annoying screeching sound in soundtracks

[matferronato]

Hello everyone,

I recently bought a saturn and I noticed that through my gameplay, almost every game played had some kind of scratching noise on the soundtrack.
A game like Sonic R would sound like this:

"Everybody's Super Sonic Racing
Try to keep aspdhiufbwbfisbdfkisjdfbsdfsdfsfon on the ground"

That bothered me a lot, so I tried everything insight that the internet could provide me.

I Tried to clean the lenses, tried to change modchip, tried to work with the potentiometer, tried to check the capacitors (they seem fine). I even tried some old music albuns, like an Iron Maiden CD. Audio kept the scratching noise.

That's the only problem with my saturn, otherwise it runs very well and can read both legit games and burned ones.

So, I'm in need of a higher knowledge right now. Should I buy a new lens or try something else?

My best regards to all

[MIK]

Try another TV or video lead just in case it's some short, it could be the lead, it could be a lack of power when the CD player is reading? Fuck knows to be honest but try a different screen and/or video lead if possible.

Some Saturn games and if the music has been recorded directly to the disc you can put in any normal CD player, like Daytona USA.
Skip to track 2 as track 1 will always be the game data, it should start playing music like a normal CD. This will help prove some of your disc's are a-ok and as they should be, meaning it's the Saturn doing it.

[zyrobs]

Does it do it without the modchip? I remember some chips adding audio noise for some reason.

[matferronato]

Try another TV or video lead just in case it's some short, it could be the lead, it could be a lack of power when the CD player is reading? Fuck knows to be honest but try a different screen and/or video lead if possible.

Some Saturn games and if the music has been recorded directly to the disc you can put in any normal CD player, like Daytona USA.
Skip to track 2 as track 1 will always be the game data, it should start playing music like a normal CD. This will help prove some of your disc's are a-ok and as they should be, meaning it's the Saturn doing it.

I had tried another television and I kept getting the same problem. However, I couldn't try another cable, I don't have one
Do you know if I can use other console's cable on the Saturn? Maybe the Mega Drive one, or even the Multi Mega CD one

[matferronato]

Feb 6, 2017 19:39:36 GMT zyrobs said:

Does it do it without the modchip? I remember some chips adding audio noise for some reason.

Yes, unfortunately it does. Indeed, I just bought the modchip because firstly I thought it would be a problem with the Action Replay cartridge used to play burned games.

Btw, sorry for the double post, I though I had quoted zyrobs and MIK in the same post. I must have done something wrong, my mistake

[zyrobs]

Does it only do it in games with CD Audio, not in any other games?

Any chance you can make a recording?

[matferronato]

Feb 6, 2017 21:11:30 GMT zyrobs said:

Does it only do it in games with CD Audio, not in any other games?

Any chance you can make a recording?

Sure!

I recordered the audio from my television, the quality isn't great, but I think it manages to show the problem.

here is the video

www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1fZlLLy3Qc&feature=youtu.be

[zyrobs]

Okay, does it happen from a cold boot on the first game, or only after a little while, once the unit warmed up?

It's definitely a problem in the cd drive, not a video cable or action replay. At a guess, either the cd tray is low/high, the laser is on its way out, it needs to be recapped, or perhaps the power supply is getting bad. I'm guessing your unit is either a model 1 or an early model 2. If it's an early model 1, you also have several other pots on the cd drive, not just the laser one.

[matferronato]

Feb 6, 2017 23:31:50 GMT zyrobs said:

Okay, does it happen from a cold boot on the first game, or only after a little while, once the unit warmed up?

It's definitely a problem in the cd drive, not a video cable or action replay. At a guess, either the cd tray is low/high, the laser is on its way out, it needs to be recapped, or perhaps the power supply is getting bad. I'm guessing your unit is either a model 1 or an early model 2. If it's an early model 1, you also have several other pots on the cd drive, not just the laser one.

Mine saturn is from a brazilian manufactory called Tectoy (at least I supose...). It has the round buttons that as far as I know is more common on the model 2, but the cd drive pcb has two more potentiometes, so maybe an early model 2?

It happens all the time, doesn't matter if it is warmed or not.

I'm sorry but I didn't understand the problem with the cd tray. Never heard of it. How could I check if mine is ok?
 Hope it's not the power supply, I guess I should try to replace the laser first.

[zyrobs]

Okay, no clue about what power supplies Tectoy used.

If the unit has a separate pcb for the controller ports and a 5-pin power supply, then it is an early model 2 (a late model 1 in model 2 shell). If it has a single pcb motherboard, then it is a later model 2.

For the tray, pull off the little black spindle on the end of the motor that the CD snaps into. Then push it back down in small steps (put the tray back on the spindle and gently hit it from exactly the top), checking how well it reads the disc between each step, until you reach a point where it reads discs the best. That's what I do. Not really scientific, but it helped me in the past. Just watch out so you don't push it down while it is spinning, if you do that the disc will contact the surface while spinning and get scratched.

The reason this helps is because the tray slowly slips down the spindle as you slam discs on it through the years. Only by an incredibly small amount, but it adds up enough so the cd now sits just a bit too low for the laser to properly focus on it (exacerbated by aging, weakening lasers). So reseating the tray can alleviate this a bit.

Of course if the laser is on its way out, then there's little you can do.

[matferronato]

Feb 7, 2017 1:00:04 GMT zyrobs said:

Okay, no clue about what power supplies Tectoy used.

If the unit has a separate pcb for the controller ports and a 5-pin power supply, then it is an early model 2 (a late model 1 in model 2 shell). If it has a single pcb motherboard, then it is a later model 2.

For the tray, pull off the little black spindle on the end of the motor that the CD snaps into. Then push it back down in small steps (put the tray back on the spindle and gently hit it from exactly the top), checking how well it reads the disc between each step, until you reach a point where it reads discs the best. That's what I do. Not really scientific, but it helped me in the past. Just watch out so you don't push it down while it is spinning, if you do that the disc will contact the surface while spinning and get scratched.

The reason this helps is because the tray slowly slips down the spindle as you slam discs on it through the years. Only by an incredibly small amount, but it adds up enough so the cd now sits just a bit too low for the laser to properly focus on it (exacerbated by aging, weakening lasers). So reseating the tray can alleviate this a bit.

Of course if the laser is on its way out, then there's little you can do.

Hey Zyrob. Thank you for your answer, and sorry for my late reply.

Well, I tried to fix the audio again this evening. I changed the potentiometer values (increased and decreased it) and tried to raise the spindle a little higher.
I couldn't pull off the black spindle as you said, I would have to use a little bit of force to do that, at least that was what I felt. Do you know any tutorial on how to do that?

Should I check the other potentiometers on the pcb? I really don't know what they supposed to do.

Again, thank you very much for all the help you are providing guys!