greebe, I do know that flipping the CD over makes no difference (other than you'll have to tell anyone who'll use your CD player/drive that he/she has to flip the CD ), but I thought the platter (instead of the relatively small area normal CD drives hold the CDs with), or the added mass (or both) would make a difference..

AZ

[az]

elfredo, no problem

It's nice to see another Friedrich here *g

AZ / Friedrich

[Greebe]

elfredo, it is the disc if the drive is functioning properly. There is no question about that. The vibrations of a disc spinning at those speeds is a major problem that all manufactures have and a harmonic balance is the only real way to compensate.

Of course it could be that the motor bearings are shot and that your problem.