My 20Gb CECHB01 lost backwards compatibility....

[MCP]

My friend and I have an original 20Gb PS3, which like many of these models have had a laser-lens burnout. We have correctly reinstalled the entire laser assembly (KES-400A/KEM-400AAA), and put the housing back together. However, now...CD/DVD/PSX1/PS2 discs are no longer recognized by the system. (PS3 discs and PSN titles work perfectly fine). The discs are gathered by the BD drive correctly as it should, but no icon is displayed on the XMB. We've taken a look at the BD drive while it's completing these functions without the main PS3 housing, (just the top stripped off), and have noticed that it tries to spin, but doesn't continue to after a few moments. At first we thought it was a bad laser module, and reinstalled yet another assembly, but to no avail. Then we thought it might be a bad motor on the laser assembly itself, not allowing the laser module to be put into place correctly, thus not sending the signal to the motor to spin the disc. (As most techs should know, once the diodes receive the information that a disc has been inserted, the motor on the assembly move the laser module into place, so that it may produce the "checklist" laser functions in order to read what kind of disc it is). Having tediously scoured the internet for manuals/tutorials/how-to's as to why this is happening, we have come up with little to nothing. So far we've troubleshot most aspects of what could be causing the problem, but we are stumped. Here is a list of troubleshooting we've gone through ;

The laser has been carefully cleaned with a q-tip and propanol as instructed by most laser assembly companies.
All screws/bolts/brackets are correctly fastened.
The motherboard and daughterboard are fully functional and have no reported errors.
The EE + GS chip is securely soldered to the motherboard, (we checked just to make sure we didn't knock loose anything during the laser re-assembly, although unlikely we did).
The new 500GB Internal HDD is securely connected and receiving/sending information.
Both laser drive diodes are connected and report no errors.
All ribbons are securely connected and receiving/sending information.

If anyone can help with this conundrum, it would be most appreciated. Thank you.

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CECHB01 - 500GB HDD
3.55 Kmeaw Multiman (Update Current)
KES-400A Laser Module/KEM-400AAA Laser Assembly Housing

[MCP]

Nearly 200 views and not one person has any information for me?

[defyboy]

Sir!,

Welcome to Sony's after hours technical support, before we can proceed I need to ask you a few troubleshooting questions:

1) Is there paper in the printer?
2) Is the cassette tape inserted the right way up?
3) Have you attempted to clean the device with warm soapy water?
4) What is your credit card number?

We will endeavour to ignore your repeated help requests and cripple your device beyond all usability. Please allow 6-7 working months until you may enter a class action lawsuit.

[MCP]

Ah yes....the ignorant ramblings of an adolescent troll. If you have nothing helpful to add, please keep your comments to yourself. The adults are trying to work. Thank you.

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[No0bZiLLa]

sounds like the laser you got is faulty. happens all the time. also, when you buy them lasers as "new"...... they are really just old burnt out ones someone has just put a new diode in. your ps3 did not loose Backwards Compatibility, the laser is just faulty

[MCP]

We thought that might have been a problem but, we switched the old laser module (where the prisms are contained) with the new laser lens (diode) and vice versa with the new module/old laser lens. Installed both to try them out, but all we found was that the old module/new lens didn't work at all, and the old module/new lens worked as it did when we originally replaced the assembly. Now I'm not dismissing the probability that the new laser assembly in its entirety may be damaged, but I don't see how it would work at all if it was. The fact that it still plays blu-ray discs says that it's still working right? We're pretty sure that the PS3 didn't ACTUALLY lose its backwards compatibility, I just find it hard to believe that an entirely new assembly would exhibit the same symptoms as our original laser assembly when it first broke down. We thank you for your input and we will most likely look into buying a new assembly again to test this, however we were looking for a solution that doesn't involve spending much cash in order to fix our problem. Because if that doesn't work then we've wasted resources on parts not needed.

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[No0bZiLLa]

its either the laser, or fuses ont he bd controller or mobo. take your pick, get a multimeter and measure, measure, measure

[sel2killa]

it's probably the laser assembly.... i know for a fact that for the single diode laser assembly to read cd/dvd it has to ramp UP the voltage to the diode. if the diode was weak it wont be able to do it. bluray reads takes much less power - oneof the reasons why they migrated to a dual laser setup, so that it off-loads the massive power usage through the diode when reading cd/dvd

[Transient]

I had something similar happen years ago with my PS2. In that case, it couldn't read DVDs but read CDs no problem. I replaced the laser and the symptoms remained the same. In that case, it turned out to be the controller.

[MCP]

We thank you for your input. In regards to the voltage output, we have no way of reading what it's giving out, and furthermore we wouldn't even begin to know where to look. So we hope that's not the case. We looked into the single diode advice, and we have come to a conclusion that this must be the case. In the meantime we will give updates on progress of this problem, and when we receive our new laser assembly and install it, we shall keep our fingers crossed. Thank you for your input.

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