Craig JC6011: Jewel of my collection

serge1996

This piece of, eh, technology, was bought off eBay as part of a lot "for parts/repair only". I bought the lot because of Philips AZ6804 but this Craig became THE star of my collection!
Not metal, but the next best thing: polycarbonate shell:

real metal hinge, old-school laser mechanism:

the year is 1993, already made in China:

it is service-friendly, just 7 screws and it is all yours:

When I first saw this, I thought that my glasses got distorted. So I took them off for a closer look:

I wonder who designed and assembled this player, those people must have smoked something real funny. Unlike electrolytics, which could not be fit nicely because the board is too small for them, the few dip caps were intentionally soldered at some crazy angles... amazing craftsmanship:







As always, KSS-330 is nice and the underside of the board looks clean:


More good news: it still sounds better then iPod on lossless files!!!     

kaosun

Nice cosmetic condition but terrible component. If they use all SMD capacitors, it won't cost too much more but much better looking inside.

It uses classic KSS330 laser, CXA1081/1082 and CXD1167 which provides strong reading capability but weak DAC LC7881 and weak earphone BA4558. The first time I saw LC7881 was in my double-speed ACER CDROM CD525 which used in my Pentium 586 100Mhz in 1995. Now even a $39.99 Resperry Pi has a much more faster 700Mhz ARM CPU. The LC7881 was only designed to be "make some sound" instead of silence. In that CD525, a TL084 was used to be the earphone amplifier. TL084 is a high speed quad operational amplifier faster than dual OA.
If you have time, mod it?  

kaosun

Oh, my bad.
The BA4558 is a line out amp.
The earphone is CXA1522. It has strong output power by 110mW at Vcc=3V.

serge1996

To mod this "beauty"? Oh, no! I want this JC6011 to have the honorable spot of the "ugliest one" in my collection. horror from the inside. Thank you for your comment about its cosmetics: Novus polishing pastes do a miracle for clear parts.
I have a question: if line-out works nice and clear but there is a background noise thru the headphones, where should I look first? I changed headphone coupling caps for two Rubicons (as you can see from photo 052, originally it was a mismatched pair: Elna and Nishicon, its simply amazing how hard they tried to be bad even at such minor things)

kaosun

If both earphones have noise, check external components of CXA1522 like power filter capacitors; if L/R channel has noise, check corresponding capacitors or resistors. Coupling caps won't generate any noise, they only affect bass. Larger capacitors make more bass.

serge1996

xxx

serge1996

My latest restored Discman was Kenwood DPC-55. It was more like my plastic modelling hobby than the usual Discman revival. Real proud of the "brushed" look I invented for its lid:



The good thing is that its headphone amp is as powerful as those of D-7 and SL-XP5, measures at over 30mW into 30Ohm
The Bad is its DAC: LC7880. Is it any better than LC7881 I have no idea, hopefully Kaosun knows, but the overall sound, with all that h/p power, is pretty flat (I am trying to be polite here).
Nice candidate for the upgrade project