Panasonic Q Problem

[Ish]

My Panasonic Q has stopped playing GameCube games. It never thinks the disc is in the drive. But it works fine with DVDs.

Anyone know anything about this?

[Pavey]

I know its two separate machines crammed in there,so does that mean it has two lasers?

ie dirty GC one,clean dvd one?

PM Yoda maybe,know he will.

[Yod@]

I'm afraid I don't know - never worked on a Q.

[Ish]

I'll have the lid off it tomorrow I suppose.

Dammit. I was well up for a game of F-Zero.

[wod]

you could try one of them dvd lens cleaners to see if that makes a difference

[Ish]

Pleased to say I got this working again. Stripped it down, cleaned everything, reconnected it all and now its working fine. Phew.

[leon0]

Problem with Panasonic Q aswell

My Q seems to have developed a similar problem. I put in a DVD and the quality was very poor and grainy. It was a DVD-R, so I just figured Q's dont like DVD-R's. But I tried a proper DVD and it didn't work full stop. It just keeps whirring and says the disc cannot be read. Just tried playing a US game and it says theres no disc in it. Tried a JAP game and I get the same message. Put in a music CD and it plays fine. Very strange.

Ish, how easy is it to strip these things down and clean? Looks like i'm going to have to do that.

[vertigo]

I know it's a very basic thing, but go to Maplin or some electronics shop and buy a can of compressed air. Should cost you about 7 or 8 quid but it's worth every penny.
Whip the lid off whatever's giving you gip and give as many holes and angles a good blast. You won't hurt anything, but any crap, dust, rogue bits of metal/plastic etc will get blown out of there.
It's a very good starting point if you're having problems with anything electronic.
I had a non-working PCB that was quite dirty, reseating the ROMs fixed it almost, then I gave it a good blast of compressed air all over and it was 100%.
Do not, repeat NOT attempt to clean dust or dirt from electronic things with a vacuum cleaner. The static generated by a vacuum cleaner will almost certainly nuke it.

[Ish]

It's not hard. You just undo the screws you can see and the two sides come off. Getting the lid off is a little awkward without a second pair of hands as you have to press these small clips in on either side to release it but its not hard. Then you disconnect some leads from the circuit board underneath the lid and you can carefully lean in to one side. I say lean it to one side as there's a very short ribbon cable connecting the circuit board on the lid to the circuit board at the side which on my model at least didn't seem to be attached by and kind of plug. Once you've done that your looking at the drive and can give it a clean.

It sounds harder than it is. If you've had the lid off a PC before its no more difficult than that.

[leon0]

Ok, thanks, i'll give it a go.

[wod]

is the panny q stacked up like inside a gamecube ?