Pioneer Elite Pro-510 problem [Text View] - Page 3

Mr Bob

07-31-06, 02:43 PM

I work with Tom and he told me about this Forum. We've owned our 610 for 4 and a half years, and our extended warranty is going to expire in 6 months. (I specifically had them check when Tom told me about the problem.) Should I have them out to fix this? As easy as you all say this fix is, I have no clue how to solder and wouldn't want this to be my first practice.

Yes, and do it pronto before it gets any worse. It only gets worse, it doesn't get better by itself. Like dental work...

And point them to this thread. They will not necessarily be Pioneer warranty techs, could be freelancers. Tho with Pioneer's denial of this problem, probably wouldn't matter...

If they call Pio tech assist, they WILL most likely be advised of this problem. I called as a freelancer, and was. However, you have to have the service manual in your possession before they will call you back. They can't be reached live, like Mit factory techs can.

On the other hand, I have not experienced the blue flash (boy doesn't that sound like a Microsoft problem???)

I'm kind of in the mind set - if it ain't broke don't fix it.

But I am worried that the problem might crop up after my warranty ends.

Does anyone know how pervasive this problem is??

If you want to know how pervasive it is, read this entire thread. If you don't want to do that, just look at how many pages it currently has. Then find a few entries delineating the latest number of victims.

It IS pervasive. At least 50 people on this thread are victims of it.

Also just curious, does anyone know if Pioneer is finally admitting to this problem?

Tech assist mentions it to techs who are calling in; don't know about their CS people, but word from here is that CS does not.

Mr Bob

jesup

07-31-06, 04:23 PM

make that 51....

Started a year or so ago, rare. Now once a day or more, and sometimes instead of just needing a power-off, it needs to be off "for a while", and if you turn it on before that you get a horribly fuzzy "image" with heavily bowed out sides taking up maybe 60% of the screen.

Ours was bought in Jan/Feb 2000, 510HD. Had the early factory repair for a HV zap that would cause it to jump. Went in last night and just blew out any dust on general principle.

I'm going to read this thread in detail, but it sounds like it's a pull-boards-and-reflow operation. Any caveats about avoiding zapping yourself while in there? Discharge-points? I have access to a full tech lab at work, and have a Weller iron at home as well (needs a new point).

Thanks!

Mr Bob

07-31-06, 11:40 PM

make that 51....

Started a year or so ago, rare. Now once a day or more, and sometimes instead of just needing a power-off, it needs to be off "for a while", and if you turn it on before that you get a horribly fuzzy "image" with heavily bowed out sides taking up maybe 60% of the screen.

Thanks!

Sounds like you have a convergence problem, and if you go on letting it go and still using it, you will probably zap something else in there before you get it fixed, causing an even more expensive repair. Could be you have both the power supply problem and the convergence problem, where the conv prob is still in its infancy. Problem is, none of these problems gets better on their own, only worse. Like needed dental work.

I would recommend getting it fixed NOW, before any further domino-effecting happens. It'll save you money in the long run.

It won't get fixed by your continuing to use it in this condition, that I can state unequivocally.

Mr Bob

soltex9

08-01-06, 12:53 PM

In my brief contact with them, Pioneer's CS department denies any knowledge of this problem. I encourage all who do have it, to at least inform them.

jesup

08-01-06, 01:56 PM

Sounds like you have a convergence problem, and if you go on letting it go and still using it, you will probably zap something else in there before you get it fixed, causing an even more expensive repair. Could be you have both the power supply problem and the convergence problem, where the conv prob is still in its infancy. Problem is, none of these problems gets better on their own, only worse. Like needed dental work.

It appears as if the convergence issue (more like a totally (massively) defocused screen) is due to the PS issue - perhaps a cold solder joint that opens enough that a simple power on/off doesn't solve things'; it has to remain off long enough to cool down (I assume).

I would recommend getting it fixed NOW, before any further domino-effecting happens. It'll save you money in the long run.

It won't get fixed by your continuing to use it in this condition, that I can state unequivocally.

Absolutely - I've already made plans to pull the PS board and resolder it in the next day or two. We have a full lab and equipment here at work. I'm still reading ALL this thread; should I pull and do another board at the same time?

Mr Bob

08-01-06, 02:14 PM

It appears as if the convergence issue (more like a totally (massively) defocused screen) is due to the PS issue - perhaps a cold solder joint that opens enough that a simple power on/off doesn't solve things'; it has to remain off long enough to cool down (I assume).

Absolutely - I've already made plans to pull the PS board and resolder it in the next day or two. We have a full lab and equipment here at work. I'm still reading ALL this thread; should I pull and do another board at the same time?

One of the regulators supplying voltage to the conv sys has been known to go cold solder on the PS board. Lack of one of the critical voltages can throw the whole thing out of parameter.

Mr Bob

Brian Bunge

08-01-06, 07:54 PM

Actually, I believe I was number 86 in this thread with this problem. So it's got to be around 90 or more now. My TV is still going strong. Just need to get it calibrated and have it all cleaned up....

John Tillman

08-05-06, 12:16 AM

I posted #470 about a month ago. Since then I had a local shop do the soldering and it was working fine again for about 3 weeks.

Now I've got a very unfocussed picture with yellow, blue and magnenta images on all inputs. Anyone care to take a stab at the issue?

Mr Bob

08-05-06, 10:46 AM

Now I've got a very unfocussed picture with yellow, blue and magnenta images on all inputs. Anyone care to take a stab at the issue?

Look very closely. Are the yellow images accompanied by blue images beside/above/below them? Are the magenta images accompanied by green images beside/above/below them?

If so your convergence system has stopped functioning properly. Repairing it usually entails replacing the OP ICs, on the convergence board - that board is to the left side, vertically mounted, as you look at the inside of the back of the unit, back plate removed (NOT mirror section! NEVER remove mirror section from the back! See my warnings about this, elsewhere in this thread).

If it is out, there will be a red LED lit up on that board, and possibly 2 fuses blown on the PS board, tho if they were blown chances are the unit would be shutting down.

I believe the ICs used are the STK 392-110's, available via www.electronix.com, among other places.

The conv board is a 2 level board, with one board on top of another one.

The ICs are in between the 2 boards, mounted to the bottom one, and there is extensive metal plating taking up space half an inch below that board, making soldering on it very challenging.

While not a walk in the park, it's an op that can be done by anyone versed in soldering and heat sink compound replacement, to keep the heat sinks effectively shedding the intense heat that convg ICs give off.

And taking things apart and getting them back together without breaking anything in the process...

:rolleyes:

This and the PS board resoldering are all that ever typically go out on these Elites. Luckily enough, if both of these problems are addressed and remedied whenever they rear their ugly heads, these Elites just keep going, and going, and going...

:)

Mr Bob

John Tillman

08-06-06, 05:32 PM

Originally posted by Mr Bob
Look very closely. Are the yellow images accompanied by blue images beside/above/below them? Are the magenta images accompanied by green images beside/above/below them?
Wow, I think you've nailed it Bob! I'm going to try replacing the STK 392-110's and we'll see what it does - I'll post back after completing it. It's a wonderful set I'd like to continue using so your advice is much appreicated!

Sidepipes

08-07-06, 07:35 PM

Hello from a newcomer to the forum! Boy, am I glad I found this excellent resource. My Elite PRO-510 was developing the "flash and shut down" sickness, but also, it had intermittent EMI/RFI interference symptoms (now don't laugh) that went away for a few minutes by either opening and closing the microwave oven or refrigerator door!

After studying the resolder instructions from several posters, I decided to jump into the fray.
Sure enough, the E3 and E2 connectors, as well as two IC connections seemed to have cracked solder joints. Using a fine point Weller heat controlled iron, I reflowed all of these joints. After reassembling the set, and powering on, much to my delight, the set is now working great -- 12 consecutive hours with no pop, shut down, or EMI lines.

Thanks to all for the insight, especially to Mr. Bob.

jesup

08-07-06, 11:26 PM

Well, I got my PS board out. At least 3 and more like 5 cracked solder joints on E3. E2 seemed ok (including to the hotshot tech in our lab helping me). +9, +12, the last GND, and probably a couple more.

I found lots of "iffy" joints in the upper half of the board - I reflowed all the connections that looked bad to me or the tech (especially those showing circular rings in the solder joints, like on several of IC201-IC204 and some of the components near them). I probably reflowed around 40 joints, maybe a bit more.

4+ days now with no shutdowns/resets, so I think we're good. Thanks everyone!

BB-Georgia

08-09-06, 01:16 PM

The entire problem could all be in the convergence and have nothing to do with the PS board. Unfortunately, the only way to check that out is to uncouple the power rails from the conv ICs, minimum, without removing those voltages from other parts of the board, or other parts of the circuit, like the PS board, where they come from. Or remove the ICs and replace them.

If decoupling the plus and minus voltage rails from touching the conv ICs makes the unit stay on, then for sure the ICs need to be replaced, as they are shorting things out in there. One or both, depending on how your troubleshooting skills are.

I would always replace both, because if one goes now, the other could go tomorrow. You know, old throw-out bearing principle.

Read up on my entries about conv IC repair.

Mr Bob

Here is the solution to my "Pop - Shutdown Problem" on my 710HD

After trying to fix the problem by soldering all cold joints on power supply board, I still had the problem. I had two red lights on after the shutdown, one on the power supply and one on the deflection board. Also started to get convergence issues after problem started.

FIX: Replaced he power supply board first per Pioneer tech. This corrected the convergence issue but not the Pop-Shutdown. Had same two lights one. Then changed out the deflection board. Once changed all was fine. I am burning in the new boards to make sure that they hold up before I can say my issue is solved.

All I can say to all, especially Mr. Bob, is THANKS. Reading this forum gave me the nerve to change out the boards myself. It was a little difficult but very rewarding once done.

Will keep folks informed if further issues arise.

Good luck to all.

BB-Georgia

RTSinDallas

08-12-06, 09:30 PM

Phantom Gremlin

08-12-06, 11:07 PM

I think this thread is the closest you'll find to an "owner's thread" for this display. Yes there are other threads, but this one has seen the most activity by far in recent weeks.

Mr Bob

08-13-06, 01:25 PM

Hi folks,
I recently picked up a Pro 510HD used. The picture is fantastic, but it seems to lose its convergence settings over a couple of days. Could this be due to a cold solder?
Also, I couldn't find an owners thread for these units. Is there one?
Thanks
RT

Keep in mind, all CRT RPTVs use a convergence circuit that has a running temp that takes roughly 45 minutes to reach, and stabilize at. In the first 45 minutes, ALL CRT RPTVs will undergo changes in where the convergence lands, among the 3 colors. As such, we calibrators NEVER do the highly critical high-precision point convergence alignment until AFTER the first 45 minutes of a set's warm-up. There's plenty to do until then - optics cleaning, focusing, overscan reduction, geometry, roughing in the convergence, etc. - before we get to that point, so waiting for the first 45 minutes on that particular op is no big deal.

There will be much more drift when the points are fighting the coarse settings, so these things should always be optimized accordingly if possible. Unfortunately, on a Pioneer you can't just zero out the points and go from there like you can on a Mit, which is difficult on a Pioneer just because of their hexadecimal counting system, and completely ineffective anyway once zero'd, I've tried it. And you can't just go to 2-3% overscan either. Either scenario forces you out of its linear operating range for geometry and convergence, and as such makes accomplishing anything by doing such things impossible.

You can, however, reduce the HD overscan substantially and recenter the pic effectively, and reduce your DVD overscan to 4-4.5%.

But owners need to know this as well, about operting temp. You can get your set perfect in the middle with the crosshairs at any time, but the edges will remain rough and not highly precise for quite awhile as your set warms up. The convergence ICs run ungodly hot in there, and have to level off at their long term - per viewing session, at least - running operating temp before you can trust them.

Could be that your conv ICs have formed cold solder joints at their legs. The conv bd is the vertically mounted one on the left side of the set as you're looking into it from the back, with the lower back plate removed. (NOT the upper, slanted rear section with the mirror on it. NEVER remove that! You'll break something!) It is a double-board assembly, and the conv ICs are in the middle with their legs pointing thru the bottom of the lowest board.

If the convergence SNAPS out, then in, on occasion, the conv ICs need to at the very least be resoldered. Or they could be exhibiting internal bad conn's, and need to be replaced.

It they've shorted out fuses on the power supply board, they are defective and definitely need replacement, and a red LED will be lit up on the conv bd, along with another red LED on the PS board.

Mr Bob

RTSinDallas

08-13-06, 04:36 PM

Thanks Mr. Bob,
I didn't know about the warm up time. I'll warm it up and do the convergence, then check it, only when the set is properly warmed up. If it is still drifting off, I'll check the board for cold solder joints.

What is a good dvd player for this set? I know the PRO-510 had a good deinterlacer for it's time. Is there a recommended progressive player under $300?
I was looking at the Oppo 970 new, or a used Panasonic RP 56, 72, 82, 91 S77, S97 or Denon 1600, 2900, 3800. Or, one of the hackable units (LG/ Zenith, Samsung) that will upconvert over component. I am hoping that with the current HDMI and HD DVD/ BR craze, that some of the old better players, that did their thing over component, might be more accessible.

Thanks
RT

bradturner32

08-13-06, 08:49 PM

I wanted to thank everyone on the forum for keeping this thread going and helping those of us who experience this for the first time.

I have a PRO-710HD that started experiencing the "blue flash" and popping sound right towards the end of my 5 year warranty. I had called the tech out before I found this thread and of course the tech could not find anything wrong while he was here. The problem continued for several months and gradually worsened until a large pop one night caused the 5A/125V fuse to blow. Replacing the fuse delayed the inevitable for awhile and the fuse began to go quicker and quicker until I found this thread and gradually worked up the nerve to attempt repair of the PSU.

After removing the PSU from the chassis I noticed the unit had been repaired before (I bought the unit new!) because it had two wires soldered across the bottom (assumably to fix a bad trace). The first one was from the trace from the main transformer which was directly next to the pin leading to the 5A/125V fuse that kept blowing. Given the proximity of the two solder joints and some discoloration around both I started in this area to remove any excess solder and fractures. The only obvious "halo" I found was at the base of one of the transistors (the largest one with by far the largest heat sink on the board - op amp?) . I reflowed all three leads and then went to work on the all of the other "discolored" areas. I did not see any halos or fractures on any of the E# bus connectors but I worked on these last since there has been such a large consensus of issues here. The other discolored areas were around the large white resistors and the other transistors - all of which were re-done.

It's been about 16 years since I had any real training with a soldering iron, and I had long since gotten rid of it, so I did have to head over to Radio Shack to pick up some parts. I ended up with a dual 15W/30W iron, a new base, and some .050 60/40 rosin core solder. All up I think it was about $25 in parts to fix an $8000 television!

Thanks again for keeping the thread alive - the unit is back to working at peak efficiency. Are there any other preventative maintenance issues with this series?

Brad Turner

bradturner32

08-14-06, 01:30 AM

Doh!

The 710 operated flawlessly all day with no flashes, loss of convergence, oversaturation or any visable artifacts. My wife shut the TV off (and the DVR) by mistake and when we went to turn the TV back on it would not - after checking it was the same fuse that had blown. However, this time I noticed a new LED that I had not seen before lit red - it was labeled V. Def P.D on convergence unit.

I just noticed Mr Bob's earlier post regarding blown fuses and the LED light on the convergence board indicating an issue with the convergence ICs. Are these user servicable and how do I go about ordering a replacement?

Thanks,

Brad Turner

Mr Bob

08-14-06, 08:26 AM

What is a good dvd player for this set? I know the PRO-510 had a good deinterlacer for it's time. Is there a recommended progressive player under $300?
I was looking at the Oppo 970 new, or a used Panasonic RP 56, 72, 82, 91 S77, S97 or Denon 1600, 2900, 3800. Or, one of the hackable units (LG/ Zenith, Samsung) that will upconvert over component. I am hoping that with the current HDMI and HD DVD/ BR craze, that some of the old better players, that did their thing over component, might be more accessible.

Thanks
RT

I am not up on the newest upconverting DVDPs, l but am very sold on using them rather than 480i->p DVDPs. The structure looks so much better, you don't have any window-slat effect, and you only have to caliberate the 1080i, rather than both 1080i and 480i on structure (can't cal 480p on structure on the Elites, only 480i, which coveres 480p).

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

08-14-06, 08:29 AM

I just noticed Mr Bob's earlier post regarding blown fuses and the LED light on the convergence board indicating an issue with the convergence ICs. Are these user servicable and how do I go about ordering a replacement?

Thanks,

Brad Turner

One good place to get the ICs is www.electronix.com.

It's a user doable op, but you have to be handy, and adept at repairs.

Mr Bob

RTSinDallas

08-14-06, 11:17 AM

Thanks again Mr.Bob

Can any Pro 510hd, 610 or 710 owners recomend a player that upconverts over component?
Do these sets have a problem with macroblocking with DCDI players? I thought I saw what I understand to be macroblocking watching a football game the other day. The first down markers were a dayglow orange, and had a lot of video noise going on.

RT

bradturner32

08-14-06, 12:29 PM

One good place to get the ICs is electronixcom.

It's a user doable op, but you have to be handy, and adept at repairs.

Mr Bob

Thanks! Can you recommend which part numbers should be replaced? I imagine you should replace the entire set to be safe?

Brad Turner

bradturner32

08-15-06, 02:17 AM

John Tillman

08-15-06, 07:47 PM

Mr Bob

08-16-06, 06:45 AM

Ok, I disassembled the convergence unit and noted the following parts:

(2) STK391-110 (voltage regulators?)
(1) 2SB950
(1) 2SD1276

...which are all attached to the giant heatsink. I'm guessing the two STKs need replacing, but do the other smaller ones also need to be replaced?

Brad Turner

I believe you mean STK 392-110's, 2 of 'em, which are what needs to be replaced. Never had to replace anything else, on the x10 series.

Best to always replace both, yes.

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

08-16-06, 06:53 AM

Well I got the ICs from electronix.com, pulled the boards and had the local shop that resoldered my PS board do these.

Put it back together and it powered right up but while I originally had yellow, blue & magenta images I've now got white, magenta and green rings around most figures. The rings are much tighter than before though but figures are more fuzzier. Could it be a convergence adjustment or is something still not working?

Got to go back and check the fuses, but would it even power up if a fuse was bad?

Whenever you replace both the STK's on a Pioneer, the result will require an entire new geometry/convergence setup. If you only replace the affected one, then that series of colors' images has to be completely redone.

Either situation is quite daunting for a newbie, and has a substantial learning curve. But a good time to reduce overscan as well, if that is one of your goals. This has to be done on both the 480 and the 1080 scanrates.

One reason to have a calibrator do it, if he is able to do both the repair and re-setup, like I do.

Very few calibrators are capable of repairs, and very few repairpeople are capable of calibration. Just a handful of us around the country, who can do both on the same visit.

If any of the fuses are still blown, no the set will detect the absence of voltage in a critical measuring place, and will not fire up.

Mr Bob

bradturner32

08-16-06, 01:09 PM

Whenever you replace both the STK's on a Pioneer, the result will require an entire new geometry/convergence setup. If you only replace the affected one, then that series of colors' images has to be completely redone.

Either situation is quite daunting for a newbie, and has a substantial learning curve. But a good time to reduce overscan as well, if that is one of your goals. This has to be done on both the 480 and the 1080 scanrates.

Mr Bob

Hmm, I'm sensing more work than I thougt here - are the calibrations done on the boards themselves or through the remote? Is there a basic guide to doing the calibrations?

How much should I expect to pay for someone to come out and do a proper calibration?

Thanks,

Brad Turner

John Tillman

08-16-06, 10:34 PM

Actually, I think my set is okay now. I went into setup and adjusted the convergence, it's back to normal and looking good.

I still need to check out a DVD and HD picture but i'm on the right track. If after a while it still needs a recalibration (originally done by Kevin Miller), I'll have it done again.

As long as the hardware bugs are gone then touche'!!!

Mr Bob - thanks much for your advice :).

Mr Bob

08-17-06, 04:08 PM

Hmm, I'm sensing more work than I thougt here - are the calibrations done on the boards themselves or through the remote? Is there a basic guide to doing the calibrations?

How much should I expect to pay for someone to come out and do a proper calibration?

Thanks,

Brad Turner

Cals have to be done in the sm, which can be daunting for first-timers. I am available for paid phone consultation if you want to do it yourself.

I would charge travel plus $250/primary scanrate, $200/secondary scanrate to get it back to where it had been before the repair, as far as geometry and convergence go, if the repair hoses things as much as it has on the conv repairs I have done on Pioneers. On Mits's things usually line up really close to where they were before, so no extra charges there, but on Pioneers it's very different, and unfortunately a lot more work.

If you wanted the full basic cal package, it would be travel plus $485 for the primary scanrate, plus $285 for the secondary scanrate, and would include general optics cleaning, geometry and convergence, focusing via the Cantilever Technique (which I wrote), grayscale, setting of brightness/contrast, detail/sharpness, and color and tint in sm, so that in user all you would do would be to center everything, and you'd be at my calibration settings.

To do overscan reduction, which would cover redoing your convergence after repair as well, I charge $200/scanrate additional, and in this case that would simply be added to the regular basic cal rates. If you were doing a regular cal and chose to have the overscan reduction done as well, I would kick in redoing all the offness caused by the repair into the $200/scanrate extra.

Mr Bob

danbarb

08-17-06, 06:21 PM

Mr Bob

08-18-06, 12:57 PM

First time to the forum and found it after my Pioneer Elite 610-HD screen started to go blank, sometimes after a small popping noise (it was purchased in 2001). It has gotten progressively worse. It sounds like the issue with poor solders on the power unit described my many threads on this forum.
I decided to go to the Pioneer website to see if they had anything listed about this problem. I saw something about a class action suit against Pioneer in California for persons in the USA who prior to May 12, 2006 purchased a Pioneer Elite high definition, rear-projection TV model no. Pro-530-hd, pro-530 hdi, pro 630 hd, pro-730 hd or pro-730 hdi. Has anyone heard of this and will it allow us to get the power supply replaced at no charge. Does the 510-hd and 610-hd fall into this listing of models?
Appreciate any inputs.

The x30 line was the last line of CRT RPTVs produced by Pioneer, and it followed the x20 line, which followed the x10 line, with each progressive model year. The x10 model year is what this thread is all about, from 2 years before the x30 line.

I have not been seeing this type of problem with any prevalence in the x30 line or x20 lines, only the x10 line. But I would not be surprised if the x30 line - or the x20 line - was/were affected just as much, because I have been seeing cold solder joints cause problems in Pioneers ever since the SD-P line of RPTVs. Which was years before the advent of the HDready in anybody's lineup!

If I were an x10 owner, I'd hop on this, as a template for a similar action re. the x10 series.

In any class action of this nature, I would be glad to be called as an expert witness, and will gladly repeat everything I have said here, while on the stand.

Mr Bob

Paulwm

08-18-06, 04:06 PM

Pankaj2000 - pls continue your good work and count me in. Trying the fix tonight, thanks to the many excellent comments above. -PM

Phantom Gremlin

08-19-06, 02:44 AM

If I were an x10 owner, I'd hop on this, as a template for a similar action re. the x10 series.
I wonder if the extended warranty companies would have any "standing" to pursue a class action suit? They paid dearly for this. My TV had these flashing and popping problems and was fixed under extended warranty.

Mr Bob

08-19-06, 12:13 PM

BTW, chalk up another one. I just repaired a 610 yesterday in Milpitas, after which he elected to have the optics cleaning done. Unfortunately on the x10 series, the deeper optics cleaning also always needs to be done at this age, due to the gaps between the lenses and what the lenses affix to. It costs a little extra, but well worth it. He elected to have that done as well.

I called them back later, and he said that some friends had just come over and the first words out of their mouths were, "Hey. Did you get a new set???"

Mr Bob

billfish33

08-24-06, 12:49 AM

well,I'm back in this thread again {replaced my PS board in jan '05}
have not had any flashes at all,the set has been working great till this evening.

Right after watching a DVD,right at the very end....I heard a pop and the set shut off,I cannot get it back on even after having it unplugged for a few hours.
also there is a red L.E.D that is in the rear of the set {when behind the set it's on the far right side in the lower corner {looks like it could be ON the PS board}
it's kinda hard to tell with the back on though.

Liquidpen,have you found out what your problem is yet ?

I had purchased a Pioneer HD-610. It was fine for a week then started shutting off. Turn the main switch off and turn it back on it would be ok for a while. Then it just stopped turning on. So I read the forum did the soldering trick and still same thing. Click the main switch on and the light just stays red. There is a red light on also in the back... when you turn on the main switch there is also like a clicking/slight popping sound like it wants to turn on. I am not sure where to go at this point. I am tghinkin of ordering a power supply board? Probably going to call a tech any more advice on what to try?

Thanks

Mark

Mr Bob

08-24-06, 06:36 AM

well,I'm back in this thread again {replaced my PS board in jan '05}
have not had any flashes at all,the set has been working great till this evening.

Right after watching a DVD,right at the very end....I heard a pop and the set shut off,I cannot get it back on even after having it unplugged for a few hours.
also there is a red L.E.D that is in the rear of the set {when behind the set it's on the far right side in the lower corner {looks like it could be ON the PS board}
it's kinda hard to tell with the back on though.

Liquidpen,have you found out what your problem is yet ?

Look for another red LED in there, on the left side as you look in from the back of the set. If you see one on the left side, chances are it's your convergence gone bad. If so one or both of your conv ICs has probably shorted out, and my recommendation is to replace both if you replace one.

This is covered earlier on in this thread.

Mr Bob

billfish33

08-24-06, 10:35 AM

Mr. Bob,
I do indeed have 2 red LED's lit
the lower far right side ,and a mid high far left side.

I had the 510 unplugged all night,plugged it in and attempted to to turn it on while I watched the rear,no red LED's this time,I moved to the front and had a green on light this time but within a split second it shut-off again with the LED's on in the rear.

Is this what your talking about ?

Symptom: Set is in shutdown mode. Diagnostic LEDs indicate a
problem in the vertical circuit.
Cure: Replace defective C909 or C911 on Convergence Amp. assy.
Models Covered: PRO510HD, PRO610HD, PRO710HD, SD532HD5,
SD582HD5
Tip Date: October 04 2001
The Tech Name: Jeff Andrews

how difficult is this job and how costly ?,
is it simply swapping boards,or sending out boards ??

billfish33

08-24-06, 01:05 PM

this looks like what you were refering to. ?

so by what I gather,I'd need 2 fuses {202 and 204}
as well as 2 of the same conv IC's {STK 392-110}

are these the parts #'s for both the fuses and the IC's ?
this appears more than I can handle,swapping out a board was easy but this seems like allot more work.

If the board comes out as easy as the ps board,can I send it somewhere to have the IC's installed ?

I have been seeing someting lately that has nothing to do with cold solder joints. The last 2 repairs, one a 510 and the other a 610, had exactly the same problems, with exactly the same solutions. Neither involved the power supply board except for replacing fuses, and both involved direct shutdown of the set upon turn-on, with no intermittency or blue flash, or any other hinkiness. The set would simply not go on, at all - do not pass go, do not collect $200.

If your set shuts down directly upon turn-on and you go in and find that fuses 202 and 204 are both blown on the power supply board, you have a characteristic set of data that points to only one thing.

The first is a 6.3 amp, the second is a 5 amp, and they are both smaller-sized GMA F type glass fuses. They are both horizontally mounted on the power supply board, directly across from each other with another fuse in between and another one to the right, and the left one's board locator number is covered with a white stuck-on label which simply IDs it as a certain voltage rating and 5A.

One goes to the +25v. rail and the other goes to the - 20v rail.

These 2 rails are the plus and minus voltages to the convergence ICs. One of the ICs will be blown, taking out both fuses, and if you don't want to figure out which and believe in the throw-out bearing principle, just replace both ICs and upgrade your system. That's what I do, even tho the convergence has to be redone after either is/are replaced.

The IC is the STK 392-110, 2 of them, mounted deep into the double board that comprises the convergence assembly, which is the other vertically mounted board on the other side of the back from the power supply board.

The top board of this double-board set has to be removed so you can get to the ICs, and if you pull the small ribbon connector that connects the 2 boards, it pulls away most co-operatively. The ICs are mounted on the large heat sink, and be sure to apply a liberal amount of heat sink compound on beneath the new ones, while in the process removing any old compound on the heat sink that has dried out. If you're careful you may get away with not having to dismount the board from the sink itself, but the soldered legs are a tight squeeze to get both a soldering iron and a solder sucker in there.

I have not found any cold solder joints on this problem. The joints are all gleaming and solid, so the ICs themselves are what goes out.

The set will not turn on without the fuses being in place and whole/not blown, and it also won't turn on if you disco any of the 3 conn'rs going to the conv yokes. In one case the lack of voltages at the other end of the fuses does not enable stay-on, in the other case there's some interlock in each of those 3 connectors that needs to be there for the set to turn on.

Whoever has this problem, good luck and keep us informed.

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

08-24-06, 01:43 PM

billfish33

08-24-06, 05:16 PM

bradturner32

08-25-06, 01:06 AM

Success!

After ordering all four parts (the 2 STK's and the two smaller ones) from electronix I was able to desolder the parts and replace them. It has been quite awhile since I did any desoldering, but the simple copper desolder braid I used worked very well. Once I got the hang of the operation it went much faster.

I removed all four parts attached to the heat sink, cleared off the old heat sink compound and spread a conservative amount across the new parts. Having worked with heat sink compound before with CPU fans, I understand that too much will actually reduce the thermal transfer so I was careful not to add too much.

As for reattaching the parts, I was careful to use a pair of small needlenose pliars to duplicate the positioning of the pins so they would fit through the holes (only on the two small three pin parts). After threading the pins through I reattached the mounting screws to the heat sink and made sure there were no visable gaps. The only issue I had was after mounting the STK's I noticed that the PC board was warping due to the stress the pre-bent pins were placing on it. I took the pliars and pulled the pins through to relieve the stress and the board went back into place. After everything was mounted the resoldering went quickly and I was careful to watch for solder bridges. Before re-mounting the board I clipped off the excess pin length.

After remounting the convergence boards I replaced the 5A 125V fuse that had blown repeatedly. I had already replaced all of the fuses before considering they were more than 5 years old, so I knew the one fuse was all that was left.

After powering the set back on I was astonished to note how clear the picture was. I waited the 45+ minutes to allow the STK's to warm up and set about tuning the convergence. There were very minimal adjustment required in both the centerpoint and the mult-point adjustments. It also seemed like my previous User settings remained, even though the set was without power for more than a week.

I then set about validating the picture with a variety of inputs. The SD channels looked fine and slightly fuzzy as they always have. The HD channels were crystal clear and my previous overscan problems were greatly reduced with no adjustments. I was no longer experiencing any cutoff of the station logos with the exception of the ESPN-HD channel which had very minimal overscan (only the bottom leg of the E was obscured).

The only thing I have left to discern is to identify the source of some oversaturation and banding of scenes with intense red. Could this be an issue with the comb filter?

Brad Turner

Mr Bob

08-25-06, 06:34 AM

Bob :

I had the double board out within minutes,was very simple ,I used a marker to lablel the plugs and it won't be a problem at all.and it's all boxed up and ready to ship.
one thing though,
I checked the fuses by sight,and they look ok to me ? could be wrong though ?

with that said,
after I spoke with you earlier,I started having second thoughts and started looking at newer sets,and only because I got scared off from the problems ahead of reconverging the set.
You had mentioned it will be so far outta whack and would take quite a bit of work to get it back to where it is now ?,and the IC's may not even be the problem ?

I really need some input on this cause if I do go ahead for a new set,it won't be as nice as things are real tight right now.the piano black matches my psb's
so nice,and what I've been looking at I hate to say it is DLP sets.

If you'll look at the entry that follows yours you'll see that on his, replacing the STK's caused no problems with the convergence or geometry. I would say that it's very likely that it won't be any problem with yours either. It's actually pretty rare that doing this replacement causes massive shifts in the geometry/convergence paradigm, but it does happen on Pioneers now and then.

If it does cause shifts, correcting it is something I can walk you thru on the phone. I charge for my time on this type of thing, but it's well worth it to have someone as experienced as I am on the other end of the phone. My consultations have been universally well received at the user's end. I know tricks very few know, after having done this as long as I have, in the very specialized field of big screen calibration.

In any case, worst case scenario is that you have to have someone in to redo your convergence and geometry. For any talented DIYer, this has been pretty much a no-brainer. And you will have upgraded your convergence sys with new parts - never a bad idea in the first place, as they work real hard in there at all times that the set is on. And if it allows your set to stay on from then on, you have successfully repaired it, as many on this board, at this thread, have. These Pios, which cost many thousands when new and were worth every penny, are definitely worth spending a few hundred bucks on, to repair and keep going.

If my replacing your STKs did not solve your shutdown problem, I would refund half the labor money you paid me to do the IC replacement for you. In which case you'd get the upgraded convergence sys for half price on the labor part of it. This would not include the parts, which would remain the same.

But in your email your description of the state of the fuses is that you have not tested them with an ohmmeter for continuity, when removed from circuit. This should be done before any final decisions are made, on your end.

Mr Bob

esdc

08-25-06, 02:20 PM

billfish33

08-25-06, 10:25 PM

http://www.electronix.com/catalog/product_info.php/cPath/6_308/products_id/9359

also
besides the 2 IC's {stk-392-110},theres nothing else in actual parts {besides the 2 fuses} ?correct ??

Johnla

08-25-06, 11:11 PM

esdc

08-26-06, 02:37 PM

I did not get any of the names, but was told by the manager that calls should go through the "warranty repair" option (which is where I was), and if the CS rep cannot find it, to ask for a manager.

The Pioneer customer service number is 1-800-421-1404. Once you go through the menus to warranty repair, it takes 15-30 minutes to get an operator. They asked for model number, serial number, place and approximate date of purchase. The rep was going to just set up the repair, but I asked for a manager to answer some questions. He said the words "power supply", "solder", "flash", and "pop" should be plenty to get them to identify it as this problem.

They then took further details (name, phone, address), and I hung up. This was all on Monday Afternoon.

Friday morning I was called back by them. A service call had been set up with the "Pioneer Preferred" local repair place, and they gave me that info. I called them, and a service call was arranged for Monday AM.

Thanks to soltex9 who was the guinea pig on this! :)

Mr Bob

08-26-06, 03:31 PM

http://www.electronix.com/catalog/product_info.php/cPath/6_308/products_id/9359

also
besides the 2 IC's {stk-392-110},theres nothing else in actual parts {besides the 2 fuses} ?correct ??

Well, the price has gone down from what I remember it was before, and even factoring in shipping to that price, it's definitely a great price! I have been paying more, from other sources. I will definitely go with this source from now on, and will reduce the price I am asking for them, from those who have me service their convergence boards in this thread.

And yes, these 2 are the only parts needed, aside from the fuses, which I think are a 5A and a 4A.

In talking with Pio's tech assist dept. yesterday, I found out that the vertical circuit in there does use both positive and negative voltage rails, but they also say that the vertical rarely goes bad, and is definitely not the prime suspect/most likely suspect on the convergence board. That the conv ICs are - those and only those.

So yeah, those are all you'll need to order.

Have you checked your fuses yet, out of circuit with an ohmmeter?

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

08-26-06, 03:44 PM

FYI: Pioneer Customer Service acknowledged the solder problem on my out-of-warranty 710 and is sending out an authorized tech to do the repair at no expense!

It may take a bit of CS roulette, but I was told the policy now is that they *are* dealing with it.

Yay! Maybe they will do enough for the Elites - and SD series' - out there right now to keep them all truckin' for many more years!

As I have been saying for years on these boards, the lifespan of a well treated CRT RPTV is less like 5-7 years and more like 10-15 years, when taken care of properly. Pioneer centers their contrast BY DEFAULT in a very safe range, both in sm and in user operations, which not only keeps the CRTs from aging prematurely, but keeps everything else in there operating within its linear operating range while being viewed.

All those 10-15 years, they are capable of looking better then new, when cleaned and calibrated properly and regularly.

If Pioneer has finally bit the bullet and ackowledged these weak points, and is ready to step up to the plate and handle fixing them properly after all these years, you Elite owners can look forward to stellar performance out of your sets for at least another 5 years, possibly even longer.

You Elite owners paid dearly for the privilege of the nice black lacquer piano finish and the capacity for image greatness built into these puppies - thousands more than other brands were asking, at the time - and you deserve the finest treatment Pioneer can give you.

Mr Bob

billfish33

08-27-06, 10:03 AM

Well, the price has gone down from what I remember it was before, and even factoring in shipping to that price, it's definitely a great price! I have been paying more, from other sources. I will definitely go with this source from now on, and will reduce the price I am asking for them, from those who have me service their convergence boards in this thread.

And yes, these 2 are the only parts needed, aside from the fuses, which I think are a 5A and a 4A.

In talking with Pio's tech assist dept. yesterday, I found out that the vertical circuit in there does use both positive and negative voltage rails, but they also say that the vertical rarely goes bad, and is definitely not the prime suspect/most likely suspect on the convergence board. That the conv ICs are - those and only those.

So yeah, those are all you'll need to order.

Have you checked your fuses yet, out of circuit with an ohmmeter?

Mr Bob

the only fuse blown is a 5 amp fuse {the one that had the odd look to it}
I checked each one with my ohm meter.
My Neighbor has offered to do this for me reasonably !
I'll just have to wait to get the parts in and he needs a few weeks to free up some time.
I'll post the results when it's done !!!!

KevinH

08-29-06, 05:18 PM

esdc, thanks. I called the warranty dept. They said they had some information on the problem. They gave me a case number and had me fax them my purchase receipt and any service documents, of which there are none because this is the only problem I've ever had. Now I'm waiting for the call back. I wrote that I knew what the problem and fix was and would prefer a resolder rather than a new PS board that may go bad again. We'll see what they say.

Did your tech come out Mon.? If so, how did it go....what did they do/say?...and most important...is it fixed and did it cost you anyting??

Again, thanks for the info.

esdc

08-29-06, 05:57 PM

The scheduled appointment happened Monday afternoon.

Pioneer inverted two number on the street address (a "phone tag" problem, I guess), but that was easy enough to deal with on the cell. Just in case, you may wish to confirm your address when your local repair place calls you back.

The tech that came out was the owner, and he knew exactly what he was looking for. Once the board was out, he touched up 202-204, then inspected the rest of the board, and touched up half a dozen other connections (although he said only one "really needed it"). The set was reassembled and back together for a total time of 20-25 minutes.

Speaking with the tech, he said that there have been "some" of these cases since late 2004, but that they have become much more prevalent in the last six months or so. He then left, and all I had to do was sign the work order. In other words, it was indeed no cost as promised. Sincce you've not had any work done on the set before, I'd get a card and rate sheet (if they have one) from the guy/company Pioneer sends out and hold on to it. Considering this Houston company (APM) is Pioneer's preferred service center, I was a bit surprised to find they were significantly cheaper than the folks I had been using (less than half for the cost of a cleaning).

No visible flashes through the Monday Night Football game or Letterman in HD. It is certainly "mostly fixed", although I won't say it is 100% so until I've had time to check it out further. :)

KevinH

08-29-06, 06:20 PM

Sweet deal esdc!! Congrats and I hope mine goes as well. It's really a relief to hear that Pioneer has begun to acknowledge this. I've been SOL trying to find someone local to do this for me. Was fixing to use our friend's(MrBob) service, and just may yet if I"m not as fortunate.

Mr Bob

08-29-06, 07:43 PM

The scheduled appointment happened Monday afternoon.

The tech that came out was the owner, and he knew exactly what he was looking for. Once the board was out, he touched up 202-204, then inspected the rest of the board, and touched up half a dozen other connections (although he said only one "really needed it"). The set was reassembled and back together for a total time of 20-25 minutes.

Speaking with the tech, he said that there have been "some" of these cases since late 2004, but that they have become much more prevalent in the last six months or so. :)

If I were doing this under warranty, I may have also given it half an hour's time, and resoldered essentially half a dozen spots.

However, on the last 2 boards I have repaired, I have elected to resolder virtually every solder joint on the board - everything except the straight jumper wires between pads and the test point prongs, neither of which ever get stressed directly. That's a lot of solder joints, and I assure you it was not completed within half an hour. Just getting into the back and freeing up the board to be soldered - which involves removing numerous screws and removing it from its metal casing, which has generous plating underneath, preventing any soldering - and getting it back in place, with all plugs removed and then replaced into their sockets - then putting the back back on, including all screws you had to remove to get it off - just getting in to where you can actually do the work and then back out again, takes that long.

I will agree with him about one thing: these things keep getting progressively worse as the years go by. Whenever you touch your soldering iron to a joint's leg and the solder there separates and congeals on the leg, parting company with the outer edge of the pad, revealing an acre of space between the leg and the pad - as if it had never been soldered - you know that was an accident waiting to happen, and you gotta wonder how much longer that joint would have lasted once the board was put back into the unit and into service again. In exploring that board, I have seen many such separations when the joint is hit by just the iron itself, before the solder is applied. The same stresses that caused the initial problems continue, and you gotta wonder how long it would be till connections that are OK - but weak - now, will last under the same conditions that originally weakened them.

If these boards were being treated like computer boards in massive server rooms, where the climate is strategically controlled and run at a very precise and constant temperature, these problems would never have occurred.

But big screens are not climate controlled, in any way shape or form. They get turned on and get hot, then they get turned off and get cold; everything heats up and expands, then it cools and contracts again, then the whole expand/contract/expand/contract cycle repeats itself, over and over and over, day by day. After years of this, the PS boards originally put out by Pioneer failed. If many of the smaller joints not mentioned heretofore in this thread are weak now, how long will it be till the board fails again?

Not only do you have to wonder about all these things, you also gotta wonder how much you can trust any boards sent out by Pioneer, for replacement. If you have sent for one, please look at it closely and let us know whether the solder conns in there are dull and flat looking, with thin solder, as the original boards are. Or are they gleaming and glossy, with plenty of solder, indicating a fresh and thorough re-soldering job?

I can't say, as I have never seen a replacement PS board for this series sent out by Pioneer. They could all be excellently resoldered, like the job I do.

All I know is that I never get problems later, years down the line, when I apply my version of cold solder joint protocol to these boards.

Mr Bob

KevinH

08-29-06, 08:00 PM

Bob, have you received my email(s). I'll wait to hear what Pioneer says when their warranty dept. calls back, but I"m still leaning on sending my board your way to make sure it gets done correctly and all the way through.

Mr Bob

08-30-06, 05:30 AM

Bob, have you received my email(s).

No, no emails from you at my regular email address in my signature, below.

You can find the real thing in my contact info at my website, www.imageperfection.com.

I have been preening my spam filter for months, perhaps I have set something in motion that won't let yours thru, esp. if it has any promotional content in it.

Can you try from an alternate email address at your end?

Mr Bob

KevinH

08-30-06, 10:14 AM

esdc

08-30-06, 08:23 PM

If I were doing this under warranty, I may have also given it half an hour's time, and resoldered essentially half a dozen spots.

However, on the last 2 boards I have repaired, I have elected to resolder virtually every solder joint on the board - everything except the straight jumper wires between pads and the test point prongs, neither of which ever get stressed directly. That's a lot of solder joints, and I assure you it was not completed within half an hour. Just getting into the back and freeing up the board to be soldered - which involves removing numerous screws and removing it from its metal casing, which has generous plating underneath, preventing any soldering - and getting it back in place, with all plugs removed and then replaced into their sockets - then putting the back back on, including all screws you had to remove to get it off - just getting in to where you can actually do the work and then back out again, takes that long.

Understood!

However, given the time to repair (Almost three weeks since I first observed the symptoms), the cost of repair (zero), the real downtime (an hour or so) and the fact it appears to be fixed (still no flashes), I am going with "beggars can't be choosers."

I was happy to get a tech who was clearly familiar with the set, could proceed with the disassembly (removing the back, removing the board, removing the plating) in a confident and careful manner, knew what needed to be fixed, and got the work done in a timely manner.

I definitely think it is worth going through Pioneer Customer Service and an authorized repair center over "DIY," even if the individual is experienced with a soldering iron.

While I hope not to need your level of service, I'm glad to know there's some place I can get it! Also good to hear from the other Houston/area x10 owners, and we just might find a reason to bring you down to Texas if and when it becomes necessary.

JoeyT

08-31-06, 08:56 AM

Justin_Thyme

08-31-06, 06:35 PM

esdc, thanks. I called the warranty dept. They said they had some information on the problem. They cave me a case number. . .

Fixed the "flashes" problem by resoldering back in '04 but the "pop and shut downs" have become an issue. I called Pioneer, they assigned a case # and said that a CSR would get back to me in the "next few business days". It would be just sensational if Pioneer would own up to their mfg problems and provide a solution for free. I am pretty persistent but keep your collective fingers crossed.

Will report back as I know more . . .

Justin

Mr Bob

09-01-06, 05:55 AM

Ok Bob, I sent you another email from work...hopefully that will reach you. I had copied the PM in the original email that did not reach you and have since deleted the PM......so I guess we'll start over. Let me know if you get it. I'm still waiting on a call back from the Pioneer warranty dept. but just don't have a good feeling that the board will be checked over thoroughly. While "free" certainly does have appeal, I don't want this cropping up again anytime soon.

Have not received any emails from any Kevins in recent memory. Wonder what's hanging things up?

If you want to doublecheck my email address, go to my website and it will be there in its normal form, for your perusal.

Mr Bob

Ndna Jnz

09-08-06, 01:09 AM

Hello,

I just developed a problem with my 510. I was watching TV the other night and after a few minutes, it suddenly shut down. I came across this thread and read every post. Here are my symptoms...I never experienced the blue flashes, this is the first problem I have had in 6 years with this set. I removed the back panel and noticed that there are 2 red led's on. One on the PS board and one on the deflection (high voltage) board. Does this mean the problem lies in the deflection board? or do both boards have a problem? Could this also be a solder problem?

Any input is greatly appreciated.

- Joe

Here is what I have found on my 510 so far (as of this morning)...
I have been seeing the random brightness change problem for about 4 months. A couple months ago, I started seeing bright flashes and a pop - about once a week. The TV has shut itself off 4 times now in the past month. After the last time, which was 3 days ago, I unplugged it to let the high voltage discharge over night. In the meantime I decided to wire up my surround speakers to my newly acquired used Marantz A/V amp.
I disconnected the 2 front tv speakers (since I never use them anyway) and wired them directly to my amp's Center-out. This is going to sound great! I pushed the tv back into place, turned the main power on, and the green ON light came on... for about 3 seconds, and then shut off. Back into Standby mode. I tried to turn it ON with the remote and the front panel button, but to no avail. Ok, so it is still stuck in the same state as the day before.
I unplugged the tv again removed the rear lower cover, and removed the power supply board. I did not find any cracked solder joints but I found 2 that looked quite bad, one on a large filter capacitor, the other on one of the large resistors. Well, since I read here that many people had problems with the wire harness connectors, I started touching up all of those pins, adding a bit of solder to many of them. I then re-soldered all of the large capacitor leads as well as all of the transformer pins. I would say I re-soldered about 1/3 of the board. About 2 hours worth. I cleaned the entire back of the board with flux remover, let it dry and put it back in the tv.
Hit the main power button and the tv turned on, then the green ON light, then back to Standby again. However, now I noticed that there was 1 red LED glowing on the power supply board. Ok, I remembered reading something about that on this thread. However, I did not see a 2nd red LED glowing anywhere. Well, I found out that the single red LED meant 1 of 4 causes, one of which had something to do with the Audio section. I wonder... could it be that the tv tests for those speakers to be connected? Sure enough. I reconnected the speakers, and now the tv turned ON and the green light stayed on. Cool. All systems go. Threw in Spiderman 2 and watch the whole movie (~2 hours). All sounded great, except I was dissapointed I was back to no Center channel. Well, at least the tv is ok. Plus, I did not see any blue/white flashes and no audible "pops".
Next morning (today), I turn the tv on just to check all is still ok, and the green light comes on and stays on, but the picture is... well basically, non-existent. On the screen, there are bright color/rainbow bars on either side, and there are about 20 visible horizontal lines somewhat pincushioned, especially at the bottom. If I change inputs or press the Split Screen or Menu buttons, some very small change is noticable at the top edge of the screen. No red LEDs on anywhere. Shut it completely off for an hour. Still no go. Left it off all day today and just tried it again (9 PM). No go. So now I am not sure what to try next. I do not know if this is a problem with the deflection circuit, convergence circuit, or still a power supply problem.

Photo 1: http://www.microdisk.com/images/510HD/510HD-1.jpg
Close-up: http://www.microdisk.com/images/510HD/510HD-2.jpg

Has anyone else seen this before?
Señor Bob?

Jeff

Mr Bob

09-08-06, 08:39 AM

Here is what I have found on my 510 so far (as of this morning)...
I have been seeing the random brightness change problem for about 4 months. A couple months ago, I started seeing bright flashes and a pop - about once a week. The TV has shut itself off 4 times now in the past month. After the last time, which was 3 days ago, I unplugged it to let the high voltage discharge over night. In the meantime I decided to wire up my surround speakers to my newly acquired used Marantz A/V amp.
I disconnected the 2 front tv speakers (since I never use them anyway) and wired them directly to my amp's Center-out. This is going to sound great! I pushed the tv back into place, turned the main power on, and the green ON light came on... for about 3 seconds, and then shut off. Back into Standby mode. I tried to turn it ON with the remote and the front panel button, but to no avail. Ok, so it is still stuck in the same state as the day before.
I unplugged the tv again removed the rear lower cover, and removed the power supply board. I did not find any cracked solder joints but I found 2 that looked quite bad, one on a large filter capacitor, the other on one of the large resistors. Well, since I read here that many people had problems with the wire harness connectors, I started touching up all of those pins, adding a bit of solder to many of them. I then re-soldered all of the large capacitor leads as well as all of the transformer pins. I would say I re-soldered about 1/3 of the board. About 2 hours worth. I cleaned the entire back of the board with flux remover, let it dry and put it back in the tv.
Hit the main power button and the tv turned on, then the green ON light, then back to Standby again. However, now I noticed that there was 1 red LED glowing on the power supply board. Ok, I remembered reading something about that on this thread. However, I did not see a 2nd red LED glowing anywhere. Well, I found out that the single red LED meant 1 of 4 causes, one of which had something to do with the Audio section. I wonder... could it be that the tv tests for those speakers to be connected? Sure enough. I reconnected the speakers, and now the tv turned ON and the green light stayed on. Cool. All systems go. Threw in Spiderman 2 and watch the whole movie (~2 hours). All sounded great, except I was dissapointed I was back to no Center channel. Well, at least the tv is ok. Plus, I did not see any blue/white flashes and no audible "pops".
Next morning (today), I turn the tv on just to check all is still ok, and the green light comes on and stays on, but the picture is... well basically, non-existent. On the screen, there are bright color/rainbow bars on either side, and there are about 20 visible horizontal lines somewhat pincushioned, especially at the bottom. If I change inputs or press the Split Screen or Menu buttons, some very small change is noticable at the top edge of the screen. No red LEDs on anywhere. Shut it completely off for an hour. Still no go. Left it off all day today and just tried it again (9 PM). No go. So now I am not sure what to try next. I do not know if this is a problem with the deflection circuit, convergence circuit, or still a power supply problem.

Photo 1: http://www.microdisk.com/images/510HD/510HD-1.jpg
Close-up: http://www.microdisk.com/images/510HD/510HD-2.jpg

Has anyone else seen this before?
Señor Bob?

Jeff

It would be best if the images you send in contain something gridlike, to see what happens to it. If nothing else, make it the convergence grid in User section. From what I can see, it looks like your pic is lacking any convergence at all.

I would check the appropriate fuses on the PS board, for convergence, and the plus and minus voltage rails on your conv bd for +25 and -20v. I believe they will be marked on the conv bd, as to what voltages to look for.

There is a regulator IC on the PS board that comes loose under cold solder conditions, and while it does not shut the set down, it deprives the conv generator of the power it needs to produce the appropirate wafeforms, for the conv ICs to do their job. The conv ICs could be fully powered up and operational, but if the conv gen bd is not powered up, the result will be the same: set won't shut down, but no conv correction either.

Since you did the barebones repair similar to what the warranty tech did recently in this thread, you probably didn't hit the reg IC in question. I would never have let that one by me, since it is heat sunk, and anything that develops heat is prone to cold solder joints as the set ages, if the solder used originally was thin, as is all solder that I see on these Pio PS boards.

Remember, the conv ICs just do what they are told, they are only amplifiers (audio amplifiers, to be exact). If they are not told to correct anything from the conv gen bd, they won't. If the conv gen bd is down - usually from not being properly fed its proper voltages, rather than from being defective - the result will be the same: no correction signals to the ICs, so no conv correction to your images from the CRT coils those ICs feed.

Since the conv ICs are not being worked with any incoming signal - if they are just sitting there, powered up but passive - they could have all their appropriate voltages and still probably be stone cold at their heat sinks, on the conv bd.

Mr Bob

Ndna Jnz

09-08-06, 03:52 PM

It would be best if the images you send in contain something gridlike, to see what happens to it. If nothing else, make it the convergence grid in User section. From what I can see, it looks like your pic is lacking any convergence at all.

Mr Bob

Thanks for the quick reply!
Do you mean the convergence adjustment grid as accessed from the User Setup menu? I tried to select this by following the menu pics in the owner's manual, but since I see almost no change on the display, I cannot guarantee that I am actually invoking the grid. If I am in fact invoking it, then it looks like there is little change in the display from the pic I posted above. I will check the fuses and voltages tonight.

Jeff

Mr Bob

09-09-06, 12:00 PM

Thanks for the quick reply!
Do you mean the convergence adjustment grid as accessed from the User Setup menu? I tried to select this by following the menu pics in the owner's manual, but since I see almost no change on the display, I cannot guarantee that I am actually invoking the grid. If I am in fact invoking it, then it looks like there is little change in the display from the pic I posted above. I will check the fuses and voltages tonight.

Jeff

Yes.

The pic you posted shows nothing but a blank screen. At this point all I can see in it is that there is red on one side and blue on another. That could simply be static conv being off, except for the curvatures I see in the top and bottom sections.

I need to see something in the middle! The easiest grid is in User under convergence, the one after you have already selected up the crosshairs and want to get it tighter.

Or you can go into the sm and do that one. Really doesn't matter - what matters is that we see something in the center of the screen that will tell us what's going on there. It could be something as simple as the grid from your cable or sat guide.

If what is happening is that you can no longer get a pic at all, oh boy. That is not on the list of things DIYers can do, via this thread.

I would take that PS board out again, be sure to resolder the or 4 or 5 pin regulators that are heavily heat sunk if you have not already, and check very carefully for solder bridges.

One of the reasons I try to stay away from soldering the entire board - and am very careful whenever I do - is that the smaller conn's lend very easily to solder bridges if you're not watching like a hawk. And can be very hard to spot afterwards, since the components in there are so very small, and their conn's so very close together.

To find something that has been solder bridged by eye, you'd have to study the silkscreening under it, and see if there is any. If there doesn't appear to be, verifying that those 2 conns should be connected anyway, you have to desolder that bridge and see for yourself whether the 2 should be connected by a silkscreened run between them or not.

If you do have a solder bridge in there, I don't know why it would work fine for 2 hours and then quit, unless the bridge caused something to start overheating, and over 2 hours it finally quit.

If you have no pic at all, but can see movement in the upper atmosphere when you try to change things in your user menu, it could indicate something wrong with the vertical circuit, but that usually causes the entire pic to be squished up there at the top. In your case there's plenty of raster showing in the entire pic, which would at first glance eliminate vertical sweep problems from the equation.

Mr Bob

Sidepipes

09-11-06, 06:15 PM

Hi, Over a month ago I was living with the Pop - Snap turn -off problems with my PRO-510. With the forum member's good advice, I re-soldered many of the E series connectors on the PS board. A very small tipped iron, and a good set of magnifiers sure came in handy, because it is very easy to solder bridge across the little traces!

After about two hours of careful work, I reassembled the whole unit. The smartest thing was to take several digital photos of the wiring layout -- this really helped for proper routing, etc..

With some trepidation, I powered up, expecting the worst -- but much to my pleasant surprise, the set came on, working great!

It now has been running perfectly for over 5 weeks without a problem!

Thanks, guys!

-- Sidepipes

Justin_Thyme

09-12-06, 07:29 PM

Update: I contacted Pioneer warranty support on 08/28 and they assigned a case#. For over a week, their entire computer system (i.e. database) was off-line. Unbelieveable for a company of that size. Anyways, I called back today and the computers are back up. The case has been assigned to a manager and I should be receiving a call back tomorrow. Rep said that my case was considered "a priority case" and they were just debating how many parts to authorize replacing. I told them I would be happy just to have a service tech come out and resolder the existing boards.

If you have been hesitating doing the fix yourself, give them a call. So far they seem to really be taking ownership of the problem . . .

I will report back after repairs have been completed.

Justin

KevinH

09-14-06, 07:24 PM

I too was given a case# a little over 2 weeks ago. I also called back after no response to be told the same thing...their entire system was down. I called back today and was told a manager is reviewing my case number and I should expect a call in 48 hours. We'll see. Still keeping fingers crossed.

Mr Bob

09-17-06, 11:52 PM

Just wanted to let people who would like my attention on their boards or for calibrations, I will be in Anaheim midweek. I will be at Disneyland from Tuesday thru Thursday, and would love to do some work in the area afterwards. Presently I have a job that can happen Thursday, but the park ticket has already been purchased, and I'd hate to miss a third day with Mickey!

But of course if I am totally Mickey'd out by then...

My preference - at least at present - would be to do all 3 days of Disneyland, and then do a few days of work on big screens there - either repairs on these units, or calibrations, or both.

Let me know if you'd like my services while I am there. I will be free for big screen work from Friday on.

Mr Bob

drvcrash

09-18-06, 09:08 AM

You gonna be near the east coast anytime coming up?

Mr Bob

09-18-06, 02:26 PM

You gonna be near the east coast anytime coming up?

Send me a plane ticket and I'll say yes!

;)

Mr Bob

JohnnA

09-24-06, 10:03 AM

LesMoss

09-24-06, 01:53 PM

JohnnA,

Sounds like the standard power supply board cold solder joint problem.

Complete instructions for repair are on this thread.

Good luck.

Mr Bob

09-24-06, 02:03 PM

Hello,
I'm new to this forum, and am not really sure how to use it. I have a Pioneer Elite Pro-610 HD unit that I bought new some five or six years ago. I've read some of the messages in this thread and have learned that these units have their issues to say the least. Mine has always been very good until recently. The picture has always been great. The only thing has been an occasional "pop", which, while unsettling, never seemed to do anything. Now however, the whole unit just cuts out after being on for maybe fifteen or twenty minutes. No picture, no sound. After some time -- cooling time, perhaps? -- it works again, but only to shut down. I would like to have it repaired, but prefer to be somewhat informed beforehand. Thanks to anyone with info.... John

Intermittent problems with big screens never get better on their own. They're like dental problems, they only get worse as time goes on.

I hope your formerly fairly innocuous problem has not domino-effected into something worse.

First thing is to get your PS board resoldered, either by yourself, by a friend familiar with good solder technique - which I cover earlier on in this thread - in your home town or by sending that board off to someone like me. If you've read any substantial content on this thread you know that it needs to be done anyway, so may as well make it your first line of defense.

You Pioneer owners are very fortunate to have circuitry in there that is usually not adversely affected by these cold solder joint problems, outlined in this thread. Resoldering the PS board usually does the trick. If it doesn't and there are further problems, it's good that resoldering it has been done anyway, as preventive maintenance on a known technical problem on these units, which I am sure has generated its own personal set of service bulletins at Pioneer.

Mr Bob

Gib

09-25-06, 04:17 PM

Mr Bob

09-25-06, 06:43 PM

I have also just started having the blue flash and brightness fluctuation problem on my 510. It is amazing to find forums like these where people have the same problems and have actually determined how to fix them (unlike apparantly Pioneer). I am likely going to go ahead with the PC board soldering.

In addition, however, my TV has been having a lot of problems with convergence in HD mode. For a long time I didn't have HD, and just started getting it at the beginning of 2005. The first time I went in to adjust the convergence for HD, the pincushioning was off the board - the grid was bending many many inches and wasn't even close to the edges of the screen toward the middle. I spent many hours converging it as best I could (in the service menu) and got it so that it was pretty good, but still had geometry and some convergence issues in the corners.

After a while I decided to go in and try to fine tune it some more. However, when I entered the service menu something happened and all of a sudden the convergence was back to the extreme pincushioning. This time however, it was much more difficult to even get it watchable. The top of the screen was the worst, where there was no way to straighten the lines and I had to change the V-Mode to increase the overscan to move the really bad warping off the top. For a long time though I have been living with vertical lines that are basically wavy, extreme warping at the top corners, convergence off at the top corners, and geometry spacing problems towards the sides as well. It is really noticeable with panning where images move right/left or up/down and you notice them distort.

Has anyone else had similar issues? I noticed a service bulletin about a diode replacement that might be related. Any tips on resetting the convergence so I can try again?

Thanks,
Gil

The most characteristic test for whether the conv ICs are bad is to tell the entire picture to go right or left or up or down, and see if ALL parts of the pic do so. If not - if some stay stuck - then your conv IC for that color is usually bad and needs replacement. I would recommend replacing both if you replace one, just from the POV of why you replace a throwout bearing in a manual clutch system on a car when it needs the expensive labor of going in, even tho it is still good. It may entail a lot more geometry/convergence work later, but is still a valued upgrade as long as you're in there changing out the bad one anyway.

There is a regulator on the PS board that affects performance of the conv bd, and sometimes resoldering it remedies conv probs as well. So resoldering the PS board should be your top priority for now.

Mr Bob

Fiberboy

09-27-06, 02:13 PM

HJ Seeley

09-28-06, 12:45 PM

My 510 has been showing the exact symptoms reported by most others here. Since my soldering skills are minimal, I thought that hiring a repair person was the best option even if it cost more ($268.00).

The local repair guy knew exactly what the problem was after I told him it was a 510 Pro HD. He re-soldered most if not all the contacts on the power supply board, and then opened the front of the tv and re-soldered all the contacts on the three crt boards as well. This also gave me the opportunity to clean the lenses, which was a nice bonus.

He indicated that he had seen failing solder points on the crt boards during other repair jobs and that it was best, and most cost effective, to do all of them during the same visit. Total time was around 90 minutes start to finish.

I left the set on all evening and it showed no glitches and I also think it looks better than ever, considerably better than it did prior to repair.

Mr Bob

09-28-06, 02:16 PM

sjm992

09-28-06, 02:36 PM

The most characteristic test for whether the conv ICs are bad is to tell the entire picture to go right or left or up or down, and
Mr Bob

How do I move the picture up/down/left/right for this test? Like many of the other HD-510's in this thread mine shuts down after an hour or two of viewing then the PS board clicks for 30 seconds. I switch off at the front, wait a few minutes, switch on and all is well for a while. Last year I resoldered all the joints on the PS board to fix the blue flash problem. This time I don't get the blue flash - it just goes bang (from the speakers) and shuts down. I'd like to use your test to determine if the convergence board has a problem. Tonight I'm going to resolder a couple of less than perfect PS board connections.
Thanks, Stuart

Mr Bob

09-29-06, 03:55 AM

How do I move the picture up/down/left/right for this test? Like many of the other HD-510's in this thread mine shuts down after an hour or two of viewing then the PS board clicks for 30 seconds. I switch off at the front, wait a few minutes, switch on and all is well for a while. Last year I resoldered all the joints on the PS board to fix the blue flash problem. This time I don't get the blue flash - it just goes bang (from the speakers) and shuts down. I'd like to use your test to determine if the convergence board has a problem. Tonight I'm going to resolder a couple of less than perfect PS board connections.
Thanks, Stuart

That would be the convergence crosshairs. I don't know if the Elites allow you to see what you're viewing while you do the entire pic movements on the crosshairs - don't think so - and if not, you'll have to move them whichever way you want, then go out of the convergence menu and back to the real pic to see your progress.

Or use the crosshatch to view what happened after you moved the crosshairs.

A predictable reaction like you're getting now is not usually the fault of the conv bd, which usually either works or doesn't.

I would go over that PS board with a fine tooth comb, and if you didn't solder ANYTHING on it aside from test points and those heat sink pods that connect on one end and not the other, I'd solder whatever you didn't solder. If you left ANY of the joints "less than perfect" in there the first time, I would go back in this thread and reread my pointers on good solder technique.

Or just have me down to do your entire job, repair and calibration. You certainly don't live all that far away from me, in East Bay, here.

I just completed my latest repair of a 510 today, along with a full cal on the 480i scanrate, including the deeper optics cleaning, overscan reduction and all 3 extra aspect ratios. It turned into a 10 hour job plus the travel of a little over an hour, RT. Long day, but the owner was totally blitzed by the resultant pic, and will be having me back as soon as he's got himself equipped with HD, towards the end of the year.

It was really cool scooting his rocker chair 5' in front of where his couch normally seats him, inviting him to watch it from there for awhile instead of from the couch - 6' away instead of 11' - and seeing that he had no intention of going back to that couch any time soon, and was loving every minute of it! BIG smile on this guy's face...

His was not all that bad when I arrived, just a sprinkle of color offness here and there, but now it is rock solid, after I did just what I am advising you to do, above.

Mr Bob

sjm992

09-29-06, 11:02 AM

I would go over that PS board with a fine tooth comb, and if you didn't solder ANYTHING on it aside from test points and those heat sink pods that connect on one end and not the other, I'd solder whatever you didn't solder. If you left ANY of the joints "less than perfect" in there the first time, I would go back in this thread and reread my pointers on good solder technique.

Or just have me down to do your entire job, repair and calibration. You certainly don't live all that far away from me, in East Bay, here.

Mr Bob

Yes, I resoldered everything on the PS board. Final check this evening for bridged connectors then I'll fire her up.

My grand plan is to fix it myself with the help of this forum and in particular your great advice then to invite you here for deep optics cleaning and calibration.
Thanks
Stuart

KevinH

09-29-06, 12:15 PM

Mr Bob

09-29-06, 01:26 PM

My grand plan is to fix it myself with the help of this forum and in particular your great advice then to invite you here for deep optics cleaning and calibration.
Thanks
Stuart

I'll be looking forward to that!

:)

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

09-29-06, 01:31 PM

Well I finally got a call from Pioneer after having my case number for about 4-5 weeks. I detailed what I wanted done in my original correspondence, which was to have the current PS board resoldered. They've informed me that they will order and install a new board. I told them I would really prefer my option of resolder and she said that the manager would only authorize a new board. I guess it's better than nothing. I'm going to see if I can keep the original PS board and have it resoldered on my own time and have it handy just in case. Anyway, this new board should last me much longer than I'll actually keep the tv. I plan to move to a FP unit for the dedicated theater and a slimmer LCD or DLP for normal tv viewing. But I still plan on enjoying the Pioneer for another year or two. :)

Fully calibrated, your set can look every bit as good as any of the FP out there, and IMHO, better. I don't know why anybody would want to go FP over what their fully cleaned and calibrated CRT can do, esp. these Pioneers!

When you get your new board installed, see if they will let you eyeball it before they put it in. See if the solder job on the bottom of the board is full of gleaming, glossy solder joints, or if the solder there is all dull and flat-looking, which is what they look like when I get them out to resolder.

If it's gleaming and glossy and thus fresh and generously soldered, chances are it will then last forever. If it is dull and flat-looking all over, then you will probably have problems with it eventually, as I think part of the problem was that they used solder that was too thin. Kinda funny that their deflection boards are not having this problem, eh? Or any other board in there. Could be their PS boards were farmed out - solder-flowed in some foreign city, state, or even country...

I would say you are on the right track, and are doing everything I would do.

Except having the intention of replacing your set in a year or 2...

Mr Bob

Johnla

09-29-06, 02:05 PM

I'm going to see if I can keep the original PS board and have it resoldered on my own time and have it handy just in case.

That won't happen. They will not let you keep the board because they send them back to be refurbished to be used again. Even when you buy a board outright from them you can't keep the old board unless you also want to forfeit a rather high core charge of $100, that you are charged and also refunded when you return the old board.

http://parts.pioneerelectronics.com/corecharge.asp

KevinH

09-29-06, 02:48 PM

Bob, the only reason to move to FP is for a much bigger screen and to have a dedicated theater room. And I may just keep the Pio for normal tv, hdtv etc......depends on the type of space constraints I run into.

Thanks for the heads up John, well I'll make sure to look over the new board as Bob says before they install it. I'll post my experience when it is done.

rkumar

09-30-06, 12:44 PM

Mr Bob

09-30-06, 02:45 PM

Hi all, I had the same problem with my PRO-710HD monitor a few months back with the blue flashes. I soldered the IC and some other joints in July, 2006. Since that time, my TV has been working flawlessly and I have not seen any blue flash nor has my TV turned off unexpectedly since. However, last night I was watching TV around 5 PM and turned it off at around 6 PM. At 11 PM I tried to turn the set on, but it would not turn on either by remote or the switch on the TV. The red standby light would just stay on. I also tried turning off and on the main power switch, but that did not rectify the problem. If anyone has any suggestions I would really appreciate it. Thanks!

The red light is on, so it's getting power. Does it TRY to turn on and fail - like a couple of clicks, then the red light turns green momentarily, then red again? Or does the red light stay red and never go green at all, and there are no clicks - as in, there is no response at all to your turn-on commands? In which case you gotta suspect your turn-on circuit, a very little-experienced phenom on these units.

First thing I would do is check the fuses in the middle of the PS board. If a certain 2 are blown, you know your convergence sys now needs attention. I wrote a post or 2 about that awhile ago on this thread, which you can probably do a search on. If the red LED on the conv bd is lit, you know the conv is what is bad.

Usually a red LED will be lit up on the defective bd in question ALONG with a red LED on the PS bd. If so, the PS bd may not be what is acting up, but as we all know by now, should be resoldered anyway, even if it is not what is acting up at the time of the set's failure to turn on.

Fortunately, these 2 things - PS bd needing resoldering and the conv ICs being blown, and taking PS bd fuses with them - are what screws up most on these units, followed very lazily behind by the occasional red LED on both the PS and the Defl bds, indicating that something else is wrong other than the 2 primary things mentioned above.

This is usually remedied by replacing the Defl bd. Which would be the first thing to do if both the Defl and PS boards have red LEDs lit up on them.

Mr Bob

rkumar

09-30-06, 09:21 PM

The red light is on, so it's getting power. Does it TRY to turn on and fail - like a couple of clicks, then the red light turns green momentarily, then red again? Or does the red light stay red and never go green at all, and there are no clicks - as in, there is no response at all to your turn-on commands? In which case you gotta suspect your turn-on circuit, a very little-experienced phenom on these units.

First thing I would do is check the fuses in the middle of the PS board. If a certain 2 are blown, you know your convergence sys now needs attention. I wrote a post or 2 about that awhile ago on this thread, which you can probably do a search on. If the red LED on the conv bd is lit, you know the conv is what is bad.

Usually a red LED will be lit up on the defective bd in question ALONG with a red LED on the PS bd. If so, the PS bd may not be what is acting up, but as we all know by now, should be resoldered anyway, even if it is not what is acting up at the time of the set's failure to turn on.

Fortunately, these 2 things - PS bd needing resoldering and the conv ICs being blown, and taking PS bd fuses with them - are what screws up most on these units, followed very lazily behind by the occasional red LED on both the PS and the Defl bds, indicating that something else is wrong other than the 2 primary things mentioned above.

This is usually remedied by replacing the Defl bd. Which would be the first thing to do if both the Defl and PS boards have red LEDs lit up on them.

Mr Bob

Thanks for the reply! The set was not trying to turn on and fail-- the red light just stayed on and nothing happened. I opened up the back of the set and checked the fuses, but all four were in-tact. I just pressed on some connections and tried the set again and it turned on! I was thinking to call Pioneer on monday and have them send a technician out to have them replace the board (as they were doing for several other people on the forum).

Mr Bob

10-01-06, 04:19 AM

Thanks for the reply! The set was not trying to turn on and fail-- the red light just stayed on and nothing happened. I opened up the back of the set and checked the fuses, but all four were in-tact. I just pressed on some connections and tried the set again and it turned on! I was thinking to call Pioneer on monday and have them send a technician out to have them replace the board (as they were doing for several other people on the forum).

If you could press on some part of the board and it started working, then something is still not soldered well in there.

If you go a few pages back, you'll see a post by me delineating why I resolder virtually EVERYTHING in there that connects to somewhere else in there, these days. I don't believe you can just solder the half a dozen points mentioned earlier on in this thread and consider it done, anymore. The only things I don't resolder these days are test points - which are open to the air - and some of the straight-thru jumpers, which are intentional direct shorts and don't develop any heat on their own.

On the little conn's, esp. if you see a little halo around the leg in the middle of the pad when you light it from the side, if you touch your iron to them and they give way before you get your solder to the joint, revealing a large open space where the solder used to be, that's a dead giveaway that it was on its way to becoming a troublesome cold solder joint, even if it wasn't quite, yet.

I can't say experientially, but I have serious doubts as to whether a replacement PS board from Pioneer will be any better than the ones installed at the factory, in terms of lasting any longer than the original ones did.

Mr Bob

Justin_Thyme

10-01-06, 02:40 PM

Justin:

I have had same problems with my 510 and I called and received case number. After a week with no response I called again. Result was they did contact a local dealor whom I'll be meeting with on Monday. Did you ever get results?

Fiberboy,

Yes. Initially when the "case manager" called me back, she sounded as though they were not going to approve the repair. I was firm but persistent with her. Although I had used the "key words" repeatedly when talking with the CSR's, they had apparently not put them down in the case notes. I repeated to the manager "flash" "pop" "solder" etc. and she finally agreed to "go back to the engineer's" again. Next day, she called back and authorized the re-soldering of the power supply board only. They would not pay to replace it or any other parts. I said that a professional resoldering was all that I wanted.

A local service center called and scheduled an in-home visit for 7:00 a.m. the next day. Very professional guy. He had the right equipment and did a very thorough job. Took about 75 minutes.

After he left, I closed the front panel access door for the last time and the set has been perfect so far. BTW, he mentioned that he would be billing Pioneer $180 for the house call.

I am happy with my set again . . .

Justin

JCBM

10-01-06, 10:25 PM

rkumar

10-01-06, 11:08 PM

If you could press on some part of the board and it started working, then something is still not soldered well in there.

If you go a few pages back, you'll see a post by me delineating why I resolder virtually EVERYTHING in there that connects to somewhere else in there, these days. I don't believe you can just solder the half a dozen points mentioned earlier on in this thread and consider it done, anymore. The only things I don't resolder these days are test points - which are open to the air - and some of the straight-thru jumpers, which are intentional direct shorts and don't develop any heat on their own.

On the little conn's, esp. if you see a little halo around the leg in the middle of the pad when you light it from the side, if you touch your iron to them and they give way before you get your solder to the joint, revealing a large open space where the solder used to be, that's a dead giveaway that it was on its way to becoming a troublesome cold solder joint, even if it wasn't quite, yet.

I can't say experientially, but I have serious doubts as to whether a replacement PS board from Pioneer will be any better than the ones installed at the factory, in terms of lasting any longer than the original ones did.

Mr Bob

Well, after moving around the connections for the past three nights to make my TV turn on my luck ran out tonight. Moving the connections no longer remedied the situation and the TV just exhibits the red LED on the PS. I remember that my E3 connection was not soldered very well when I did it 3 months ago, but it looked better than what I started with, so I left it be. However, I found it so difficult to prevent solder bridging that I couldn't risk re-soldering my entire board. I could not find any other red LED on other boards (ex: Defl bd or Convg bd). The PS bd just makes a very high frequency humm when I plug the power in. Again, it looks like no fuses are blown. Thanks again Mr. Bob for all your help. I will try to get pioneer to re-solder my board or send me a new board that I will have the tech inspect before installing.

EDIT: Also, if this helps... my TV turns off around 1030-1100 every night when watching television.

Mr Bob

10-02-06, 04:35 PM

I have bought Pioneer PRO-510HD projection TV 5 years ago, and have encountered some problems with the monitor recently. It automatically shut off around 10 to 20 minute after the TV was turned on that usually happed whenever the humidity was high, such as raining or cloudy days. I have tried turn main power down and wait for awhile then turn it on again, but 10 to 20 minutes later, the problem came back. So now basically I cannot watch the TV on raining or cloudy days. I saw some previous discussions about blue flash and monitor down, but my problem seems different. Dose anyone had same trouble like mine?

It's entirely conceiveable that moisture could get into cold solder joints and cause problems.

I would advise you to have your PS board resoldered, JIC. It may or may not solve your problem, but needs to be done anyway, if you've read this far on this thread.

Cold solder joint problems are like dental problems. Both are classic signs of deterioration, and don't get any better on their own.

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

10-02-06, 04:42 PM

However, I found it so difficult to prevent solder bridging that I couldn't risk re-soldering my entire board.

My heart's with ya. I feel exactly the same about the smaller conns, and take very special attention when I do them. I don't like to do them, and only do them under extreme duress. In many ways you're taking your life in your hands when you do so.

But what I have been finding lately tells me that I definitely have to do them on these PS boards. So I make sure my lighting is excellent and copious, use my highest power reading glasses, and make sure that my eyeglass lenses are very very clean!

Mr Bob

JCBM

10-02-06, 11:08 PM

It's entirely conceiveable that moisture could get into cold solder joints and cause problems.

I would advise you to have your PS board resoldered, JIC. It may or may not solve your problem, but needs to be done anyway, if you've read this far on this thread.

Cold solder joint problems are like dental problems. Both are classic signs of deterioration, and don't get any better on their own.

Mr Bob

Bob, I have sent email to Pioneer web support last night also. The representative gave me the same feedback like yours this morning, but only said “It sounds like the power supply on the set needs to be checked out and serviced”, not like the explanation of yours that was much more knowledgeable and professional. This evening I have experienced something more that have never happened before. First the problem still exist even the rain has stopped last night and the weather was very pleasant today. So I shut the main power off and turned it on few times when the problem appeared. But onetime I didn’t shut the main power down (the green light was still on) just went to another room to watch my favorite show with another TV, and after around 20 minutes I backed to the 510HD to shut the main power, the monitor was back working itself. I asked my wife, “did you do anything to the TV?” she told me the TV just backed on 2 minutes before I came back. This has never happened before. I guess may be the TV was warmed up and once the humidity was less, the problem stopped. I don’t know if this makes any sense. Anyway I have paid more attention to the monitor this evening and I did notice the monitor flashes couple of times from bright to low and eventfully shut off though the flashes were not blue. I will give it little bit more time until it getting worse, otherwise if the service was here the problem would hard to demonstrate and I’m kind of skeptical the service guy is good for diagnosis. What do you think? I wish I’m living near your business then I can let you to fix the problem. Really appreciate your help.

John

Mr Bob

10-03-06, 03:22 PM

Bob, I have sent email to Pioneer web support last night also. The representative gave me the same feedback like yours this morning, but only said “It sounds like the power supply on the set needs to be checked out and serviced”, not like the explanation of yours that was much more knowledgeable and professional. This evening I have experienced something more that have never happened before. First the problem still exist even the rain has stopped last night and the weather was very pleasant today. So I shut the main power off and turned it on few times when the problem appeared. But onetime I didn’t shut the main power down (the green light was still on) just went to another room to watch my favorite show with another TV, and after around 20 minutes I backed to the 510HD to shut the main power, the monitor was back working itself. I asked my wife, “did you do anything to the TV?” she told me the TV just backed on 2 minutes before I came back. This has never happened before. I guess may be the TV was warmed up and once the humidity was less, the problem stopped. I don’t know if this makes any sense. Anyway I have paid more attention to the monitor this evening and I did notice the monitor flashes couple of times from bright to low and eventfully shut off though the flashes were not blue. I will give it little bit more time until it getting worse, otherwise if the service was here the problem would hard to demonstrate and I’m kind of skeptical the service guy is good for diagnosis. What do you think? I wish I’m living near your business then I can let you to fix the problem. Really appreciate your help.

John

Get it fixed now, don't wait, it's definitely bad, and doing what so many on this thread have already testified to. No, looks like so far, things aren't automatically domino effecting into greater problems for the moment - for NOW - but even so we have had some exceptions to that rule here, where some really strange stuff happened, not correctable via the resoldering. I don't know if that's because things got worse before they attended to the problem or not, but what are the chances that something new might happen, where something in there gets not properly connected because of cold solder joints, and this time it leaves something unloaded that needs to be loaded, and this time a REAL domino effect DOES happen, causing extensive damage?

No need to take that chance, if you get it fixed NOW. It needn't get worse for you to go ahead and make that decision NOW.

If you want more proof, go back and reread this ENTIRE thread. Or just take my advice. Your choice.

Mr Bob

JCBM

10-03-06, 04:43 PM

Get it fixed now, don't wait, it's definitely bad, and doing what so many on this thread have already testified to. No, looks like so far, things aren't automatically domino effecting into greater problems for the moment - for NOW - but even so we have had some exceptions to that rule here, where some really strange stuff happened, not correctable via the resoldering. I don't know if that's because things got worse before they attended to the problem or not, but what are the chances that something new might happen, where something in there gets not properly connected because of cold solder joints, and this time it leaves something unloaded that needs to be loaded, and this time a REAL domino effect DOES happen, causing extensive damage?

No need to take that chance, if you get it fixed NOW. It needn't get worse for you to go ahead and make that decision NOW.

If you want more proof, go back and reread this ENTIRE thread. Or just take my advice. Your choice.

Mr Bob

I will contact the service now to get it fixed. Thanks Bob.

Anyware

10-03-06, 09:37 PM

Mr Bob

10-04-06, 05:02 AM

Mr. Bob: I have the same problem as mentioned in this thread with my 710 (and a few more). I've sent two e-mails to (what I think is) your e-mail address over the past week-and-a-half, but I haven't heard anything back. Do you have a different e-mail address?

Thanks.

My email address has been acting up lately, yours is one of several that I am evidently continuing to miss. I must get my platform changed out soon, the spam filter I have been feeding relentlessly for months has finally started eating good emails I want to receive. And it is so extensive by now that I have no idea how to remedy it - which of the filters are deleting your guys's emails. There are literally hundreds of entries now.

For now, sent it to my alternate email addresses: bdclick at gmail dot com, and/or bdclick at hotmail dot com.

Sorry for the cryptic way I have to say it, but there are spambots watching...

Mr Bob

JCBM

10-04-06, 05:29 PM

Hello everyone,

I'm new here, and my 4 year-old Pro610HD had the same problem. Mine started acting up about three weeks ago, so I did a search on several forums, and thankfully found this thread. I fixed mine, so far no problems.

Up front, I would like to thank everyone for their contributions to this thread, and many, many thanks to Siloreed, for posting the link to his video. As soon as I saw it, I knew I was in the right place.
This post is quite long and I apologize for it's length, but I feel this information will be helpful to others.

Disclaimer: This information is provided as-is and based on my observations. I assume no responsibility for what you do to your set or, in the extreme, your health. If you feel uncomfortable going about this, then call a technician and provide him with the info from this entire thread.

Diagnosis:

I began by tapping the heat sinks on the power supply board (part # AWV1795), and got a few flickers of blue, but that was about it. I was about to put the cover back on when I decided to tap the connectors that go to it. Immediately, the screen went ballistic - it can be only described as "blue thunder"! I decided to work on it ASAP.

The following is a general procedure based on what I did to fix the board. Allow yourself an afternoon to do this, TAKE YOUR TIME. BTW, I recommend to everyone to buy/beg/borrow or steal the two service manuals that go with the x10 series HDTV's. These are ARP3051 and ARP3047, they contain info on how to get to the service menus, and parts lists and schematics as well.

Board Removal and inspection:

Turn off main power switch, wait a few minutes and UNPLUG SET. Wait several minutes to completely drain high voltages. The power supply board is large vertical board in the back on the right side, AC cord goes to it.

There is an RF coil near the connectors at upper left, be careful not to squash it with your thumb when disconnecting wire harnesses. (oops....) After removing all those screws, handle board with two hands, as it flexes quite easily. For some reason the actual PC board is very thin, in relation to the weight of the components. Try not to flex it too much, or it may cause more broken solder points. Rest the board on blocks of wood when working on it.

Use an 8x magnifying loupe (available at photographic supply houses) or glass to inspect solder joints, as you will not be able to see breaks with the naked eye or reading glasses. A cold solder joint can be described as being dull gray and/or pebbly in appearance, sometimes accompanied with a "fracture ring" around it. Found quite a few on my board. Gently wiggle the component on the other side to see if the actual joint wiggles as well. if it does, re-solder it.

As I suspected, there were broken solder joints on connector E3 (12+ supply and a GND) and the joints for and around IC204 and IC202 looked "cold" with possible ring fractures. It's amazing how little solder was used on these joints, especially the connectors. (shame on Pioneer's QC...)

Re-soldering:

This section assumes that you have had previous soldering experience, such as an electronics hobby kit, repairing something on a circuit board, etc. Again, if you are not comfortable doing this, have someone who knows how do it for you.

Work on the board in a well-lit area, such as a workshop. (a dinette set with chandelier lighting just doesn't work!) A desk lamp for additional lighting helps. Prop the board up to prevent flexing. I suggest using a magnifying headset such as an OptiVisor (available online or dedicated tool supply shops) to see what you're doing while soldering, some of these joints are quite small.

Use an AC-powered 30-40 watt soldering iron with a fine tip. Cordless units, such as a Wahl, are okay, but pressing the "on" button gets tedious after awhile, and because of the wait time for heat-up, may not be consistent. Do not use a high-wattage soldering gun, the trick is to solder the joints, not vaporize them... I used a Weller soldering station set on "4" with good results. The iron must be hot, meaning that the solder liquifies instantaneously on contact. Also used fine 60/40 rosin core solder, for PC work. Clean the tip on the iron frequently, using a wet sponge.

It's your choice if you decide to re-solder all the joints on the board, I only did the questionable ones. On the connector pins, however, I desoldered these with a vacumn pump and re-soldered them. I did ALL the connector pins just to be safe. Re-flowing solder on the other components should be sufficient, just do it quickly to prevent over-heating of the actual component. You can also use clip-on heat sinks on the component leads, if you can reach them. (the board heat sinks sometimes get in the way)

When you're finished, inspect your work - look for free-floating solder "blurbs", and make sure you didn't solder two joints together accidentally. Re-install the board, and hopefully, the flicker is gone for good.

Well, that's about it. I hope this info helps someone in the future, I know this thread helped me. Thank you again.
--Dave G.
I have ordered ARP3051 from Pioneer web for $27.00 shipping included, and found ARP3047 free download:
(getmanual.ru/tv/sb/pioneer.pdf#search=%22ARP3047%22)
Is this the right service manual? THanks!

John

Mr Bob

10-05-06, 03:48 AM

The above is very good advice, and should be very helpful in the right hands. I would add a few things:

I was once concerned about overheating components on boards, but then I took a job in production at Tektronix - board stuffing and straightening - and found that heatsinking components during the soldering process is entirely unnecessary. They get hot when soldered, and that's OK. They are made for it. As long as you don't sit there with your soldering iron on a joint for minutes at a time, where you possibly could cause problems due to massive overheat.

But being too quick per point with your soldering technique is also not the best policy. Those boards sometimes have legs that have been fatigued by the heat-up/cool down process, over and over hundreds of times, and I think it's best to "boil" those legs in some extended heat when resoldering them. The worst offenders have to be scraped before the solder will even adhere. I have not seen any of those on these Pio boards, tho. A steady pace is what I would advise, not rushing, nor being lazy. A few seconds per joint - not enough to dry out the joint, but not a quick hit and run either - will allow for the solder to intimately bond with both the leg and the pad in all cases. The end result should always be gleaming and fresh-looking, and any of the boiled brown transparent rosin still left around the edges is entirely allowable, and does not need to be cleaned off.

The sponge is there not only to clean your iron, but to cool it down. Left there to simmer in its own juices, the tip of a soldering iron will get hotter and hotter just because of heat build-up. Using the sponge to clean it and thus also cool it down between every few joints is a great way to keep it at the right temp.

You'll know you have let the joint see too much heat, and for too extended a time, when the solder on the joint starts to dry out and leaves a trail of solder when you remove the iron's tip from it. In that case you have to touch some more solder to it - just a squinch - to allow more rosin to get in there and rejuvenate it, and make it glossy again. If you get too much solder in there, just get rid of it via solder sucker or wicking braid, and start over on that joint.

The ideal timeframe is when what you achieve is that the solder allows the tip to go away effortlessly, without the solder clinging to it, but instead acting like mercury and blobbing up in a symmetrical circle around the components being joined. Not a sphere, tho. A spherical shape on a joint means that there's too much solder there. It should climb the leg gracefully from the pad, and not too thin - thin is what we see on these failing x10 Pio PS boards all the time.

Hit it too long and it will take a solder trail with it, necessitating touching it up again.

Mr Bob

billfish33

10-06-06, 01:46 PM

just wanted to follow up as I recently finally got my 510 up and running again !!

replaced both IC's on the heatsink as well as the 2 other parts also mounted on the heatsink and the convergence was pretty good,just had to do minor tweaking

picture is outstanding !!

Thanks to Bob as well as everyone else in this thread who contributed !

KevinH

10-09-06, 04:55 PM

Another update here: Pioneer Warranty finally called early last week and had approved a new PS board. Local service center got the part this morning and came out this afternoon to replace the board. So far so good......no more increased brightness and flashes. I will watch it for a several days and make sure all is good. I asked for a resolder and they approved a new board. I know others have had the opposite happen. This tech guy was nice and knowledgeable. He didn't expect me to have any more problems but said he can and has resoldered these boards before. Took him about 10 minutes. I'm relieved Pioneeer finally acknowledged this problem and although I would have preferred a resolder....a freebie is a freebie and I should be good to go for a long while.

I personally wanted to thank everybody who participated in this loooong post, both the DIY gurus and the professional Bob. A lot of us may not be getting free post-extended warranty fixes if it weren't for all of YOU! so THANKS A MILLION! :)

Mr Bob

10-10-06, 09:43 AM

I personally wanted to thank everybody who participated in this loooong post, both the DIY gurus and the professional Bob. A lot of us may not be getting free post-extended warranty fixes if it weren't for all of YOU! so THANKS A MILLION! :)

I am so glad they are finally beginning to take notice. These units cost far too much money when they were purchased to just buy new and roundfile them now - a kind way of saying take them to the local dump and drop them off, or let the local BB or GG or CC cart them away when they deliver their new replacement FP stuff - something that is happening to CRT triple guns as we speak, all over the country. It's why I started my thread elsewhere on this board, and on other boards, entitled "Don't dump your CRT RPTVs!"

Especially when EVERY CRT based HDready Pioneer I have cleaned and calibrated in the last 7 years - since the advent of the HDready itself - has turned out gloriously restored, to BETTER than new performance, in a day. (Including those I have repaired.) Stealth performance, to stand tall beside any FP out there. And capable of looking better than most, with only the brand new and highly expensive 1080p's even standing a chance of looking as good.

This "7 year lifespan" that retailers and manufacturers lead us to believe is what should apply to big screens, really makes me gag. I prefer twice that, out of my stuff, with a minumum of at least 10 years on big screens.

There is no need to buy new when you have a Pioneer CRT based HDready.

Hopefully this trend will continue. Last time I heard of something like this in the field, Pioneer in its great glorious goodness, had arranged for a customer to receive relevant service on his 510 for ONLY the very reasonable fee of $200. Enabling that low a fee to be paid to the servicing tech was all that Pioneer would concede at the time, and was actually a very good offer, considering what they had been doing up till then.

Nothing.

:eek:

I like the service you received better.

Again, let's hope this turns into a trend, and then a massive tide, to take care of this problem that never should have been. I LOVE supertweaking CRT technology, and Pioneer in particular, and it breaks my heart to see them being dumped right and left when I know their true potential. GET THEM TO ME! (Or me to them). I will take care of them.

;)

Mr Bob

manwhore

10-12-06, 12:58 AM

This Forum Is Sweet. I Found This About A Year Ago While Looking At Reviews On My Pro 610. At This Time My Tv Was 3 Years Old And I Loved It. So About 3 Months Ago I Started Getting The Blue Flash, Then Bright Screen, Then Blue Flash, Then Back To Normal. I Knew What It Was Right Away And Looked Up This Forum. I've Never Soldered On A Circuit Board Before, But I'm A Pretty Handy Guy, And A New Board Is Only 300 Bucks So **** It, Why Not Give It A Try. Ripped Apart And Old Monitor That I Had And Practiced On A Board From It, Pretty Easy.

So I Pulled The Back Off My Set And Began Tapping On Differant Parts Of The Power Supply Board, Just Like I Had Read In Here, While My Buddy Watched The Screen. The Problems Seemed To Be On All The White Wire Plug Connections On The Top Left Of The Board, Perticularly The 13 Pin Connector. Pulled Out The Board And Resoldered All Of The Suspect Joints, Adding A Little Bit Of New Solder And Flux To Each. That Was Two Weeks Ago And No More Problems. Thanks To Every One On This Thread That Has Contributed, You Saved Me Money And Possably Anger Management Classes.

If Anyone Lives Around Portland Oregon And Needs Some Help Doing This I'm Sure We Could Work Out A Deal, As My Time Is To Valuable To Be Free But I Am A Sucker For Good Beer. Or If Any One Around Portland Wants To Sell Or Get Rid Of One Of These Sets I Would Be Interested.

Thanks Alot, Joel

BShaw@BedHandles

10-12-06, 10:38 PM

I've been waiting for my FHD1 ( :D ) monitor to arrive and what do you know, my 510, recently began turning itself off. (I think it just wants some attention and has overheard that I'm going to demote it to another room.)

The set turns itself off and the only thing I heard was a relay clicking off. I had to disconnect power, let the set cool down, and then restart it.

I got a service manual for $10 and took off the back of the set. The power-down LED was on. After studying the schematic, I checked all of the voltages and everything looked fine. No blown fuses or anything obvious. I just couldn't believe it when I found this thread! All of the collective wisdom sure made quick work of the repair. I pulled the power board and soldered all of the power handling points. The worst looking area was the main transformer T101. Two or three of the connections were heavily stressed out (complete halos). Otherwise there was a lot of dull, poorly made solder points. It took me about an hour to go over the board. Luckily, I have a large, lighted magnifying glass on a bench and a very good 15W micro-tipped soldering pencil as well as a big tipped propane pencil for some of the larger leads and heat sinks.

I reinstalled the board and, BINGO, everything is working great. I checked the static and dynamic convergence and didn't have to hardly touch it. I do believe that my convergence and overscan are improved after the operation. Since my set is about 6 years old, and has this new lease on life, I think I'm going to get it an ISF tune-up just to see what this set is capable of doing given some tlc. Perhaps I can get a two-fer deal after the FHD1 burns in.

Thanks to all that have contributed to the warm-and-fuzzy feeling that I have tonight on succesfully reviving my 510 !! :D :D :D

Mr Bob

10-13-06, 01:25 PM

If Anyone Lives Around Portland Oregon And Needs Some Help Doing This I'm Sure We Could Work Out A Deal, As My Time Is To Valuable To Be Free But I Am A Sucker For Good Beer. Or If Any One Around Portland Wants To Sell Or Get Rid Of One Of These Sets I Would Be Interested.

Thanks Alot, Joel

I will be visiting Portland soon. If you would like a calibration on your newly repaired set - turning it into an officially newly restored set, capable of a new and REALLY sizzling picture - let me know.

For now, until I get my email situation corrected (right now I am not getting certain emails) if you email me, please cc that email to bdclick at gmail dot com, for possibly necessary email redundance.

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

10-13-06, 01:28 PM

Since my set is about 6 years old, and has this new lease on life, I think I'm going to get it an ISF tune-up just to see what this set is capable of doing given some tlc. Perhaps I can get a two-fer deal after the FHD1 burns in.

Thanks to all that have contributed to the warm-and-fuzzy feeling that I have tonight on succesfully reviving my 510 !! :D :D :D

Where do you live? I would love to blow you away with how your set can REALLY look! And I would work out a deal with you for doing your FHD1 as well.

:cool:

Have you seen the thread on the FHD1?

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=706995&goto=newpost

Mr Bob

BShaw@BedHandles

10-13-06, 03:14 PM

Where do you live? I would love to blow you away with how your set can REALLY look! And I would work out a deal with you for doing your FHD1 as well.

:cool:

Have you seen the thread on the FHD1?

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=706995&goto=newpost

Mr Bob
I live in the middle of nowhere - that's Kansas City to you. I'd be interested in your services, Bob, if you line up some more work while in the KC area for cost control. Oh, and yes, I do follow the FHD1 thread, thanks. I'm still waiting on my FHD1 and it should be delivered next week.

PamW

10-13-06, 09:34 PM

I cannot believe that I found this thread tonight!

My 710 started flickering lighter, then darker a few nights ago. My husband and I thought maybe it was the cable, so we let it ride. Tonight, I settled in to watch a DVD, when lo and behold, the same thing began happening. Then the bright blue flash occured. I remembered seeing an Elite X10 thread when I visited this section a few days ago, but didn't read it until now. Thank goodness we have an extended service warranty/cleaning that is still good (for one more month!). I will call them first thing Monday morning to set up the fix.

Thank you all for your posts. I will send this thread to my tech so he'll be up to speed on what to do, although it looks like Pioneer might be owning up to this defect.

Mr Bob

10-14-06, 03:10 PM

I live in the middle of nowhere - that's Kansas City to you. I'd be interested in your services, Bob, if you line up some more work while in the KC area for cost control. Oh, and yes, I do follow the FHD1 thread, thanks. I'm still waiting on my FHD1 and it should be delivered next week.

Build it - a calibration tour - and I will come. See other remarks about tours made by me in this thread, I think you'll find it easier than you think.

Mr Bob

transco

10-17-06, 01:30 PM

Forgive me if this has been covered, but I gave up going through all 21 pages of this thread after reading half a dozen or so. I have a 610 and also have the blue flashes and loud pop in the speakers. Initially (at about the 4 year point) it would do this then recover. Next came changes in picture brightness sometimes in an hour, others in a day or more. Recently, it will do the blue flash and audio pop, then shut itself off (red led lit on the power supply board). Set can't be turned on again from the remote. Only way to recover is to power cycle the set. It is so bad now it only runs a few minutes before shutting down again.

Here's my situation... I'm old, have arthritis, and it's a pain (literally) to work on the set, but I simply can't afford service. I've already pulled the power supply board and will inspect and resolder as recommended here. I have a solid electronics background (some what dated now) and all of the symptoms seem to point to the power supply board. It is such a pain to pull the board, reseat the connectors, etc. I don't want to do it any more than absolutely necessary. I am quite sure it is the power supply, but can't be 100% certain. Rather than keep messing with it, I'm willing to buy a replacement board if I were certain that was the problem. Any advice would be appreciated.

keithaxis

10-17-06, 01:36 PM

my 710 has had the exact issues as everyone else on this thread but has not gotten worse in the 18 months it has been going on. Do some of you have this where one month it will blue flash quite often and then show bright for a while before the popping adn click back to normal and then go maybe 2 or 3 months without this happening? I had a like a 2 month break and now the popping and such, but only a few times jhas the set completely shut down, and can this poppoing and brightness harmn the picture? I sure see my 710 being a lot, lot less detailed than the dlp I recently purchased for another room and was wondering if some of the lost detail is due to the power supply issues...

Mr Bob

10-17-06, 02:23 PM

I have a quick message for both of the last 2 posters - these problems are due to degeneration of connections, and as such are like needed dental work: it never gets better on its own! Don't wait to get these things fixed. It's only a matter of time before every one of those sets now experiencing intermittent problems, goes to no longer turning on at all.

And all the time you run the unit in this kind of experimental intermittency stage/condition, you take the chance of something worse happening. We have had reports of worse things happening, and then definitely needing to call in a qualified service repair tech. Ater a certain point, it's ALWAYS going to be more expensive, the longer you wait on something like this.

Head this off at the pass by getting your set's now-relatively-minor problems remedied straightaway, before they escalate.

Transco -

You can get the board either from Pioneer directly, or from me. Or if you want to send your board to me, I can resolder it here and send it back.

Either way it will require your removing the board in question, unfortunately.

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

10-18-06, 11:12 AM

I just repaired a 15 year old Pioneer SD - a 50" SD-P5053 - yesterday, where I was not told till later that the problem had been intermittent for some time, and had now gone to not turning on at all. All I was told when I got there was that it no longer worked.

It was not even trying to start up - no response from the turn-on button at all. That meant the passive power supply - the circuit which is always on as long as the unit is plugged in, waiting for a momentary press of the Power button on the front panel or a command from the remote to turn on - was the culprit. At least of the moment anyway.

I checked all the incoming power connections and where they went to, and finally pinned down/located exactly where the 120v AC from the wall got DIRECTLY turned into low voltage DC for the turn-on circuit. Do not pass go, do not collect $200 - there was no switching between the incoming 120vAC and this circuit. It was direct-connected. That indicated the passive power supply, as expected.

It provided 14 volts AC - no loss there - and after the diodes, provided 12 volts DC. No loss there either.

I scratched my head, backed off and studied all the runs where the 12v was radiating out from where I was successfully measuring the 12v DC - at its board to board connector, where the power from the PS board was powering up the deflection board, where the giant microprocessor was for the turn-on circuit, which would then deliver the coil voltage to throw the master turn-on relays - and started wondering how far I was going to have to track down where THAT went. Whether I was going to have to remove a second board, which would not be easy - had already removed the PS board, had not found any OBVIOUS cold solder connections yet - or whether I was just going to have to order the service manual and come back.

Then I tried turning it on, just in case, and presto. It worked again. I had not resoldered anything yet. Just removed the PS board to look under it, then put it back in place by screwing 2 placement screws back in.

Just manipulating the board had brought back full ops! I was ecstatic! I was virtually done. All I had to do was resolder the localized area of the passive power supply and I was home free.

I wound up resoldering more than that, even tho it involved those super small connections that can get you in trouble if you're not REALLY careful, and it continued working afterward, for as long as I was there. (Believe me, I will hear about it immediately if it craps out again!) I offered to resolder the entire board for extra charges, and this was a retirement home/facility, and they didn't want to spend any more money. I was working for another service entity other than myself, where I only get a minor percentage of what is charged, and on those meager earnings I didn't want to take on any further risk - over and above the extended risk I had already taken on when I hadn't stuck strictly to the passive PS section, but had already thrown in doing other sections of the small stuff as well - of screwing up good connections with solder bridges on the super-small ones, so I backed off after soldering only half the board, all in the super small section.

ALL CRITICALLY RESOLDERED CONNECTIONS WERE IN THE SUPER-SMALL SECTION! And many of them went to opening up wide spaces to the air between the leg and the pad's edge - air gap windows! - after I hit them with my soldering iron's tip and before I hit them with my solder. As I reported on some pages back, where I stated that these days I am resoldering virtually the ENTIRE boards on these Elites, rather than just the prescribed half dozen points the warranty guy hit.

As I mentioned early on in this thread, this non-permanent/non-lasting soldering stuff with Pioneer on their PS boards goes back a long, long way.

Mr Bob

drvcrash

10-18-06, 11:50 AM

Build it - a calibration tour - and I will come. See other remarks about tours made by me in this thread, I think you'll find it easier than you think.

Mr Bob

Anyone in MD/DE/VA Area interested in going in on getting Bob out here? My 710HD could use some tlc.

keithaxis

10-18-06, 12:10 PM

transco

10-18-06, 02:27 PM

I went over my 610 power supply board with a 5X magnifier / ring light and couldn't believe how bad the solder joints were. Several cold solder joint, rosin joints and joints there were nothing more than a ball of solder on the lead with a dry pad underneith. It appears the board was soldered in two steps: 1) wave soldered after auto-insertion, and 2) hand soldered after manual insertion of the larger parts (IC's, transformers , connectors, etc.). The wave solder joints all appeared OK, but the hand solder joints were a mess. It is hard to believe this board ever worked! Anyway, I resoldered the joints done by hand, hooked the board back up and am burning in the set now. So far (2 hours and counting) it is working perfectly. Prior to the repair I was lucky to get 5 minutes out of it. Of course I can't be 100% sure it was the poor solder joints that caused the problem or even if it is truly repaired, but it's looking good. Just thought I'd share my success (?) with the thread members.

PRO710HD

10-18-06, 02:27 PM

Man am I glad I found this thread. PRO710 here. Worked flawless untill the last week. Thought I was going nuts. Started seeing very small changes in brightness. I thought my eyes were going bad!

Called Pioneer and used the keywords, flashing, brightness, et.. although I didn't use Pop, and No-power becasue my TV hasn't gottne to that point yet. Am I understanding this correctly? It starts with changing brightness and gets progressively worse right? The brightness or contrast seems to jump which makes the picture look a little white washed. I hope it's the PS bad solder problem. At first the rep said they're not doing anything about it or covering the repair, but when I insisited that there others out there that Pioneer is helping, he put me on hold and came back with a case number. I hope they callback and provide the new board replacement and/or repair the old one.

Did I diagnose this right and will I have to make any adjustments myself if they do change the PS board? Man I hate to do the convergence. I tried once, got about 10% done and gave up!

PamW

10-18-06, 02:49 PM

Post #204 in this thread has symptoms/fixes for the various problems with these units. I have another week and a half until my service guy comes. I already have everything ready for him (Post 204 printed out :) ) and will remind him to bring in his soldering kit.

It took me almost two hours to read all the pages ofthis thread, but it was well worth it when I figured out this is my 710's problem as well.

PRO710HD

10-18-06, 03:58 PM

My 710 appears to only have the brightness flicker. Do I probably have the PS/cold solder joint problem as well or could it be something else?

PamW

10-18-06, 04:32 PM

Sounds like the PS / solder to this chick...

transco

10-18-06, 05:25 PM

My 710 appears to only have the brightness flicker. Do I probably have the PS/cold solder joint problem as well or could it be something else?

If your set is like my 610, the brightness flicker will get worse over time. Later stages include screen flashes, speaker pops, and shutting down. The later stages can't be good for your TV. I agree, time to get out the old soldering iron before it gets any worse. A few minutes bench time now will save you a lot of grief in the future.

keithaxis

10-18-06, 05:28 PM

PRO710HD

10-18-06, 05:31 PM

Thanks Pam and Transco. Makes me feel better that I know where the problem most likely is. I'm waiting on Pioneer to call me back. I'm wondering if I should just try to get them to install a new board. That way I have new components and can always touch up the solder later if that board goes bad as well instead of trying to touch up the existing board and having some other component on the existing board go bad in the near future?

HMMMM....

transco

10-18-06, 06:20 PM

when you guys talk soldering iron are you just reheating the current solder to get it to bind back on or are you also adding solder?
One person on this thread said he used a solder sucker and removed all of the old solder before adding new. I didn't go that way because I was afraid I would lift a pad or trace on this cheaply made board (XXXP and 1oz copper is my guess). I simply reflowed the solder that was already there and added a little (60/40) where I felt more was needed. When you inspect your board be sure to have a good light and magnification. I used a bench mount magnifier with ring light. To the naked eye the board looks OK. Under magnification, it has to be the worse soldering job I've seen in my 40+ years in the business. If one of my assemblers handed me a board like this, they'd be fired on the spot.

Mr Bob

10-18-06, 07:15 PM

is MD/ DE / VA anywhere near Western Washington? the state?

ok, maybe if we consider 3000 miles near...I have the 710 also at over 6 years old now and it could use a tuneup but I don't trust any local guy that does not have recommendations...

I have a brother who lives in Seattle. I would share the travel expenses with you as an equal partner - either singly or as part of a cal tour - to be able to have your assistance in visiting him.

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

10-18-06, 07:25 PM

question as I have not really ever soldered much in my 42 years other than my guitar a few times...
when you guys talk soldering iron are you just reheating the current solder to get it to bind back on or are you also adding solder?

Just adding a touch of solder is enough. All you want to do is get the solder abundant, and gleaming and fresh and new again, and adding just a touch of solder gives it that saturation of rosin that it needs, to become new again. And perhaps adding a little when the original joint was/is super thin, with too little solder on it.

When the iron will leave the soldered item without leaving a trail of dried-out solder in its wake, and is shiny and gleaming, it is done. If you hold it on there too long and get it dried out and flat/non-glossy anymore, you have held your iron on there too long and have dried it out. You then have to redo it with a bit more solder. If you have too much solder on there, you should really suck or braid the extra off, so you can see how good a job you have done on each one.

There's a very long post early on in this thread where I cover such issues.

guess it is time for me to look at this as it has been happening for two years...

Uh, yeah, just a tad. I wrote about that a few posts ago, in the last page of this thread before this one. Do it now, before anything worse happens. It will NEVER get any better on its own now, and will only continue to get worse, possibly causing substantial damage to your set.

Mr Bob

AikenGhoti

10-18-06, 07:32 PM

I'll just add another success story...

I took the board out and had an engineer friend reflow the solder on all of the connectors and a few of the other components people have mentioned. As with everyone else, the bad +12V on the one connector was the main culprit and he could see it clearly, along with a few others. He also commented, unprompted, on how cheaply-fabricated the board was.

Anyway, I now have a rock solid 510. Thanks to all the folks on this thread who worked out the problem, and especially Mr Bob for huge contributions and actively answering people's questions! :)

(Oh, and as people have mentioned... clean your optics, it makes a world of difference.)

Mr Bob

10-18-06, 07:33 PM

One person on this thread said he used a solder sucker and removed all of the old solder before adding new. I didn't go that way because I was afraid I would lift a pad or trace on this cheaply made board (XXXP and 1oz copper is my guess).

This is a very valid concern.

I have had to rebuild parts of boards because the pads lifted, or invisibly separated from their runs. When this happens, you HOPE there's enough indication left to see, for you to repair the board right then and there. If not you have to order the service manual for that schematic and/or board layout and wait for it to get there, before you can make your next move.

Mr Bob

RI-PRO-510

10-18-06, 11:06 PM

Do not know if you are still keeping track of the number of Pro-510's that have had this problem and been repaired. But you can add mine to the list.
I read somewhere in this forum that there was a particular location to go to that explains the optics cleaning procedure. Could someone point me in the right direction.
Thanks

sborsher

10-21-06, 09:20 PM

I had the same 610 problems as many others with the flashing screen working its way to the dim screen. It took me 6 1/2 months, 2 weeks, and 1 day to fix it, with help from a manual off ebay, posts on this site, and posts a year ago and older on another site: hometheaterspot

Yes, indeed, it was cold solder joints on the power supply (AWV1795) board. It took 6 1/2 months for the problem to finally go critical (dim screen), 2 weeks before I could put an entire day towards trying to fix it, and 1 day to fix it. When I turned the 610 on at the start of today it was working OK, so I went to check on the prices of new boards (I thought it was the HV/Deflection board). When I found the Pioneer price on the board I googled up AWV1809, looking for a better price, and came up with this and the other forum. I spent half the day reading and printing applicable posts and then got down to work.

I first tried just tapping and poking with an insulated adjustment tool and found that the only thing that set off the problem was pushing on the clump of wires in the upper left of AWV1795. So the first thing I did was pull the connectors, spray them with cleaner, and reconnect. Now I had the LEDs come on, so I knew it was cold solders at those connectors.

I pulled the board and found what I consider to be the worst wave soldering job I have ever seen: most of the solder joints were dull, and many had resin left on them. This is an indication of the waver solderer either not hot enough or the wave moving too fast (most likely the latter). All of the resin should have been burned off and all the joints should be bright.

I believe in "if it ain't broke ...", so I resolder (with new additional resin core solder) all the joint with resin residue (the suspect connector joints had resin under the solder) and all the joints that had any sign of cracking (small circular fissure around the wire or pin). The more soldering the more likely to cause a bridge, so I did only what I considered of immediate need.

It took me about 2 hours to pull the board, resolder and inspect (in iterative process), and re-install. I had no doubt that the problem would be fixed (for now), but I was worried about solder bridges etc. Everything seems to be fine.

I do think that Pioneer owes everone who has had this problem. This is clearly a manufacturing defect that could have been caught with even the most cursory inspection of the board after the soldering. :mad: This may be a problem with just one batch of AWV1795s, all batches, and/or possibly all boards in the 610. Like I said, I'm not about to pull all the boards to check now, but I will certainly know where to look for similar problems in the future.

This is the short version of my experience. If anyone wants the very long version including debugging, disassemlby, and solderng tips, and my credentials, I will write it and post it.

transco

10-22-06, 11:12 AM

Just reporting in... my resoldered 610 has been working perfectly for over a week now. The strange thing is, I think it looks better now than it did straight out of the box. Of course that was 6 years ago and I may have forgotten what it originally looked like, but I am certain that it looks better than it did at least a year ago. Even powering up the set is different. Bottom line, if you have any flickering at all, unexplained noise in your speakers, etc., repair it now. It's like getting a new TV.

Recently (before repairing the 610) I've been looking at new TV's... mainly 60" or larger DLP's. I don't know what it is, but the 'depth' and richness of the colors or my repaired 610 looks better than anything I saw on the showroom floor. Of course these sets are adjusted for the 'wow' factor and are badly overdriven, but still the difference is striking. On the other hand, the new sets are sharper, but unless you are using them for computer monitors I don't think this is all that important. I watch mainly movies and the lack of razor sharp edges isn't a problem. My only problem with the 610 is that it lacks 720p. Oh well, I guess you can't have everything.

Mr Bob

10-22-06, 01:20 PM

I pulled the board and found what I consider to be the worst wave soldering job I have ever seen: most of the solder joints were dull, and many had resin left on them. This is an indication of the waver solderer either not hot enough or the wave moving too fast (most likely the latter). All of the resin should have been burned off and all the joints should be bright.

I will agree with parts of that. As to the rosin being "burned off", no, that's not how it works. I worked in the board stuffing/correcting dept. of Tektronix in Beaverton Oregon for almost a year back when I was in my twenties, and became intimately familiar with soldering - although I was already expert grade on my own before I joined up - and wave soldering. And board silkscreening, IC fabrication, schematic to board layout design, etcetcetc.

The rosin gets CLEANED off, not burned off. Any time I resolder anything, there is ALWAYS rosin residue afterwards. I could get benzene or some other chemical to clean it off, but see no need to be exposing myself to caustic, breatheably noxious chemicals, like they had at Tek in massive bins with paintbrushes at the ready, for just that purpose. So I leave it there, it does no harm to do so. The only reason they clean it off of oscilloscope grade and studio monitor grade boards is for the look of ultra cleanliness when inspected by buyers. Its presence or lack thereof has no place in the actual working ops of these boards. It can be on there for 20-30 years with absolutely no adverse effects. It does not eat away the solder or cause corrosion. Cleaning it off has its place in certain esoteric areas of marketing, but efficacious repair is not one of them.

I believe in "if it ain't broke ...", so I resolder (with new additional resin core solder) all the joint with resin residue (the suspect connector joints had resin under the solder)

Again, I don't think so. If there was resin as part of the solder joint you saw in there, chances are that these joints had been resoldered already at some point in time, since boards that come out of factories in brand new units have all that resin cleaned off already, just as part of the normal manufacturing process. I believe a benzene bath - or whatever chemical they use to clean it off - is the second bath the board takes, after the board's bottom takes the solder bath itself.

and all the joints that had any sign of cracking (small circular fissure around the wire or pin).

There will be others you won't even see - see some of my earlier writing on this thread -

The more soldering the more likely to cause a bridge, so I did only what I considered of immediate need.

I will certainly agree with you on THAT one! Even tho I brave that now anyway, on each of these boards that I repair on my own.

It took me about 2 hours to pull the board, resolder and inspect (in iterative process), and re-install. I had no doubt that the problem would be fixed (for now), but I was worried about solder bridges etc. Everything seems to be fine.

So glad you were able to make out!

;)

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

10-22-06, 01:23 PM

Just reporting in... my resoldered 610 has been working perfectly for over a week now. The strange thing is, I think it looks better now than it did straight out of the box. Of course that was 6 years ago and I may have forgotten what it originally looked like, but I am certain that it looks better than it did at least a year ago. Even powering up the set is different. Bottom line, if you have any flickering at all, unexplained noise in your speakers, etc., repair it now. It's like getting a new TV.

You want to go the extra mile and see what she can REALLY look like, do both the optics and deeper optics cleaning ops. It's like night and day. Like seeing the murky underwater scenes in Finding Nemo vs. the brilliant, ultra-bright out of water scenes later on in the movie.

As I have said before, EVERY 510/610/710 I have done in the past 3 years has needed BOTH ops, on every color.

This also goes for the x20 series, and probably the x30 series, tho I have not done enough of them to have kept aware of the trend, on those.

Mr Bob

transco

10-22-06, 03:30 PM

You want to go the extra mile and see what she can REALLY look like, do both the optics and deeper optics cleaning ops. It's like night and day. Like seeing the murky underwater scenes in Finding Nemo vs. the brilliant, ultra-bright out of water scenes later on in the movie.

Mr Bob

Thanks for the tip. I've never cleaned mine in the 6 years I've owned it. My service manual doesn't go into much detail on cleaning so any tips you have on accessing the optics, cleaning procedures, etc. would be appreciated.

(As to the 'rosin' discussion, HP used to intentionally leave rosin on equipment that was to be shipped over or used on the sea as an anti-corrosive. The only problem was it made it difficult to inspect and poor solder joints could be hiding under the rosin. Personally, I never clean rosin off of boards I work on, nor did I expect those doing rework to clean the rosin off of boards they hand soldered. As to wave soldering (actually reflow soldering), we used a slightly corrosive clear liquid flux because it was faster and would clean contaminated leads, etc. Of course this was washed off as the boards proceeded through the machine.)

sborsher

10-22-06, 04:26 PM

JCBM

10-22-06, 06:37 PM

I will contact the service now to get it fixed. Thanks Bob.

I didn't call the service to fix my 510HD’s PS board problems (changed mind) in stead I re-soldered it myself. I did most of them and the set is so far so good. Indeed, the view is much better than before. I don’t remember how good it was when the set was bought but it definitely met my criteria. I really want to thanks anyone who contributed to the thread and I want to do something to anyone else. I have taken some pictures during the process and load into the laptop, so I can track them back incase I forgot the positions. The pictures include: Backboard, PS Board, White connectors, White connectors disconnected-1, White connectors disconnected-2, PS board disassembled (circuit board). All images less around 700kb, except circuit board one is 2.44mb. If anyone wants those pictures, you can go to my PM.

John

sborsher

10-22-06, 08:24 PM

JCBM,

Glad you had good luck with your board. I resoldered everything that looked suspicious because flexing the board while taking it in and out and working on it (I put it on a bed of packing peanuts in a shallow carton top to keep it level and relatively unstrained) could make any previous weak joint become intermittent.

I would like to see your pix to see if your board is/was anywhere near as bad as mine. I read many posts of people who resoldered their boards only to have the problem come back. My thinking is that many different intermittent joints on that board can cause similar symptoms. If I see anything else suspicious on your board I will let you know so you can do a little more preventive maintenance. So how do I get those pix? What did you mean by PM?

FYI and others, I did not take any pictures because I determined that there was no ambiguity among the cables and connectors. Also, there are 13 plain black screws, 2 black pan head, and one brass holding the board in. The brass screw goes into the transformer base in the middle of the board, the pan heads hold the cable clips. There are no pads on the board that need to contact the mounting bracket, so you can just hang it in there with 3 screws for testing purposes. The worst thing about the screws is that if you drop one it will probably go down through the ventilation holes in the base. I put some ever useful duct tape over those holes.

One very important warning I will give is that you should have a lot of experience soldering, a good temperature controlled solder station, and the right tips before attempting this. If your board is as bad as mine, you will need a lot of heat to flow the new solder and displace the rosin and the proper technique to not overheat any of the components in the process You may also need a solder sucker and/or desoldering braid to remove the solder completely from any pad where the solder won't flow, so you can scrape off some solder mask and expose some new copper.

Anyone who wants to send me a pic of the board for analysis or even the board for resoldering let me know. I might do the board for $50 depending on the severity, but no guarantees of course. My suggestion is that you call Pioneer and complain about the problem before you do anything else, citing the number of people who have had made posts about this problem and even referencing my specific descriptions if you like. As I said previously, I will be contacting them myself tomorrow looking for an extended warranty. I don't think I even want a new board from them.

JCBM

10-22-06, 11:36 PM

[QUOTE=sborsher]JCBM,

So how do I get those pix? What did you mean by PM?

Due to the Forum’s policy for spam protection, I couldn’t post my email address to the thread. You can click on my screen name JCBM and choose “Send a private message (PM) to JCBM”, leave your email address in there, and I’ll send you the pix back. But I’m not sure the resolution is high enough for your purpose. Hopefully you can get some idea though.

John

Mr Bob

10-23-06, 02:24 AM

Mr. Bob,

Sorry, gotta disagree with most of your response to my previous post. The rosin (sic resin, also used debugging instead of troubleshooting) can act as an insulator. On most of the larger solder joints, like the rectifier legs the rosin was stiil under the solder. Yes, it won't burn off the board, but the solder should displace it during the wave soldering. Maybe they just used too much rosin, but then all the joints were cold too. I should have taken a picture of the mess before I fixed it, but even now there is plenty of rosin on the board. When I resoldered it I gave the joints enough heat to displace the rosin.

Rosin is in the solder itself, I believe in a 60/40 mix for electronic soldering. It is not displaced from under the solder when a pad is soldered. It is not on the pad UNTIL the pad is hit with the 60/40 solder wire itself, and the solder wire comes from off-pad.

Masking is on the pad IF they have elected to make sure that pad does NOT get any solder. Otherwise the pad is left pure copper by the silkscreening process, so that the solder in the wave machine will bond correctly to it and the leg going thru it.

Corrosion is a different story, and we are in total agreement about how to handle that - scraping it off to get to good copper again.

If you want to see it, I can pull the board out again since its only hanging in there by a couple screws (I want it to vibrate in place to make sure there are no other bad joints) pending a week of testing before I do a full clean and recal. BTW, my 610 never looked bad except during the lbrightness increase (or contrast decrease) phase of the flashing. I had extended warranty up until last Oct (of course I never had a problem until after it expired) and had it cleaned and checked every year under that policy, although I did most of the fine tuning myself.

I am surprised to hear that they actually DID do optics cleaning for you on an ESP. Most of the promises I have heard about re. such things never came to pass when the rubber hit the road. My brother bought an RCA 46" from Fry's before HD, and during their selling they rattled off to him the same promise, which was never kept. 3 years down the line when I did it for him, he was amazed at the difference it made, and said so.

However, I am quite confident that NONE of them, even the ones who are keeping their promises about cleaning, are going to go in there and clean under the lenses at the coolant covers and the lens rears, what I call the "deeper optics" cleaning. ALL of the x10 line is in need of that by now, and while it is elective right now on the x30 line, in a couple of years ALL of them will need it also, if they have the same lens design as the x10 series, with the same relatively huge air gaps under each lens, where the dust creeps in, drawn by the ionization caused by the HV.

I think most of the people who say their X10 looked like new again after the fix probably had one or more persistent poor connections because of the cold solder.

I am assuming that you you mean that they had poor connections from day one, when they opened up their brand new unit and set it up and watched it for the first time?

And, yes, after 6+ years, it still looks better than anything else on the market, except maybe some high end plasmas which I wouldn't want anyway, but especially DLPs. I have bought a couple SOTA medium size LCDs in the past couple years, but the 610 still beats them.

Yup. In spades!

Here's what I had to do to fix the board:

1. I went after the small joints with obvious rosin residue, making sure that it was all forced out from under the solder.

2. I went for small joints that were obviously cracked, those with a near circular fissure around the lead/pin.

3. I switched from a Weller PTB7 to a PTD7 and attacked the larger joints in the same way. Many of the questionable joints were heat sink pins and I wanted to stabilize those, as many of the joints of the semi pins associated with those sinks were cracked. One of the regulators has a black sink that is not soldered in, although it is sorta siliconed in, and can still move quite a bit. Those leg joints were all cracked. The transformer in the center of the board and the large rectifier assy were also in bad shape. In fact, I could not get the rectifier lead joints to flow at all, so the rosin underneath would not bubble out;

This reference to "bubbling out from under" the joints is lost on me. Rosin is not beneath the joint, it comes from the solder itself. I have never seen rosin be "in between" the upper and lower halves of a joint. I have never seen upper and lower halves of a joint, and do not know how to identify with this. My observation of soldering, from soldering for the past 20 years plus, is that solder is a molten lava that flows between 2 metal things whose surface tension attracts it and places it properly in between them, as long as the temp is kept in the correct range and the process does not take too long - if it takes too long, that causes the joint to dry out and the rosin to eventually vaporize and evaporate, leaving the joint no longer remaining gleaming, as it should be.

Masking may bubble out from under a joint, if there is some that was inappropriately placed there during design. But rosin is not under a joint, to bubble out from under it. It comes from the solder wire itself, which is applied with the hand that is not holding the soldering iron. I see no way for there to be an upper and lower half to a solder joint, with rosin in between. There's just the joint itself, and the only separation I have ever seen is on really old-looking joints, when the solder in a joint is so dried out that a hole happens when the iron touches it, before the new solder hits it. This is what I see on these Pio Elite PS boards, and they are not old!

in that case and in a handful of other joints, large and small, I had to scrape away the mask to get better solder purchase on new copper. One pad even lifted off the board and I had to put in a jumper. This is a CHEAP and POORLY MADE board for such a high end device.

I don't bother with the legs of the heat sinks themselves, which are soldered in but lead nowhere, and as such are strictly structural. Since they are made of very rugged and thick metal, they can get extremely hot but don't flex at all. I don't believe their heating will flex them anywhere near enough to affect the leads of the devices attached to them. Sure, they have cold solder joints on them, because they do the most dynamic heating and cooling in the unit - translating to expansion/contraction, every time the board heats up and cools down. But they were still structurally sound, even with cold solder joints (except the ones where there was no solder left on them between them and the pad at all!) I do one side of them just on principle, but don't prioritize their electronic connectivity aspects at all, since they go nowhere and connect nothing to anything.

But I do always do the screw that is soldered to the board, just because for some reason they did. Possibly RF considerations. And because I found once that that was the ONLY thing that solved the problem after being the ONLY thing left to resolder on an older SD Pioneer, after 3 visits, where it would work fine every time I left, but would crap out later. Resoldering that screw after tightening it with a Philips while the solder was molten was the last thing done, before I finally stopped receiving repeat calls on it.

I agree completely with pretty much all of the rest of what you said.

Class action suit anyone?

Not the first time this has been mentioned in this thread!

I am still puzzled by how this has happened on JUST the PS boards of these Pioneer Elites. I have studied the deflection and convergence boards on x10s whenever I have been called upon to do so, and this thin/dried-out/dull-looking solder joint problem is not there. Only on the PS boards.

I am hoping your experience can add new light on the genesis of this problem, because at this point, I am still at a major loss as to how it originally happened. What the causes were that eventually led to this screamin' number of failures, all in the same areas and exhibiting the same results - steady deterioration of the connections, eventually leading to non-connection at some really critical point and resultant unit shut-down.

I really value your electronic technical experience, and your willingness to step up here and be counted. I especially like your observations about temp and duration of immersion, re. the wave solder machine, which I had not thought of.

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

10-23-06, 02:51 AM

Thanks for the tip. I've never cleaned mine in the 6 years I've owned it. My service manual doesn't go into much detail on cleaning so any tips you have on accessing the optics, cleaning procedures, etc. would be appreciated.

Here's some stuff I've been writing thru the years, from my archives:

My optics cleaning technique is to suspend ALL the gritty particulates that have built up over the years in liquid before attempting to do ANYTHING with them. Lenses are usually made of plastic, and are extremely susceptible to being scratched. Even glass lenses can be scratched.

High voltage attracts the smallest of particulates to your optics, including smoke, and it is VERY IMPORTANT not to scratch your optics.

It is also important not to allow any of the liquid to go down into the space between the edge of the lens and the lens barrel. If it does, it will cause the inner lenses to fog up. There are usually 4 lenses in a stack, in each lens pack. 3 guesses as to why I know that...

So when you send your spray to the optics, you DIVE, DIVE, DIVE with your aborbent material to the lowest part of the lens surface, to make sure that doesn't happen - that the liquid doesn't penetrate to the lower levels of the stack, to the inner lenses.

The best stuff I've found for wetting the surface is an aerosol called Sprayway, because it foams up and doesn't run. I usually use non-ammoniated Windex, or Glass Plus, and very very carefully. Non-ammoniated because of the first surface mirrors used in HDreadys. Don't want to be mixing aluminum with ammonia.

Once the mist has penetrated the contaminants and lifted the grit off the surface, a careful swipe in one direction only will get the critical mass of grit off the surface, to one side of the lens. A rolling motion as you do so, like a streetsweeper, is best and will very cleanly remove the bad stuff.

Usually takes several very careful swipes, all in the same direction, to gather and remove all the particulates - and you're done. Then one more very light cleaning swipe -

It is better to leave trace streaks than to rub till the surface is clean. Rubbing is VERBOTEN! Doing so will "scuff" the plastic with thousands of permanent streaks, which you will then rub harder and harder only to find out they don't come out, and you've just exacerbated the situation gravely. 3 guesses as to how I found out about THAT one...

As such, no I don't think these things are the thing to use, unless and until the surface is 99% clean already. I use pure wood fiber paper towels - not shop towels, which contain lanolin and will NEVER get your mirror clean - and the wetting materials mentioned above. On the outer lenses, the mirror, and the inner CRT coolant covers, where you remove the lenses to get to them.

This method has been doing it for me - and very pristinely - for years and years and years.

It's all in the wrist.

Later:

Some further notes -

When you check ANY of the optics for contaminants, shoot your flashlight at the lens surface FROM THE SIDE. It never looks that bad when you hit it head-on - but Lordy, when you shoot it from the side, MAN, that's dirty...

I usually do just a quick bump from the back of one of my fingers - no more than 3/8" long - to the surface of a mirror, lens etc, just to see if that bump turns clear black, in the middle of the gray dust. If it is dirty, it does. If not - if that surface was black and remains black after bumping it with the back of my finger - I may just leave that surface alone.

On the lenses facing up, often to make my point in front of the client, I wet one finger - don't want to DRYRUB any gritty particulates - and draw a happy face in the middle. Viewed from the front at an oblique angle, with the flashlight hitting it from the side, that usually does the trick, when that happy face jumps off the surface at you, revealing how clear your optics are SUPPOSED to be...

If you are removing and going under the lenses, be sure and check the rear surface of the lens pack - the one the becomes exposed when you remove the lenspack, whose surface faces the CRT. It is usually full of smoke, and responds the same way to the "touch" test mentioned above.

When you shoot the Windex in there, be sure and clean the outer surfaces of overspray, before cleaning the lens itself. If you don't - if you just leave it - its moisture is trapped and will eventually fog everything up in there, after you have put things back together.

3 guesses as to how I found out about THAT one...

If you do it after cleaning the surfaces in question, more lint - and other new contaminants - fall onto the surface you just cleaned, than if it is the other way around.

I have found that the actual coolant covers themselves are usually plastic, tho I have seen glass ones - very expensive to do it that way - on Runcos and Pioneer Elites. You can tell by looking at the edge. If it is plastic, you won't really see that edge, it will be inside where the coolant is and not available to your view.

If it is glass, you will see the curvature end, and straight flat glass will go to the edge of the circular chamber, usually just over 1/4" in all directions.

I just completed this protocol on a 6 year old Runco 770 at Harbin Hot Springs last week, and a 9 year old Pioneer PRO-119 last night in Redwood City. The Runco had VERY thick dust on the entire lower half of its glass coolant cover, and its keeper couldn't get over how distinct and impressivethe colors had become, later.

The response from the Elite owners was that they had NEVER seen it look that good, even when new. At 9 years old...

Naturally, the rest of my calibration protocol was also applied in each case, after hours of fine precision work.

But the importance of the light path remaining clear as glass in a projection system cannot be stated strongly enough. There are MANY surfaces to deal with in a projection environment, NONE of which exist in a directview environment. EACH of those surfaces needs its own individual attention.

Especially in the face of the high voltage of the CRTs, which always wants to cause floating airborne contaminants to cling to nearby surfaces over time, hour after hour - multiplied by hundreds of hours of use over time - PER YEAR!

This is definitely an op that cannot be left to chance.

Mr Bob

transco

10-23-06, 10:05 AM

Mr Bob

10-23-06, 01:22 PM

I'm just waiting for someone to complain that this thread is 'off-topic'. Actually the there is a wealth of information here from people with years experience 'in the business' and should be of value to everyone, especially those 'not in the business'.

I'm not one to argue with success, but I have to disagree with you here. Certainly never use shop towels for the reason you gave. However, since my early days in the lab it has been pounded into me to never use paper towels, Kleenex, etc. for cleaning fine optics. It is also the mantra taught to photographers from the very beginning. All you have to do is look at them under a microscope to see why. The wood fibers have rough surfaces that can scratch the optics, especially coated optics. In the old days we used lint free cotton fiber lens paper which has been replace now with the microfiber cleaning clothes.

I applaud your attention to detail and sensitivity to the surface of fine optics.

My experience has been that every time I have tried to use some special fibre cloth or paper handed to me by an owner with the same concerns you have put out here, it leaves streaks and residue. Every time, I have gone back to using pure but wet/semi-wet paper towels, which do not. When wet, the roughness of the fibres in pure wood fibre paper towels is softened beyond measure and they are completely limp and non-abrasive.

I haven't read what I submitted for awhile, and perhaps I left out HOW I use them. ONE pass on one part of the lens, another pass at another part of the lens, always going from one end of the pass to the other, usually down to up, with NO back and forth movement. After 3-4 SINGLE passes I am complete, and then I BREATHE on the lens and do the same thing again, before the steam from my mouth that gathers there on the surface has a chance to dry, removing the last of any residue left from my cleaning solution.

I NEVER do any of this on a DRY surface! That's where the scratching will occur. I NEVER RUB a lens surface back and forth to "polish" it (tho I do on the mirror, many many times). Many years ago I did on a lens, back and forth and back and forth, trying to get those stubborn streaks in the plastic I had just noticed to go away, and they did go away, every time - while wet. Just until they dried a second or 2 later, then the streaks were back. Thousands of them. It was on an old, cheap 40" RCA SD, and was so off on all its other parameters - which they had no intention of spending any money on to remedy - that they never noticed anything but a positive difference, and DVD was not even around yet, for picture clarity. What I HAD done - the optics cleaning process - even tho in its infancy was very effective in producing a marked improvement in eradicating the former bleariness and cloudiness of their former picture, and they were very happy. But it was a learning experience for me - a real wake-up call that I never again repeated with ANY other optics, HD or otherwise.

Just one gentle but thorough rub on an essentially wet surface, wiping AWAY from the direction you're headed - like a streetsweeper - usually down to up, and let it dry itself to the air as I go to the next pass. This causes the dirt - all the gritty particulates - to be swept OFF the lens with each pass, rather than to be ground down into its surface.

One especially nice feature of this material is that, even dry, they will lift off grease from the lens surface, rather than spreading it around as did the old lens tissue.

Again, no spreading around of ANYTHING is allowed in my cleaning techniques for lenses. After the cleaning solution has done its job, there is no grease on that surface anymore.

For photographic lenses, I always use canned air to blow away the loose (and often abrasive) particles, then the microfiber cleaning cloth. I never use lens cleaning solution unless it is absolutely necessary.

CRT lenses MUST have some sort of WET cleaning solution used in the process. You can't get dried-on gritty particulates off without damage, in any type of dry cleaning situation, in CRT lenses, be they plastic or glass. Aside from just delicately dusting it with a soft brush, which will work for the first year or 2 and after that, that stuff that has been drawn to the surface constantly via the HV, is on to stay. The gritty particulates MUST be suspended in liquid of some type or nature - foam or spray - BEFORE they are moved, on the surface of that lens.

Remember, we are not talking about the lenses of completely passive optics like telescopes, microscopes or binocs. We are talking about surfaces that are exposed to HV, whose ionization process turns the optics into powerful dust magnets, attracting dust and dirt and smoke every microsecond the set is powered up. Read some of the Nuts and Bolts section of my website for further information on this. Left passive, this optics cleaning process would never be necessitated. But the 30KV of high voltage in there, inherent to the operation of the CRT process, changes EVERYTHING.

I nearly destroyed a $600 lens with that stuff. As you said, it ran down inside the lens barrel and then on to cemented surface of the lens. The cement then crystallized leaving what looked like snowflakes in the lens. I cost me $200 to have the lens disassembled and re-cemented.

I was lucky on that one. It only took me one time of tilting the spray can to a D45 angle and having liquid from inside the aerosol can hit the lens, for me to swear off air spraying permanently. A soft photo or cosmsetics brush is the best way to get lint and dust off the surface, if it is ready to come off. Again, after 2 years or more, it will not be.

You are free to use whatever cleaning solution you like. I have been using my methods for over 20 years, with no adverse effects. It is tried and true. Of course I am sure yours is also.

As a side note on PC board soldering... most through-hole PCB's are solder coated at the factory as part of the manufacturing process. This make is a heck of a lot easier to solder the boards after component insertion. Bare copper corrodes very quickly. Solder coating the board prevents this and allows the end manufacturer to use less heat and non-corrosive flux during the final soldering process.

Great if you can get solder thin enough to do that. The feed-thrus I have seen on ECBs are way too small to still stay holes; they get filled up with solder immediately, with no room for the legs of ANY component I have ever seen.

But maybe there is such a thin solder, tho I have never seen or heard of it. I have always wondered if part of the reason these Pio PS boards are failing years down the line is because they used solder that was way too thin, out of the starting gate.

Mr Bob

sborsher

10-23-06, 01:37 PM

Rosin is in the solder itself, I believe in a 60/40 mix for electronic soldering. It is not displaced from under the solder when a pad is soldered. It is not on the pad UNTIL the pad is hit with the 60/40 solder wire itself, and the solder wire comes from off-pad.

Masking is on the pad IF they have elected to make sure that pad does NOT get any solder. Otherwise the pad is left pure copper by the silkscreening process, so that the solder in the wave machine will bond correctly to it and the leg going thru it.

Corrosion is a different story, and we are in total agreement about how to handle that - scraping it off to get to good copper again.
Mr Bob

I will concede your more extensive knowledge of wave soldering, although I did work for a couple cos in the computer industry that had those and SMT. As I remember the flux (rosin) was applied to the board prior to the wave soldering. In the case of my board, the solder was not hot enough, or the wave moved too fast, or there was just to much flux, so that there was flux actually left under the solder. Here is one example of it from my board. I think it was the large rectifier, but it was definitley one of the larger devices, one that I had to scrape to get more copper available. When I first resoldered that one, the solder, rather than flowing out to the pad flowed down the legs of the device. The flux left under the joint from the wave solderer actually blocked the solder from flowing to the pad. Those joints still exhibit the problem in maybe half of the joint now because I also (as you had mentioned before) did not want to go through the process of removing the flux and I didn't want to overheat it trying to force out the flux. Instead, I made sure I had enough new copper in one area of the joint to make up for the possible loss in another area.

I am surprised to hear that they actually DID do optics cleaning for you on an ESP...
Mr Bob

Of course they didn't, but they did open her up, dust her out, adjust the focus, and do some factory level stuff. I always did the convergence, and have also tinkered with the other mentioned settings myself having watched what they did very closely. I would be glad to pay you for instructions on doing what you do.

I am assuming that you you mean that they had poor connections from day one, when they opened up their brand new unit and set it up and watched it for the first time?
Mr Bob

No, I mean that over time one particular connection degraded, probably from corrosion as you mentioned, so that, I don't know which was the actual case, the brightness slowly increased or the contrast slowly decreased so that the picture became washed out over time. In the early stages of my problem that is how it looked to me. The picture would be fine, then it would go to that washed out state over a period of a few minutes, then it would snap back to normal. Mine never stayed in the washed out state for long, but I can understand how others might have.

This reference to "bubbling out from under" the joints is lost on me...
Mr Bob

As I said above, I believe that the flux is applied before the wave soldering ... And, yes, I had several of the joints you described where the hole opens up as soon as you touch it. What that means is that the solder was not adhering to the lead or pin; the connection was purely mechanical, probably in this case because there was NO flux there. Seems improbable that some places would have too much flux and others none, but looks that way to me, and I usually try to go with the most logical, if somewhat far fetched, explanation. Now I think that the problem may not be so much with the wave soldering itself but with the flux application. Also, as improbable as it seems, I found the screw joints to be some of the best on the board and did not touch them.

One other thing to mention vis-a-vis the flux. As I said in another post I had 100% correlation between pushing on the connector wires and intermittancy, and no other source of intermittancy, so, in my case, it was definitely and only bad joints at the cable connectors (also like I said in another post any number of poor connections on the board could probably cause the same symptoms). When I inspected the joints on the two suspect connectors, they had no cracked joints, only flux left on, and possible below, the joint. When I heated those joints and applied the new solder, the new soldered force out the old flux so that the old flux was now surrounding the joint instead of in or under it. As you mentioned before leaving the flux on the board, away from the joint, is not a problem since it is not conductive.

As far as the heat sinks, I want them as rigid as possible. One of the early problems with epoxy encased semis that I identified was on the venerable 2SC1061 xst used as an audio output amp. Those would heat up and I guess the epoxy would expand and somewhere between the leg and the chip the connection would break. The same problem occured on the early MSI output amp ICs. I guess by now they mostly have fixed that problem; I mean it has been some 30 years since then, but I do want those heat sinks rigid so there is no flexing of those legs relative to the joints or the casing. The soldering problems I identified were also around the same time, but I guess there is more potential variability even now in wave soldering, especially if the machine is not set up properly.

I am still puzzled by how this has happened on JUST the PS boards of these Pioneer Elites...
Mr Bob

In summary of all I have previously said, I can only surmise that it was a problem with the wave soldering machine and/or flux application. Obviously, they did a substantial run with that improper setup. What I don't understand is why new boards would have the same problem; did they do only one run for all time or did they not check the setup on that machine in subsequent runs? Also, hard to believe that they would not have done other boards on that machine that would exhibit the same problems, but I am glad to hear that you have checked other boards in the X10s have not not seen these problems; or has it just shown up on the PS boards because of all the heat generated and because they are mounted vertically so the heat sweeps up the entire board? Also, I'm fairly certain that I read in one of the threads that I looked at that the same problem has occurred with the newer version of the PS board. If that's true then that's really sad, because they probably redesigned the board to fix the very problem we are discussing but missed the real cause, then soldered it on the same mis-calibrated machine.

Is all that really possible? Hey, one of the reasons I ever got into fixing things like cars, electronics, whatever, is that no one else seems to be able to fix (at least not reliably and/or to my even minimal satisfaction) most of the problems that I experience; not drs, not techs, not auto. I suppose I am still a bit of a perfectionist (not nearly as bad as when I was younger), however now I have zero tolerance for being patronized and/or stonewalled especially. Too old now to put up with that crap; there's always another place to go where you might find some respect.

I'm going to start in with Pioneer right now. This should be very interesting. They have a lot to lose by not stepping up on this problem. Me for one. Much of my main system is Pioneer. I already gave them a pass on an upgrade that was supposed to be available for my DV-37 to fix a freezing problem on drill downs on a certain type of DVD. The player was in the shop for 3 weeks while they tried ROM (I guess) after ROM that Pioneer sent them and they finally had to give up and put it back the way it was. I hope that ROM was a plug in; if not, I can't imagine (or maybe I can) what that board must look like.

TBC ...

sborsher

10-23-06, 02:22 PM

This is going to look like a reply to myself (unless someone slips in between), but it is to several things I did not read prior to my previous post (or maybe they slipped in between).

Re lenses:

FWIW, I just bought a new pair of Serengeti Aviators, my sunglass of choice for many years, and this pair came with a recommendation I had never seen before which probably applies to all lenses: always wash with clean water first to remove any abrasive particles. I had never thought of that before. I always use those microfiber cloths for cleaning all lenses, glasses, camera, etc. and a squeeze bottle duster. What now? Easy to wash the sunglasses, but ...

Typically, I always start with a feather duster (of sorts) in cleaning the TV lenses to wisk off the dust. I had a Sony coffee table type projector for 20 years before getting the 610 and regulary cleaned those external lenses, first feather dusting, then cleaning with "plastic" cleaner, then polishing with microfiber (when it became available, cheesecloth before that). Never a scratch! Cheesecloth is good for polishing because it allows any stray particles to get trapped in the mesh, rather than be ground into the lens, but microfiber gives the best result.

Re thru hole:

Another early PCB problem I Identified was with thru-hole. Early boards used a metal cylinder (tinned copper or just tin?) just the thickness of the board in the hole to conduct from one side to the other. Talk about building in future problems. The joints to those cylinders would crack in a very short period of time due to vibration and thermal expansion/contraction. The fix back then was to put a small piece of wire through the whole and solder on both sides (duh). Later the industry figured out how to copper plate continuously right through the hole, no solder required.

Re off topic:

Nothing is off topic if it helps someone. Finding this and the other older thread about the X10 PS problem saved me soooo much time (and probably money). True serendipity; as I mentioned before I found the threads when I googled up the Deflection board part number, looking for a better price than from Pioneer.

Mr Bob

10-23-06, 02:23 PM

I will concede your more extensive knowledge of wave soldering, although I did work for a couple cos in the computer industry that had those and SMT. As I remember the flux (rosin) was applied to the board prior to the wave soldering.

That makes total sense, hadn't thought of that.

In the case of my board, the solder was not hot enough, or the wave moved too fast, or there was just to much flux, so that there was flux actually left under the solder. Here is one example of it from my board. I think it was the large rectifier, but it was definitley one of the larger devices, one that I had to scrape to get more copper available. When I first resoldered that one, the solder, rather than flowing out to the pad flowed down the legs of the device. The flux left under the joint from the wave solderer actually blocked the solder from flowing to the pad.

How can that be? Rosin is what causes the solder to flow easily and thoroughly. Without it, or if we heat it up too long and it dries out, we wind up with dried-out conn's that have to be redone immediately.

Those joints still exhibit the problem in maybe half of the joint now because I also (as you had mentioned before) did not want to go through the process of removing the flux and I didn't want to overheat it trying to force out the flux. Instead, I made sure I had enough new copper in one area of the joint to make up for the possible loss in another area.

So the pad has been permanently damaged, permeated by now really really old rosin, and new copper has to be found to solder to?

I would be glad to pay you for instructions on doing what you do.

I charge $85/hr for phone consultation - with a one hour minimum, payable to my account at www.paypal.com. Account number is my email address, below. You are free to record the conversation for future reference. If we do not use up the entire hour on our first chat, you can use up the remainder of that hour at any time in the future.

Contact me directly and we'll set up a time.

As I said above, I believe that the flux is applied before the wave soldering ... And, yes, I had several of the joints you described where the hole opens up as soon as you touch it. What that means is that the solder was not adhering to the lead or pin; the connection was purely mechanical, probably in this case because there was NO flux there.

These smaller ones that open up have solder everywhere they need to have it - all around the pad's edge and on the leg itself - it's just that they still open up, seemingly due to age. But maybe there was insufficient rosin used, out of the starting gate, causing insufficient bonding of the solder to everywhere it had to go. Would love to see how glossy those joints were in the beginning, before the boards went into the units themselves.

Anyone looked at a brand new PS board sent out from Pio? Did it have glossy joints, or were they dried-out looking, as they all are on the boards I have seen that needed repair?

In summary of all I have previously said, I can only surmise that it was a problem with the wave soldering machine and/or flux application. Obviously, they did a substantial run with that improper setup. What I don't understand is why new boards would have the same problem; did they do only one run for all time or did they not check the setup on that machine in subsequent runs? Also, hard to believe that they would not have done other boards on that machine that would exhibit the same problems, but I am glad to hear that you have checked other boards in the X10s have not not seen these problems; or has it just shown up on the PS boards because of all the heat generated and because they are mounted vertically so the heat sweeps up the entire board?

The joints on the other boards I mentioned were all nice and glossy years down the road. The convergence board is mounted vertically, just like the PS board, yet it was clear. The defl bd is a horizontal board, meaning that the bottom does not dissipate heat, it locks it in if there is any down there.

Also, I'm fairly certain that I read in one of the threads that I looked at that the same problem has occurred with the newer version of the PS board. If that's true then that's really sad, because they probably redesigned the board to fix the very problem we are discussing but missed the real cause, then soldered it on the same mis-calibrated machine.

Yeah.

Is all that really possible? Hey, one of the reasons I ever got into fixing things like cars, electronics, whatever, is that no one else seems to be able to fix (at least not reliably and/or to my even minimal satisfaction) most of the problems that I experience; not drs, not techs, not auto. I suppose I am still a bit of a perfectionist (not nearly as bad as when I was younger), however now I have zero tolerance for being patronized and/or stonewalled especially. Too old now to put up with that crap; there's always another place to go where you might find some respect.

TBC ...

You got that right!

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

10-23-06, 02:33 PM

Nothing is off topic if it helps someone.

Yup.

FWIW, I just bought a new pair of Serengeti Aviators, my sunglass of choice for many years, and this pair came with a recommendation I had never seen before which probably applies to all lenses: always wash with clean water first to remove any abrasive particles. I had never thought of that before.

That's exactly how I do my sunglasses. The guy who was about to sell me my last pair was reaching for a cleaning cloth, and I said "Stop. Please. I will not buy those glasses if you clean them as you are intending to do." I mentioned that I clean plasic lenses every day in my work, and would he mind if I cleaned them my way?

He consented, and I spirited them off to the closest men's room, to run pure water on them. I then used soft toilet paper for ONE SWIPE on each lens, and went back and paid him. Needless to say, he was very impressed with how clean I had gotten them, with no scratches. Still absolutely brand new.

Finding this and the other older thread about the X10 PS problem saved me soooo much time (and probably money). True serendipity; as I mentioned before I found the threads when I googled up the Deflection board part number, looking for a better price than from Pioneer.

Would you mind putting that thread up here, so I can go visit it, see how much help they need?

I can't stomach the thought of owners trashing their sets - not only Pioneers but ANY CRT RPTV brand - and going fixed pixel when CRT RPTVs can still dominate and be at the head of the class, with the proper care and feeding. That's why I started the thread, "Don't dump your CRT RPTV!" on this site and at several areas of hometheaterspot.

If it's an AVS thread I will refer them back here, for the wealth of info we have going, here.

Mr Bob

transco

10-23-06, 04:08 PM

I applaud your attention to detail and sensitivity to the surface of fine optics.

Great if you can get solder thin enough to do that. The feed-thrus I have seen on ECBs are way too small to still stay holes; they get filled up with solder immediately, with no room for the legs of ANY component I have ever seen.

But maybe there is such a thin solder, tho I have never seen or heard of it. I have always wondered if part of the reason these Pio PS boards are failing years down the line is because they used solder that was way too thin, out of the starting gate.

Mr Bob

Solder (actually tin) on PCB's with plated through holes is applied with an electrochemical process which is the basically the same as used to plate the holes with copper and the fingers with gold. It is easily controlled and can lay down the tin in microinch thicknesses.

sborsher

10-23-06, 10:12 PM

Mr. Bob et al,

I think I can do everything I intend to do now. The last time I tried it was my first post and I couldn't even put a URL in the post.

Here is the other thread, but the latest post to it is over a year old. I think some of the people may have migrated to this thread.

http://www.hometheaterspot.com/htsthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/591586/page/7/fpart/all/vc/1

I got the board pic from John (JCBM). Its good enough to see some of the things I saw on my board. I had to split the image into two of the most interesting sections and resize them and compress them adding a little more distortion. They are down below. Took me a while to get them uploaded; many rules. I couldn't open them here with magnification, but you can download them by right clicking and doing a Save As to your PC.

Here is the text of the email I sent back to him.

Yes, your board looks very much like mine, except mine had even more flux on it. And, yes, shooting it in quadrants in macro mode would be much better. However, I do see some questionable joints as it is. I would not recommend you pulling the board immediately to fix them, but if you have any future problems you should definitely resolder the following and anything like them:

All of the connectors pins where there is flux, E6 and E7 especially. It looks like you may have done some, but in my case I got the old flux to flow further away from the joints. The top pin (in the picture) on E7 definitely looks like it still has flux under it. A couple very good examples of the flux under the solder problem may be on a joint below E7 to the right of the L214 label and just to the left of the E1 label. These look like what I call Hershey's Kisses joints, where the solder did not flow out, but rather curled underneath, sitting on top of excessive flux. Those were the joints I was especially careful to fix and on several of them I had to expose more copper to get the solder to flow out.

----

I decided to wait to see John's board before I called Pioneer, so I will call them tomorrow. I'll post again after I get some resolution from them.

MB, I was hoping you had something in writing for the overall alignment. What I will do is review the alignment procedures in the manual, decide exactly what I want to do, and contact you with specific questions if necessary.

JCBM

10-23-06, 10:50 PM

I got the board pic from John (JCBM). Its good enough to see some of the things I saw on my board. Here is the pic with the text of the email I sent back to him.

Not sure what happened with the image. supposedly it uploaded successfully as PRO610HD PS Board in the Rear Rrojection gallery, but I can't find it. Maybe it will show up later.

PRO610HD PS Board

Yes, your board looks very much like mine, except mine had even more flux on it. And, yes, shooting it in quadrants in macro mode would be much better. However, I do see some questionable joints as it is. I would not recommend you pulling the board immediately to fix them, but if you have any future problems you should definitely resolder the following and anything like them:

All of the connectors pins where there is flux, E6 and E7 especially. It looks like you may have done some, but in my case I got the old flux to flow further away from the joints. The top pin (in the picture) on E7 definitely looks like it still has flux under it. A couple very good examples of the flux under the solder problem may be on a joint below E7 to the right of the L214 label and just to the left of the E1 label. These look like what I call Hershey's Kisses joints, where the solder did not flow out, but rather curled underneath, sitting on top of excessive flux. Those were the joints I was especially careful to fix and on several of them I had to expose more copper to get the solder to flow out.

Steve,
Thanks for the suggestions. The pix you saw was taken after the board have pulled out and before the resoldering. The joints that you pointed out have been resoldered myself. If I have new problems coming out, I will take better pix and may contact you. I'm living in Bedford. It's nice to have a pro near the neighborhood.

John

RPowers

10-23-06, 11:17 PM

sborsher

10-23-06, 11:41 PM

John,

Oops, I just noticed that I misread you last post, thinking you had a new problem. Glad your not. I'll leave the rest of this here anyway for your and others future reference.

Sorry to hear the board is reverting. If you want to take another shot at it read my posts from yesterday about checking for intermittencies and the soldering techniques. Its very important to try to isolate the problem first so that you can confirm the fix later. If, after reading my posts and warnings, you do not feel comfortable going back in, you can send the board to me and I will resolder it for $50.

And do send more pix if you take it on; like I said of quadrants in macro mode. You obviously have a very good camera and know what you're doing with it.

A few other things:

Why don't you wait until I talk to Pioneer to see if they will do anything for us.

Also, do not use the TV again until you are ready to do the checking. I was lucky that mine only popped badly and shut off a couple times. Others lost CRTs from those jolts after 4 or 5 times. I'm sure everyone's X10 that had this problem has been weakened somewhat too.

Also, if you do decide to send the board to me, I will be leaving my TV accessible probably for a couple weeks so I could actually put your board in mine to troubleshoot it, assuming it still can produce a picture at least intermittently.

Lastly, please do not consider me a pro or an expert in the electronic repair field of today. Although I do hold a valid MA Radio and TV service technician license, I have been in the computer industry for over 20 years now. It is only coincidental that this problem happens to be within the scope of some of my former expertise. This problem we all have is something I dealt with in the early days of solid state home entertainment systems over 35 years ago, and that is more the shame of it.

Mr Bob

10-24-06, 03:41 AM

MB, I was hoping you had something in writing for the overall alignment. What I will do is review the alignment procedures in the manual, decide exactly what I want to do, and contact you with specific questions if necessary.

I have been writing on this board and others like it for literally years, but I have never put together a comprehensive handbook on how to calibrate a Pioneer CRT RPTV. After you get the hang of them they are fairly straightforward to calibrate, but still very time consuming even when you know what you are doing. Before you get the hang of it and you are still on the learning curve they seem to take forever, with all the little nips and tucks you have to keep in mind about them. There is a very steep learning curve, and it would take forever to write it all down, even as experienced a technical writer as I have grown to become, in the last 8 years. (I have been doing this on the net since the Digital Theater Forum, now defunct, was young.)

But worth every minute spent, as many of those who have had me clean and calibrate their sets will attest. It is actually thrilling to me, EVERY time we sit down and finally watch some video, esp. HD, after the whole enchilada has been done. Optics cleaning, both regular and the deeper stuff. Refocusing via the Cantilever Technique, which I wrote - usually 2 out of the 3 lenses on Pioneers are out of focus OOB. Overscan reduction, which recaptures and reveals to you lost areas of picture that you've never seen before on your OOB unit, and which also delivers heightened resolution, because of the increased pixel density. Geometry for supreme image structural linearities and ultra-tightly stitched convergence, making it so sharp you can sit there and study the grain of the film used to shoot movies. D6500K grayscale, and nicely balanced color and tint, even in the face of red push. Techniques to defeat red push and restore linearity to your color rendition, to re-achieve what the director intended...

Suspension of disbelief is not due to just convergence, just grayscale, or just focusing, or any one or 2 of any of these. It is due to the gestalt created by doing them all at the same time, which brings your images into focus as if you were dialing in binoculars or a telescope or microscope.

Takes a little longer, of course...

Besides, I am not in the business of putting myself out of business. It takes copious amounts of FREE time on my part to attend these websites every day or 2 and do all the technical writing that I do do, here. The ONLY compensation I get for doing so is when I am hired by a bigscreen owner to do a calibration, a repair, or a paid phone consultation. Just helping out DIYers here on this thread pays me absolutely nothing, as I am sure you can ID with.

I am glad to help, as long as enough owners who don't have the time or don't want to man the learning curve hire me. Otherwise I would have to search out and find other work, and could not spend further time here. My expenses continue and are inexorable, no matter what I do or don't do in this field.

I spent quite a bit of time at the XBOX forum recently surrounding how great they consider Hitachis for their games, and was quite helpful in assisting them in getting superlative pix out of their sets. I got quite a rep there, as being "the ISFer" on their board. But in 3 months of participation, not one person there hired me for anything. I can now no longer spend my valuable, irreplaceable time there.

Calibration is not my second job, nor is repair. They are my first job - I am a career calibrator and repair person. For now I am getting a moderate number of repair jobs on these sets mentioned in this thread, and many of them turn into calibrations as well. This keeps it worth it for me to be at this board, on board for questions all the time.

I am hoping that that will continue to continue, long into the forseeable future and maybe even beyond.

Mr Bob

sborsher

10-24-06, 09:44 AM

Mr. Bob,

First let me acknowledge your reply about the calibration write-up. I understand exactly how you feel, but you could sell it and make more money off your knowledge. There wouldn't be too many people who could use it properly anyway, probably including myself. And especially for those not in your area. Think about it, although I'm sure you already have.

And speaking of thinking about something, obviously I wasn't, and so the BIG DUH and another nod to you and your explanation of the wave soldering process.

Of course, the board was hand soldered at some point because of the ground jumper wires AND the screw we talked about. That's where those globs of rosin came from. And the rosin at the connector pins, probably resoldered in the touch up phase after the wave soldering.

So what is the real source of the problem? Probably those joints where the solder falls away on the reheat where the solder never stuck to the pin. And that problem is invisible, unless the solder cracks at some point. Also probably limited to the short pins, like the connectors. The rest of the joints on the board are all suspect too, as the were dull and many were cracking. And those Hershey Kisses joints I mentioned, more likely because the pad was too small or the mask was mis-aligned and/or covered to much copper and the solder just piled up over the mask.

So, still a bad wave solder job (moving too fast or not hot enough) with the solder not adhering to some of the connector pins and other cold solder joints, and not so much a flux problem, unless there was too little flux to flow the solder well. In fact, given that new assessment, the board probably was very clean of flux before the hand soldering phase. Also, the joints where the solder covered the pin without binding to it could be an air pocket where the solder bubbled around the air in the hole of the pin as that air heated up and expanded.

A real mystery as you said before. :confused:

sborsher

10-24-06, 03:25 PM

Everyone,

I talked to Customer Service and Customer Support today and neither department was aware of any widespread PS board problems in the related models (not just X10s). I also called a local warranty shop and although their records showed several fixes of that same problem, they said that they had fixed it a number of different ways, including CRT boards, driver ICs, Deflection boards, and PS boards (those were also cited as fixes in some of the posts on this site and the other one I mentioned), so they did not consider the PS board to be a widespread cause of the problem.

My last avenue of recourse is to send Pioneer a letter, which I will do soon. I'm not expecting much of a response, so resoldering the board is probably the way to go on an out-of-warranty TV.

So, that's it for me, unless something else (different) comes up. Fortunately, (at the risk of jinxing it) the resolder fix on my PS board appears to be holding. I'll post again if/when I get anything conclusive from Pioneer. If anyone wants to contact me you can PM or email.

Thanks for all the help. TGF AVS Forum. :)

manwhore

10-25-06, 04:15 AM

Mr Bob

10-25-06, 08:26 AM

Hey, Mr. Bob

So When Are You Going To Be Around Portland? After Repairing My 610 Ps Board And Reading So Many Good Things About This Set, I Was So Happy I Decided I Needed A Tv For My Bedroom. I Went Out And Looked At Some Sets And Was Pretty Disapointed With What Is Out There Compaired To What Iv'e Had For Almost 5 Years Now. The Plasmas Look Great But Seem To Me Still Pretty Expensive For The Life Expectance, Repair Costs, And The Danger Of Burn In From Videogames. Plus I've Read Alot Of Horror Stories About Them On The Web That Have Made Me Edgey About Them. I Was Looking Around On Craigs List And Lucky Me, I Found A Pro 610 Hd For 500 Bucks. I Couldnt Believe It. Bought That Puppy And Took Her Home, Put Her Next To My Other One To Compare Pictures. Looks Like They Both Could Use Some Cleaning And Tuneing. The Old One Has More Green In The Picture Which Is Obvios During Light Scenes, But When It Is A Green Landscape Scene Its Better Than The Other Set. And Lettering Is Not As Clearly Defined On One. Well If Your Gunna Be Up This Way Maybe We Could Work Somthing Out, I Also Have A Couple Of Friends That May Be Interested For Their Sets As Well.

Thanks Joel

I am ready to set a date right now for 2 weeks in advance, to get you the best plane flight prices, and to go up and do both your sets. That plus a couple other sets for friends of yours equals a ready-made calibration tour, with each participant paying very little, relatively speaking, for my travel costs.

Get it together and I will come. Contact me directly, for flight time and date preferences. I fly out of OAK.

Let me know how you'd like to proceed on having me trick out your set, and be ready to report in here about the before and after differences, after cleaning/deep cleaning and hopefully complete calibration.

You have my phone number, also in my sig below.

BTW, my email has been down for a couple of days, due to having had to change platforms and get better spam filtering, so if anybody sent me an email in the last few days, it was probably either bounced back or vaporized.

It appears to be working now with the new platform, but the new platform will not work with my Outlook email, on my home PC. Not out of the woods yet.

So for now, please cc me at both my regular email address in my sig below, and at this one as well:

bdclick at gmail dot com (spambot aversive, please reconstitute)

Mr Bob

PS - how do you do all those caps on every word??? It would fry my fingers if I tried that...

Mr Bob

10-25-06, 09:16 AM

Ok Bob, I sent you another email from work...hopefully that will reach you. I had copied the PM in the original email that did not reach you and have since deleted the PM......so I guess we'll start over. Let me know if you get it. I'm still waiting on a call back from the Pioneer warranty dept. but just don't have a good feeling that the board will be checked over thoroughly. While "free" certainly does have appeal, I don't want this cropping up again anytime soon.

Kevin's is one of several people who have not been able to get thru to me via my email program, as it has been recently. This has included some very important and time critical real estate emails. I am working on it.

If you are one of them, and Kevin please read this also, please email to the regular email address but also cc me at (bdclick at gmail dot com) for now.

Thanks -

Mr Bob

PRO710HD

10-26-06, 09:10 PM

Mr Bob

10-26-06, 10:24 PM

Well after a week and a half I called Pioneer once again to get status on my case. The gal comes back after a 10 minute wait and tells me that the "case worker" OK'd to pay 1/2 the bill for a resolder job on the Power Supply board. I ask why only 1/2 and referenced this board and the fact that other Pioneer X10 owners receiving full reimbursement for either a replaced P.S. board or repaired (resoldered) board. She says the case worker says that I only mentioned a few of the symptoms for the P.S. board and the problem could be elsewhere. OK, what did I leave out, brightness changes, goes dim, goes bright, back and forth intermittently with occasional "Blue" flashes. Also threw in the occasional "POP" and no power from this board although my unit hasn't gotten to that point yet. What gives Pioneer?

I told them that I didn't pay 7K for a top of the line Pioneer that came fresh out of the factory with defective solder connections on the P.S. board, and that I would only settle for full reimbursement on the repair or replacment of the board.

Am I off base here? They better call me back and authorize full coverage for the replacement or I will never buy another "PIONEER" product as long as I live.

Did I miss something with my diagnosis or is Pioneer just trying to get "cheap" with me?

I have been saying from the beginning NOT to wait till lots of other problems surface. The minute ANY of the problems surface, the unit should be shut down until fixed. Otherwise you're playing Russian roullett with your unit. Bad things happen. Worse things happen when bad things are not attended to.

You are on the right track. They should be thanking you for being so diligent as to try to nip this in the bud, rather than waiting till it gets worse, especially when it's on their dime.

I once was told by a mechanic who was working on my Mazda rotary engine that one of his customers had driven his poor engine into the ground, requiring a complete rebuild on it, when the mechanic would have been glad to pay for a tow truck if the owner had just gotten it to him a lot earlier on.

That's because the mechanic was liable for warranty work on it, and was now going to have to do a complete rebuild, rather than just a repair.

Getting my drift?

I suggest taking off your shoe and pounding it on the desk of whatever VP is in charge of such things, once in his office at Pioneer.

:mad:

Mr Bob

PRO710HD

10-27-06, 02:03 PM

Getting my drift?

I suggest taking off your shoe and pounding it on the desk of whatever VP is in charge of such things, once in his office at Pioneer.

:mad:

Mr Bob

Thanks Bob. I got your drift! And believe me. I would pay a visit to Pioneer headquarters if they weren't so far from me and do just that!

Problem is I don't want to get too pushy because afterall, the unit is out of warranty and like other companies that don't give 2 hoots, they can just deny repair based on that fact! I'm not saying that Pioneer doesn't owe us to take care of these problems, just stating that hardly any of the companies out there do the right thing in cases like this.

I called Pioneer back today and stated that the defect was there since day 1 when I bought the unit, so I'm not OK with sharing the cost to repair the problem since it shouldn't have existed in the first place! Will wait to hear back and crossing my fingers

PRO710HD

11-01-06, 12:45 PM

Update. I'm still waiting for a callback from Pioneer. Over 2 weeks now and all they've offered at this point is to pay for 1/2 the repair bill to resolder the PS board. I told them I wouldn't mind paying 1/2 the bill if it I was 1/2 responsible for the problem but seeing that the boards was improperly soldered from the factory, Pioneer should pay 100% of the repair bill. I told them I wanted to escalate 2 days ago. Still waiting on a callback

Mr Bob

11-01-06, 08:35 PM

djfrestyl

11-03-06, 07:08 PM

PamW

11-03-06, 08:27 PM

djfrestyl,

Welcome to the forum! You will learn so much in so many areas that you'll wonder why you didn't know about this place sooner!

I will defer to Mr. Bob and others to answer your question.

djfrestyl

11-03-06, 08:37 PM

djfrestyl,

Welcome to the forum! You will learn so much in so many areas that you'll wonder why you didn't know about this place sooner!

I will defer to Mr. Bob and others to answer your question.

Thanks!

I'm learning a lot. I've never been a HT guy but there's always a time to start. This forum has a lot of info. I just wish I could change the color scheme :D

PamW

11-03-06, 08:52 PM

Thanks!

I'm learning a lot. I've never been a HT guy but there's always a time to start. This forum has a lot of info. I just wish I could change the color scheme :D
Aha!!! I can help you here :D -

Go to the top left of the page. Click "User CP".
Find "Control Panel", then "Settings and Options".
See "Edit Options", then go to "Miscellaneous Options"
Find "Forum Skin", then click "AVS White".

I actually prefer the default, but they offer the different options so it is pleasing to your eye.

djfrestyl

11-03-06, 08:58 PM

Ahh. So much better.

PamW

11-03-06, 09:02 PM

Ahh. So much better.
Glad I could help.

Mr Bob

11-05-06, 07:16 PM

Just registered after finding this incredible thread. Read all 23 pages!

Anyway, you can add me to the list. My 510 after about an hour of use flashes bright then pops and shuts off. I have to unplug it for about 15 minutes to let it reset then it's ok for a while. Unfortunately I had a service come out before finding this thread, they came out and picked up my set to bring to their shop for an estimate. 2 days later, they've determined that it's my "color board" that is sending out bad signals to the power board, making the set turn off. I told them to ensure that E3, E5, ic202 and ic204 were resoldered. They did so and stated the issue persisted. It was only after they swapped both boards that were they able to stop the problem.

Mr Bob and other aficionados, what are your thoughts on this "color board." Are they leading me on?

I wish there were others in the NY/NJ area that would be willing to fly you out.

Your symptoms are showing the classic signs of a thermal - thermally related problems - which is virtually always a connection problem somewhere, and in this case nearly always in the PS board, with certain critical parts of it needing resoldering. As you've no doubt seen, after reading all 23 pages of this thread here.

I have never seen a "color board" go out on these units. It would be extremenly rare, and WAY off the beaten path for these units. Not saying it can't happen, but...

If you want to know for sure, have them demo to you in their shop that it will not work with your older, original color board in there, while a new PS board is in there. If they replaced the PS board and it works with your original color board in there, chances are it was the cold solder joints on the PS board, as cold solder joints have never been reported on any other board in these units, from what I've seen. In which case the "color board" was not the problem, and should not have needed to be replaced.

If the set works with the older, original color board in there and the PS board either soldered or replaced, DO NOT let them charge you for a new "color board". Have them leave it in there and get that sucker home with you right then and there, before they can try any other shenannigans on it. And on you.

If it truly does not want to work with the old color board in there, then we have seen a new, unexpected wrinkle in this whole business, and I guess you'll have to pay for the new color board and leave it in there.

Mr Bob

transco

11-06-06, 10:56 AM

My 510 after about an hour of use flashes bright then pops and shuts off. I have to unplug it for about 15 minutes to let it reset then it's ok for a while.
I'm 99.9% certain it is only the PS board. Your symptoms are identical to those I had. I resoldered my board and my 610 has worked perfectly ever since. In fact, not only have the bright flashes, etc. stopped, the set is now running better that it ever has. Focus is tighter and convergence is a snap. When my set was originally installed the service tech had a devil of a job setting the set up. Now, I can tweak the convergence in just a couple of minutes, which leads me to believe the PS board was bad right out of the box. As others have said, it really is like getting a new RP TV. My only concern now is the beating the CRT's must have taken while the PS board was bad. I debating if I should buy a new set of tubes and keep them in reserve while they are still available, just in case.

Johnla

11-06-06, 01:17 PM

I debating if I should buy a new set of tubes and keep them in reserve while they are still available, just in case.

You do know a set of all three is about $1200, they are roughly $400 for each one.

Larry Hutchinson

11-06-06, 04:30 PM

You do know a set of all three is about $1200, they are roughly $400 for each one.

Geez. You might look into getting a whole used set for less that than price.

For example, I will soon be trying to get rid of my perfectly working 610 and I doubt I'll get anywhere near $1000 for it.

Johnla

11-06-06, 08:03 PM

I know if my 510 needed them, I certainly would not be willing to spend anywhere near $1200 just in parts alone to fix it. No matter how good you think these sets look when working right, you still reach a point where it just is not worth putting over a certain amount to keep them working.

Phantom Gremlin

11-07-06, 04:37 AM

Whether or not you will eventually need new tubes depends on your usage patterns. We have our 510 on for about 12 hours a day. So in the last five years that's meant about 20,000 hours. From what I've read, that is a lot of wear on the phosphors.

Buying a used set from someone else means buying their used phosphors.

Mr Bob

11-07-06, 11:30 AM

My only concern now is the beating the CRT's must have taken while the PS board was bad. I debating if I should buy a new set of tubes and keep them in reserve while they are still available, just in case.

This is not a valid concern. Tubes will not wear prematurely just because your set may have happened to have a weak PS board for years. They will only wear out because they are continuously over saturated on their light levels.

Unlike other brands, Pioneers default to midpoint on the contrast bargraph at all times. This keeps the wear on your tubes at the ideal level for longevity of your tubes, at all times. There's no reason the other things you saw improve would have caused your tubes to degenerate during the time before they improved, as no matter how unsatisfactory your pic was during that time, its light level was still at midpoint.

As long as you have not let screenburn happen with fixed images, as long as you have not run your contrast at +30 extensively but have kept it at zero instead, as long as you have not allowed black areas at the sides/edges of your picture to remain there extensively because the pic was not fully out to the edges of your screen - which would also cause screenburn - then you have no concerns to be worried about. It is now working better. Pop a cork on something bubbly and stop worrying! Your tubes are totally ready for it - possibly even more so if the pic has been dimmer than you'd have liked all that time. In that case, your tubes are actually YOUNGER than normal. Celebrate!

I have been calibrating Pioneers for over 10 years - WAY over 10 years, in fact - since way before the advent of the HDready, and the only time I have seen prematurely aged tubes on a Pioneer is when the owner had goosed his contrast up to full and left it there for the lifetime of his unit. We call that Torch Mode, and it causes the phosphors to eventually get mulchy and darken. I have seen it on Runcos that were old and/or had WAY too many hours on them at too high a contrast level. I have NEVER seen that happen on a Pioneer HDready.

Torch Mode will not be the case on this forum. We are videophiles here, we know how to take care of our toys.

I can't remember ANY HDready Pioneer, Elite or otherwise, that I have calibrated since the advent of the HDready in our public consciousness that has needed its CRTs replaced. I have been able to bring them ALL to sizzling, bright and dynamic image quality. And I am talking literally TONS of them, over the years.

Larry, take heed. I did your set and I'll bet it's still looking fine, tho you probably need a fresh optics cleaning by now. If you dump it for something else without getting a renew on your calibration, you'll be shooting yourself in the foot. Your set has easily another 5 years of looking absolutely sizzling, properly cared for.

And markedly better than any 720p fixed pixel out there.

Mr Bob

Larry Hutchinson

11-07-06, 03:25 PM

Larry, take heed. I did your set and I'll bet it's still looking fine, tho you probably need a fresh optics cleaning by now. If you dump it for something else without getting a renew on your calibration, you'll be shooting yourself in the foot. Your set has easily another 5 years of looking absolutely sizzling, properly cared for.

And markedly better than any 720p fixed pixel out there.

Mr Bob

Pictures tell the whole story here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=8773486&&#post8773486).

Johnla

11-08-06, 07:19 AM

Pictures tell the whole story here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=8773486&&#post8773486).

LOL,
Yeah that's probably another way to get something that looks a lot nicer than any 720p fixed pixel set also..... ;)

PRO710HD

11-08-06, 01:29 PM

Mr Bob

11-09-06, 07:29 PM

Pictures tell the whole story here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=8773486&&#post8773486).

What's the green horizontal band in your pic? What's that cloudiness on the sides? The before pic was taken very off axis, both to the side and from above - would it not be brighter if it were taken from dead center? Plasmas are more forgiving of off axis viewing, as they don't direct the beams like lenses do. Your pic was not taken from the sweet spot for CRT RPTVs, which is dead center, both horizontally and vertically. (Of course I believe you were not shooting for that - you were shooting more to show off your setting, than your display devices, right?)

How clean were your optics? How long has it been since they had both the regular and the deep cleaning? At your set's age, they need both if they have never been deep cleaned before.

Is your plasma shown there 720p or 1080p? At that viewing distance where the camera has taken the pic from, you won't get much difference between the 2, and 720 would look just as good as 1080.

1080 really excells when you are watching it from a fairly close viewing distance, and makes much less difference in the tightness of the picture when it is a faraway viewing distance. The best distance - showing the finest and biggest picture - for a fully clean and calibrated 610 is about 7'. And 8' for a 710, 6' for a 510. Your still cam was about 10'-12' away when it took that pic, looks like.

The pic on my 65" Panny on my website, on the other hand, was taken at 6'. You can see a more detailed pic of it if you go inside to the Screenshots section, and click on the same image as a thumbnail.

The 1080i pic on mine WILL blow away any same-sized 720p image out there, in terms of tight, high resolution HD picture quality. Give me a call and come on over, if you are ever in the area. I'll show you what true HD is supposed to look like.

That invitation is not just for Larry, it is for anyone reading this thread.

Mr Bob

djfrestyl

11-09-06, 09:12 PM

Mr Bob

11-09-06, 09:48 PM

Spoke with the shop today. They state that they switched only the PS board and the issue persisted. It is only when they swap both boards is when the issue goes away. I am waiting for a call back for the actual part numbers for the PS and color board, because I am very weary of this "issue" with the color board. Also, I found that the price they gave me ($~490) was the charge to have my own boards shipped to Pioneer for repair (not replacement) and then shipped back to me. I think I am going to get the TV back and order the PS board myself and do the core swap.
If the issue persists then I'll get the color board (diagnostics is 80% of the battle, lol)

Mr Bob and others, I'm pretty mechanically inclined, do you think changing the color board is equally as difficult/less/more than the PS board swap?

Also, can someone shoot me the info to order a PS board?
edit: Scratch that. Mr Bob, you repair/refurb PS boards, correct? I'm willing to give you the business. I shall give you a call tomorrow.

If it's still intermittent when you get your set back, it still looks to me like the PS board. Their PS board may have the same quality of soldering that the originals had.

I am glad to do the resoldering job on the PS board for you, but not owning a Pioneer, would have no way of testing it. As such, you'd have to put it back in and try it out again once you get it back from me. If the problem indeed persists, then perhaps you do need the new color board. Or maybe the color board's solder conn's need redoing. Perhaps you'd better send both to me.

As far as the remove/re-installs of these boards, they all have roughly the same difficulty factor. I would be sure to examine the plug-ins on the color board before disco'ing it, tho. We know the PS board really can't be HU'd up wrong, as all the plugs in any certain area have differing numbers of legs, so you can't get them mixed up. Don't know about the color board's plug-ins.

Let me know how you'd like to proceed.

Mr Bob

djfrestyl

11-09-06, 09:54 PM

If it's still intermittent when you get your set back, it still looks to me like the PS board. Their PS board may have the same quality of soldering that the originals had.

I am glad to do the resoldering job on the PS board for you, but not owning a Pioneer, would have no way of testing it. As such, you'd have to put it back in and try it out again once you get it back from me. If the problem indeed persists, then perhaps you do need the new color board. Or maybe the color board's solder conn's need redoing. Perhaps you'd better send both to me.

As far as the remove/re-installs of these boards, they all have roughly the same difficulty factor. I would be sure to examine the plug-ins on the color board before disco'ing it, tho. We know the PS board really can't be HU'd up wrong, as all the plugs in any certain area have differing numbers of legs, so you can't get them mixed up. Don't know about the color board's plug-ins.

Let me know how you'd like to proceed.

Mr Bob

Bob,

I'll call you tomorrow to get this set up. Since you say it's relatively the same difficulty, I'm confident I'll be able to pull the boards myself. I'll make sure to label each harness.

Thanks,
Nilesh

Yura

11-10-06, 02:01 AM

Happy news to owners of Pioneer HD , my is Pro 610 HD.Blue flashes-power-off and t...t...Read here complains and advises. Definitely is Power board problem.Need good resoldering ALL 8 connectors, And all heat sink legs.Important, because some legs integrated in a circuitry of board-GROUND???-my was cracked-and also please look for any bad soldering, fixed them is well-I use 35 Watt for general legs-and 15 watt for small resistors and capacitors.Careful on semiconductors- it really easy to burn them.You must have some experience how to soldered parts.Now my tv work FINE like new.It was on for 7 hr, just for test-heat-stress. And BIG-BIG thanks to all good guys who posted help for me is well.Good luck .TV is good, service from Pioneer is not.

PRO710HD

11-10-06, 12:02 PM

Mr Bob

11-10-06, 12:53 PM

Does anybody know how much a new P.S. board is? I think I'm going to give up on Pioneer Customer Service...3 weeks at this point and still won't do much for me. They haven't even initiated one callback so this will probably be my last Pioneer product.

I'm guessing that I could get a P.S. board and swap out my current board for a nominal fee. Does anyone have a part number or info on where to get the boards?

I would recommend having me resolder your old one before I would recommend buying a new OR rebuilt one from Pioneer, where the same thing might crop up again in a few years due to their illustrious - and now famous - infamous? - soldering techniques.

My resolder jobs on these HDreadys never crop up again.

Mr Bob

tmmuch

11-10-06, 02:56 PM

Does anybody know how much a new P.S. board is? I think I'm going to give up on Pioneer Customer Service...3 weeks at this point and still won't do much for me. They haven't even initiated one callback so this will probably be my last Pioneer product.

I'm guessing that I could get a P.S. board and swap out my current board for a nominal fee. Does anyone have a part number or info on where to get the boards?

FYI...the price was 381.55 plus s/h a year ago...so get out your best reading glasses, a third-hand-magnifier-contraption, a 25W soldering iron, and get to work. Pay yourself $200 an hour. You can do this...

Mr Bob

11-10-06, 03:05 PM

FYI...the price was 381.55 plus s/h a year ago...so get out your best reading glasses, a third-hand-magnifier-contraption, a 25W soldering iron, and get to work. Pay yourself $200 an hour. You can do this...

I charge $250 to do the resoldering if you send the board to me. Costs more if I am hired to go to your place and do everything from scratch - go into your TV and remove the board, put it back in later etc - but for just the resoldering...

You'd have to pay shipping both ways, of course.

Mr Bob

PRO710HD

11-10-06, 05:41 PM

FYI...the price was 381.55 plus s/h a year ago...so get out your best reading glasses, a third-hand-magnifier-contraption, a 25W soldering iron, and get to work. Pay yourself $200 an hour. You can do this...

Well I finally got tired and yanked the panel and fired up the soldering iron. I hit all the white connectors including E3 and E5 as well as all the ICs (202 and 204). Hit a few other spots here and there that looked really cold (dull).

Slapped it in and buttoned it up. So far so good. I'm leaving the set on for a good 8 hours and see what happens next. Fingers crossed

Props to all who contributed to this board and of course Mr. Bob!!!

Mr Bob

11-11-06, 01:54 PM

Well I finally got tired and yanked the panel and fired up the soldering iron. I hit all the white connectors including E3 and E5 as well as all the ICs (202 and 204). Hit a few other spots here and there that looked really cold (dull).

Slapped it in and buttoned it up. So far so good. I'm leaving the set on for a good 8 hours and see what happens next. Fingers crossed

Props to all who contributed to this board and of course Mr. Bob!!!

One advantage to only doing the worst offenders is not having to worry about the smaller conn's, where it's easy to do a solder bridge you didn't catch at the time. The downside of not doing all of the possibly affected conn's is that a few years down the line one of them may go bad, like these ones you did were now.

But I am glad you're up and running again. Chances are your set will be fine now. Keep us in the know...

;)

Mr Bob

rkumar

11-11-06, 02:46 PM

OK. Need some help from those of you that had the P.S. soldering problem and had their units authorized and repaired by Pioneer.

Q) Did Pioneer pick up the total cost of resoldering or replacing the Power Supply board?

After 3 weeks or arguing with the Warranty/Claims department, they will only offer 50% of the repair bill to resolder the board. How the heck do they arrive at 50% when the problem was defectively manufactured from Day 1 (brand new)?

At the end of september I called Pioneer to have them replace my PS board since my TV would not even turn on at that point. They called a week later and authorized a local service repair on my PS board (no mention of cost on my part... I assumed they were picking up the tab on the repair). They came around 4 weeks after I had initially called Pioneer and resoldered my board. That evening, Pioneer called my house and demanded payment for the repair done earlier that day. I told them that they did not mention that I had to pay any part of the service. We argued on the phone for a while, but then they gave up. Anyways, 2 weeks later my TV shut off completely, so I called the local repair shop and they setup another appointment to fix my PS board (their labor came with a 30 day warranty). Now, they are scheduled to come next week to replace the entire PS board on my TV, so hopefully it works. Another idea I had was to cut out a hole on the back panel and install two 120mm computer fans to pull out the heat from the TV. This way there will not be as much stress on the soldered joints when my new board comes in.

To PRO710HD: If you have tried talking to them for 3 weeks and they will only offer you 50%, just take their offer. It is much better having a professional do the work (warranty) than to do it yourself (unless you have done a lot of soldering work and feel confident enough).

Mr Bob

11-11-06, 02:48 PM

Another idea I had was to cut out a hole on the back panel and install two 120mm computer fans to pull out the heat from the TV. This way there will not be as much stress on the soldered joints when my new board comes in.

That's an excellent idea! Think of computer server rooms, whose electronics never get turned off unless they are being serviced, and whose room temp is very critically controlled at all times, and never varies.

Think of what cold solder joints could do in that scenario! They obviously have.

Mr Bob

rkumar

11-11-06, 02:52 PM

That's an excellent idea! Think of computer server rooms, whose electronics never get turned off unless they are being serviced, and whose room temp is very critically controlled at all times, and never varies.

Think of what cold solder joints could do in that scenario! They obviously have.

Mr Bob

I actually got that idea when my TV shut off completely. I touched the power board after it shut off and it was burning hot. I shifted around some wires and put a large fan blowing air on the PS board. The set turned on again to work flawlessly for 3 hours after.

Mr Bob

11-11-06, 04:07 PM

I actually got that idea when my TV shut off completely. I touched the power board after it shut off and it was burning hot. I shifted around some wires and put a large fan blowing air on the PS board. The set turned on again to work flawlessly for 3 hours after.

That's the definition of a thermal, all right. Which is what is always at the root of bad conn's and cold solder joints.

Mr Bob

rkumar

11-11-06, 07:32 PM

That's the definition of a thermal, all right. Which is what is always at the root of bad conn's and cold solder joints.

Mr Bob

I only have one question about my setup. Will having these fans increase the dust (I will make sure they blow air out of the TV) or will they interfere with the working of the TV? I can also post pictures of my setup when I have completed the installation of the fans.

DrexHollywood

11-11-06, 10:18 PM

Mr Bob

11-12-06, 11:53 AM

I only have one question about my setup. Will having these fans increase the dust (I will make sure they blow air out of the TV) or will they interfere with the working of the TV? I can also post pictures of my setup when I have completed the installation of the fans.

Dust is not a factor in the electronics, other than that if it coats the heat sinks, their effectiveness is obviously compromised to that extent. Dust is being drawn in there all the time anyway because of the HV, even without a fan.

Dust would be no more a problem on a big screen than on a computer, and I would NEVER run my computer without its fan going.

You might want to mount them at the top of the internal cavity and point them outward, so they ventilate rather than apply chill factor. That would keep the dust content to a minimum. Runco filters all the INCOMING air to its very pricy triple panel DLPs, and it is always being forced OUT of the unit, in its ventilation path.

Sounds like you're on the right track.

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

11-12-06, 12:02 PM

I just want to say that I've followed this thread over the last year as our Pioneer Elite 710 HD slowly became worse (from blue flashes to finally a dead black screen). Since I have a EE degree, I finally got the soldering iron out and went to work on the power supply board just as suggested by so many of you. After I put the board back in and fired up the TV - bingo! It worked like new! I've been using it for 2 weeks and so far no problems. All I can say is a big THANK YOU to all of you (esp Mr Bob) for your great analysis and suggestions.

Best Regards

I hope we are saving literally TONS of CRT HDreadys out there, all over the country, and that all of you will have me over to clean and calibrate them once they have been saved. That way you can start your HDTV's life all over again, with a picture that's actually BETTER than when you bought it new, years ago.

That's what I promise when you turn me loose on your sets. And I deliver. It takes all day and it costs you a little money, but for a $5000 plus set, it should be looked at as simply scheduled periodic maintenance, like for your car.

And some of you are a little late on your schedule, in taking care of your toys...

Thanks for the nod, DrexHollywood!

:cool:

Mr Bob

albertso

11-12-06, 09:19 PM

Thanks to all of you. Took your findings and advice and
have a 100% non-blue-flash 510. Been on for most of
yesterday and today without a single symptom. Apprecaite
you all.

Keep up the good work,

Fred

billythekid

11-13-06, 03:29 PM

Add me to the list of Pioneer owners with the blue flash problem. Mine is a 610, May 2000 vintage. Just found this thread. I will be calling Pioneer customer service and will post the results

Mr Bob

11-14-06, 01:52 AM

ALL owners of the 510/610/710 series need to have that PS board resoldered. If it doesn't go out now, it will soon. This thread is testament to that.

Don't wait until it possibly turns into something more serious. DO IT NOW!

Mr Bob

nykolos

11-14-06, 06:44 AM

I'm a newbie here and this is my first post. I had the same problem with my 510, the brightness would shift, flickering on and off, this eventually turned into the power shutting down, which went from turning off once a week to once every 5 minutes, when it got to this point, I unplugged the TV and researched the internet, that's where I came across this forum, isn't the internet is great!!!? I read this entire thread and came to the conclusion that my problem was the Power supply board, I was so confident that I didn't even bother to trace the problem to a location on the board, my next step was to have the entire board resoldered, but I didn't want to do it myself, I'm a cabinet maker by trade and only know a little about electrical and electronics, I asked my neighbor if he knew anyone, and he tells me his story about his Mitsubishi rear projection, that he had a repair guy come out for a convergence issue, the repair guy pulled a couple boards and resoldered the suspicious joints, reinstalled the boards and everything worked great, then he told me the bill was over $350, after I heard that, I decided to resolder it myself, if it didn't work, I would just bite the bullet and buy a new ASW1795 board from Pioneer for $400. The repair; once my nagging Wife was out of the house, and I was alone with the kids, (they don't bug) I removed the back panel and pulled the power board, without using magnification, ALL the solder joints looked to be in perfect condition, I laid out the board on my drafting table, using a halogen light, I brought out my slim soldering iron and some old electrical solder I had for years but never used, plugged it in and began going over the large sized terminals first, flowing new solder over them, then I resoldered as best I could the smaller terminals with white connectors, the entire soldering process took about 30 minutes, I reinstalled the board and it's been flicker free now for a full week, and the power has not turned off yet. I'm almost certain I got this fixed for good, I really want to thank Dave610 for sharing his detailed instructions for resoldering the power supply board, if it wasn't for these instructions, I don't think I would of felt confident enough to repair this myself, he saved me and many others a lot of money, and I greatly appreciate it!, I also want to thank everyone who contributed to this thread!.. Will keep you posted if anything changes.

PamW

11-14-06, 08:03 AM

Johnla

11-14-06, 09:38 AM

I am having my new PS board installed on Friday. Is there any reason I should try to hold onto the old board?

If you want to keep the old board, then you will also have to pay $100 to keep it. Because there is a $100 core charge on replacement boards if you keep the old board.

Mr Bob

11-14-06, 12:19 PM

I am having my new PS board installed on Friday. Is there any reason I should try to hold onto the old board? Maybe practice my resoldering techniques for the future? Should I have the tech check the new board for any problems with the solder? Would they even be noticed at this stage?

Put both boards side by side upside down and examine the solder conns on each. Is the new one fresh and gleaming with bright shiny solder? I know the old one will be dull and flat-finish looking, with very thin solder.

Is the new board soldered with nicely thick solder, or is it rather thin? Again, does its conn's gleam, or is their finish dull, like on the old one?

Let us know what you find out before you ditch the old board. Lots of people will be buying this new board. I am sure they would want to know, just as much as I do, how good THOSE solder joints are!

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

11-14-06, 12:25 PM

I'm a newbie here and this is my first post. I had the same problem with my 510...

The repair;...

...I also want to thank everyone who contributed to this thread!.. Will keep you posted if anything changes.

Welcome. Great job!

Now have your optics professionally cleaned, given both the regular and the deeper optics cleaning, and your set will look like new again. No more bleariness, like in the murky underwater scenes in Finding Nemo, which is what it looks like on all your present images, esp. the dark ones.

Mr Bob

PamW

11-14-06, 12:37 PM

Put both boards side by side upside down and examine the solder conns on each. Is the new one fresh and gleaming with bright shiny solder? I know the old one will be dull and flat-finish looking, with very thin solder.

Is the new board soldered with nicely thick solder, or is it rather thin? Again, does its conn's gleam, or is their finish dull, like on the old one?

Let us know what you find out before you ditch the old board. Lots of people will be buying this new board. I am sure they would want to know, just as much as I do, how good THOSE solder joints are!

Mr Bob
Will do - I'll post pictures as well.

If you want to keep the old board, then you will also have to pay $100 to keep it. Because there is a $100 core charge on replacement boards if you keep the old board.

Since this new board is covered under my warranty, AND I know the tech coming out, I'll see what I can do to keep the old girl. ;)

Mr Bob

11-14-06, 02:13 PM

Since this new board is covered under my warranty, AND I know the tech coming out, I'll see what I can do to keep the old girl. ;)

Warranty rates are usually pretty skimpy, and I would be surprised if they allow you to keep a board they have to pay a $100 core charge on to Pioneer. We'll see how well you know that tech...

:p

Mr Bob

Iguana Grande

11-16-06, 04:56 PM

Mr. Bob - no apparent issues with my 610 yet, but I am interested in learning how best to find someone in the Detroit, Michigan area trained to professionally clean the unit's optics??? Thanks.

Mr Bob

11-17-06, 11:10 AM

Mr. Bob - no apparent issues with my 610 yet, but I am interested in learning how best to find someone in the Detroit, Michigan area trained to professionally clean the unit's optics??? Thanks.

With the exception of one person, I don't know ANYONE who knows optics cleaning except me. There may be people out there, but I don't know who they are, except for a guy who used to work on Mits's exclusively, but retired a year or 2 ago. He had telescopes that he maintains, and so was familiar with optics cleaning from that venue.

I am familiar with it from the perspective of necessity is the mother of invention. Will never forget the difference I saw the first time I did the deeper optics cleaning on an older Sony 53", after the regular optics cleaning - which had been done several times in the unit's life already - only made a marginal difference and there was still tons of bleariness in the picture. Made a totally bleared-out picture come to life and look like new afterwards! The 10 plus year old picture was absolutely crystal clear after that. The owner thought he had been given a brand new set, he was absolutely ****-faced with delight.

My methods assure no damage to the very fragile plastic lens surfaces, nor to front surface HD grade mirrors, nor fogging up of internal optics within lens packs.

I am always available for paid phone consultation on calibration matters/issues. I charge half an hour worth of $85/hr talk time for detailed info on the optics stuff, resulting in a very nominal charge on your part. Keeps me able to pay off bills on my end, or gets me dinner and a movie.

Scratch that. Not in the SF Bay Area it doesn't...

Gets me a movie for 2 and the snacks, plus a dessert for 2 later...

That's all it costs you to get it directly from me. Contact me, anybody who's interested. I make sure no stone is left unturned, and that you don't make any well-meaning and unintentional - but possibly permanent - mistakes.

Mr Bob

PamW

11-17-06, 02:58 PM

Warranty rates are usually pretty skimpy, and I would be surprised if they allow you to keep a board they have to pay a $100 core charge on to Pioneer. We'll see how well you know that tech...

:p

Mr Bob
Yep, you were right... I could not keep the old board. :( I took pictures of both boards but my resolution is not good enough to post them - needless to say we went over the "new " (refurbed) board with a fine toothed comb and noticed all of the hand soldered places. My tech also brought his soldering iron and still touched up a spot before putting it back into the TV. It should all be good now :D

Mr Bob

11-17-06, 03:08 PM

Yep, you were right... I could not keep the old board. :( I took pictures of both boards but my resolution is not good enough to post them - needless to say we went over the "new " (refurbed) board with a fine toothed comb and noticed all of the hand soldered places. My tech also brought his soldering iron and still touched up a spot before putting it back into the TV. It should all be good now :D

Were all the solder joints on the new board gleaming, shiny and glossy? Or were they dull and thin, as in the boards with 5-7 years of age on them?

Mr Bob

PamW

11-17-06, 03:14 PM

Were all the solder joints on the new board gleaming, shiny and glossy? Or were they dull and thin, as in the boards with 5-7 years of age on them?

Mr Bob
They were beautifully glossy and NOT thin anywhere - as a matter of fact they looked a whole lot better than the old board. It helped to see the boards side by side as well.

Mr Bob

11-17-06, 03:18 PM

They were beautifully glossy and NOT thin anywhere - as a matter of fact they looked a whole lot better than the old board. It helped to see the boards side by side as well.

Cool. Maybe we can trust these new boards from Pio after all.

Mr Bob

PamW

11-17-06, 03:44 PM

Cool. Maybe we can trust these new boards from Pio after all.

Mr Bob
As a matter of fact, my tech was pleasantly surprised to see how well the new board was soldered. He had already heated his up in anticipation of a poor soldering job by Pioneer.

pet_sounds

11-18-06, 04:20 PM

I haven't been able to read the entirety of this gargantuan thread, but I wanted to know if a class-action suit against Pioneer has ever been instituted. It seems from this thread that a significant amount of the x10 series of Elite RPTVs have succumbed to this design flaw. My 510 won't even turn on anymore, and I am mad as hell that I gave Pioneer $5000, believing that they truly had the superior product. Now I can see that the quality was only superficial, and waiting in its innards was a ticking timebomb. Funny, I had one of their Elite DVD players completely fail on me too. I should've figured it out then.

I do know this -- because of this design flaw and Pioneer's inability to admit and own up to it, I will never in my life buy another Pioneer product. The level of arrogance they show to their customers makes them undeserving of anyone's hard-earned money. They may have gotten a few thousand dollars from me, but over my (hopefully long) lifetime they will have lost many times that amount from me to their competitors.

I was going to try to get the board resoldered, but you know what? I'm sick of it. I just want out. Tired of my wife complaining about how big it is, tired of having no television for over two weeks now (the TV tech conveniently decided to call in sick). It was a great set while it lasted, but my anger at Pioneer has permeated the set itself, and I'll just have to pony up and buy a plasma set, of admittedly lower picture quality (I never realized how great the line doubler in these sets are until I really started looking at SD feeds on plasmas and seeing blocky artifacts all over the place).

Good luck to those who choose to remain with this set and with Pioneer in general.

PamW

11-18-06, 05:23 PM

Mr Bob

11-18-06, 08:53 PM

pet_sounds,

Welcome to the forum!

I know you are upset - we all are - but if you can get yours soldered for a measly amount of $$, you'll be much more pleased than with an inferior picture from another TV. Plus, you'll save a whole lot of money in the process by not having to repurchase.

Right. I could deliver a set to you that looks BETTER than when it was first new. I feel your pain, but don't let them win another round by making you pay thru the nose to get a 1080p plasma, 1080p being the only format that can compete with your set's pic when set up correctly. The best one out there, the 65" Panny, is currently MSRPing at $10,000.

(So is the Pioneer FHD1, but I'm sure you wouldn't be buying anything from Pioneer anyway...)

Having a fairly direct and predictable repair job done on your set and then restoring it to better than new performance with a cleaning and calibration is NOT co-operating with the enemy, even tho I know it feels that way.

It is taking a below the belt hit directly in the shorts, finding it's not really all that expensive to live with, and doing what is really a relatively minor repair on the damn thing. Most repairs on big screens are serious business, and can get very expensive. This does not fit that scenario. Pioneer, despite the truth in all you said above, did not make these sets with serious flaws, like some brands I could name. (No names, but I will not work on a Toshiba in the field if it has anything other than convergence wrong with it, and the only Proscans I have ever serviced were seriously technician UNfriendly... won't work on them either...)

Aside from this resoldering needing done on the PS board, very few things go wrong with Pioneers in the field. I have been repairing electronics for well over 20 years, and I know whereof I speak. I am rarely called upon to repair them, out there.

Yeah it is a serious oversight on Pioneer's part, and along with you and Pam I hope that lots of people boycott future purchases of Pioneer products because of this. But while your set still has only THIS problem, you'd be LOADS of money ahead - and I mean serious money here - to just get the board resoldered, restore it if desired with the same kind of periodic maintenance all CRT RPTV big screens need every once in awhile, like Lamborgini's do - cleaning and calibration - and get on with your life.

:cool:

Mr Bob

PRO710HD

11-19-06, 10:46 AM

Mr. Bob;

Can you help me out with the optics cleaninh. I'm guessing that my PRO710 needs the deep optics cleaned so can you tell how to disassemble the lens pack to allow this?

Mr Bob

11-19-06, 01:48 PM

Mr. Bob;

Can you help me out with the optics cleaninh. I'm guessing that my PRO710 needs the deep optics cleaned so can you tell how to disassemble the lens pack to allow this?

Each lens is held on with 4 screws. They must be the correct screws or the coolant will be released and will drop down onto your electronics below. NOT a good idea.

Many Mits's are presently being ruined by this, and there are no new boards to replace with, once a 4 layer board has been infected with partially conductive ethelyn glycol and ruined. Mit coolant leakage just on gp has been happening here in the Bay area with alarming frequency these days. It all started with the HDready lines, and has affected all HD and non-HDready models since then - a high incidence of coolant leakage from their guns.

Once in, you need to use extreme care to not damage anything in there. My methods have been keeping internal and external optics preserved intact for many many years.

Please contact me directly for details on this and all other facets of calibration. I put up a post about this here, a day or 2 ago, post #717.

Mr Bob

PRO710HD

11-19-06, 10:25 PM

Just curious:

Has anyone on this board been able to clean their "deep optics" themselves?

I'm pretty handy but wondering if I should just leave the cleaning to the surface lens and mirror?

briguy_78

11-22-06, 10:05 PM

Mr Bob

11-23-06, 03:31 PM

Hi Everyone,
I'm new to the forum and have Pro 710 and can happily say I have not had any problems with my set. I've had it calibrated a few years ago and just recently had it cleaned.

Trying to make my way through the massive amounts of info. on this forum, but wanted to get your views on dvd players. I'm currently using a Pioneer Elite DVC36 (5 disc player). With all the hoopla re. HD dvd, I'm left scratching my head as my TV can only accept component inputs and it appears that you need HDMI in order to get the full benefits of the upconversion. What dvd players are folks using and what do you recommend getting to replace my current dvd player (hd or non hd)?

Thx,

Brian

For a CRT RPTV, having a digital interface like DVI or HDMI will not improve your picture. May make digital fixed pixel sets look their best, but for CRT, component or RGB deliver the absolute best pic you'll ever get or need to get on your CRT set, regardless of format. And avoid needless transcoding of analog to digital.

I use a Sammy 841 DVDP in my system for my year 2000 component-only Panny and have one brand new factory boxed one left, that can be hacked to OP 1080i/720p - or anything else - on component. The hack results in a message that says "HDCP FREE!" The one I have on the shelf is available if anybody out there wants it. The other one stays in my system!

I have also heard the Oppo's may be able to do this, but have no personal experience to verify that.

If you can find an older Momitsu 880 or LiteOn LVD 2001 or (Bravo D1, maybe?), they both OP'd 720p/1080i on component native. No hacks necessary.

Mr Bob

tmmuch

11-24-06, 11:03 AM

For a CRT RPTV, having a digital interface like DVI or HDMI will not improve your picture. May make digital fixed pixel sets look their best, but for CRT, component or RGB deliver the absolute best pic you'll ever get or need to get on your CRT set, regardless of format. And avoid needless transcoding of analog to digital.

I use a Sammy 841 DVDP in my system for my year 2000 component-only Panny and have one brand new factory boxed one left, that can be hacked to OP 1080i/720p - or anything else - on component. The hack results in a message that says "HDCP FREE!" The one I have on the shelf is available if anybody out there wants it. The other one stays in my system!

I have also heard the Oppo's may be able to do this, but have no personal experience to verify that.

If you can find an older Momitsu 880 or LiteOn LVD 2001 or (Bravo D1, maybe?), they both OP'd 720p/1080i on component native. No hacks necessary.

Mr Bob

Very interesting, Mr. Bob. Finding a DVDP with 1080i or 720p native output would definitely add value...and a few more years of service...to the ol' RPTVs, IMHO.

But I've never actually viewed a standard DVD on one of these players. Are they that much better?

Mr Bob

11-24-06, 12:58 PM

Very interesting, Mr. Bob. Finding a DVDP with 1080i or 720p native output would definitely add value...and a few more years of service...to the ol' RPTVs, IMHO.

But I've never actually viewed a standard DVD on one of these players. Are they that much better?

Actually it depends on how far back you sit.

The primary concern in getting 1080i OP on non-HD sources was to not have the scanlines so darned visible/obvious on the bigger displays. This has always been the bane of bigger displays, and has been one of the primary purposes of Faroudja products since day one, with their line doublers, triplers and quadruplers for use on ceiling pjs with 8' and up screens.

On either version of 480 - i or p - scanlines are extremely distracting to me, as I sit 8' back from a fully focused/converged 65" display. This makes the "window slat" effect of 480 - i or p - very evident, bordering on totally obvious at all times.

My criteria for dialing in a display is for everything to be crisp and clean in there. That unfortunately, by its very nature, has to of absolute necessity include scanlines. The only way to get rid of scanlines any other way involves some level of blurring of the picture, which I simply won't allow in my calibrations, which deliver the absolute crispness available in today's technology. With my cals, you get to see EXACTLY what's on your display, whatever that may be.

Including scanlines.

In fact visible scanlines are incredibly valuable in focusing displays. That's why I use 480 scanlines and not 1080 scanlines on the grids I use to focus displays, since 480 scanlines are so much easier to see on any display than 1080 scanlines are.

At 8' back from my 65" CRT display I can still see the scanlines of 1080i on my display on scenes with bright white content and lettering. I can live with that. It's worth it to be able to be swept away into suspension of disbelief anyway by the rest of the parts of the images, which take up 99% of the rest of my attention.

I just don't want to be staring 480 lines in the face the entire time I'm viewing. The window slat effect is just too distracting.

If you sit way far back from your display, none of this will matter. But if you sit as close as you possibly/comfortably can to your display - like I do - it does matter.

Mr Bob

billythekid

11-24-06, 01:20 PM

Bad news for me. Pioneer contacted my friendly local TV repair company and agreed to supply them a new PS board or pay them to resolder mine as the tech sees fit. The problem is they want $200. to $260. to come to my house and check the problem. They insist that I agree to purchase any parts the tech feels my set needs other than the PS board. I advised Pioneer of this and they will not supply the part to any other than a Pioneer approved repair service. I can not believe they are not stepping up on this problem. They did say I could purchase the board and request a refund after it is installed. They did not say they would give the refund for sure......

PRO710HD

11-24-06, 05:17 PM

Sounds like what I went through Billy;

almost 4 weeks of chasing them all they offered was to resolder the board but wanted me to pay 200 bucks.

I said "screw 'em" and soldered the board myself.

Happy 710 owner again! Now to muster enough courage to do my optics cleaning..

Mr Bob

11-25-06, 07:16 AM

Happy 710 owner again! Now to muster enough courage to do my optics cleaning..

I am there for private phone consultation with you, if you get in there and don't quite "feel lucky"...

To see how much dirt is caked on your lenses after all these years, be sure to shine your flashlight at the lenses from the side, while you are viewing the set from the front, if nothing is on.

If viewing material is on, make it bright light level material and observe the caked on dust straight from the front, with your eyes down where the lenses would be at eye level, not from standing up.

Then lick your finger and draw a happy face in your green lens, to see how black the surface SHOULD be, and is when completely clean. But be sure your finger is wet before you do so, and AS you do so. You don't want to scratch the surface of your lens!

Mr Bob

joec1210

11-25-06, 03:26 PM

Mr Bob

11-25-06, 04:41 PM

Hi Everyone,

I have a Pioneer Elite Pro-510HD Projection TV. I just had a TV repair man at my house to confirm what I already knew, but he charged me $100. My TV turns on and then just shuts off intermittently. I then unplug it and plug it back in and I can get it to turn on. It shuts off approximately 2 - 3 times in a 4 - 6 viewing period. The repair man told me I need to replace my power board which I could see was located in the very bottom right corner of the TV from the back as he had the back panel off. He told me it would be an additional $750 plus tax for the part and labor with a 90 day warranty.

Should I be shopping around for a better price, or is this a good price considering what is wrong? Can I directly order this piece from Pioneer? I read a few times people say this repair should cost as little as $200 - $400 tops. I tried to find the part I need at Pioneer but I find 2 parts that I believe are what I need and I don't know which is for my TV

AWV1795 POWER SUPPLY ASSY (FOR OLD MOD) $299.16
or

AWV1872 POWER SUPPLY ASSY (FOR NEW MOD) $294.06

I believe one of these is the correct parts for my TV and they cost about $300.00 each (although I don't know what a "CORE" charge is that Pioneer says is an additional $100). Should I only be paying $100 in labor cost to have this piece installed and the old one removed? I just don't know what a fair price is? $300 for the part and $100 for labor???

I would sincerely appreciate your insight. Thank you for your time and consideration, and happy holidays.

Regards,
Joe Cosentino

Joe -

First of all, you should delete your redundant post here on the thread. The Edit option allows for this. It would keep things tidy, here, for those who are just joining us.

If you are handy, you can save a ton of money here. What this guy is charging is OK for those who are not in the know and need someone professional on the case to do everything for them. You are not in that category. Obviously. You are here on this thread.

:cool:

Buy the board from Pio and install it yourself, you'll save several hundred bucks. The plug-ins all have different numbers of legs, and as long as you keep the bundling as it is and don't change it, the wiring should fit in there just fine - plugged in on the new board, without a hitch.

The core charge is just to make sure they get the original board back, so they can resolder it and sell it to us again, "rebuilt". You get the $100 back as soon as they receive the old board back.

Mr Bob

joec1210

11-25-06, 06:05 PM

Mr Bob

11-25-06, 07:31 PM

Mr. Bob,

Thank you very much for the help. I apologize for the duplicate message as I believe that I did delete one as you instructed.

I have never worked on a TV before. I understand slight car mechanics and can assemble anything with instructions. Do you believe that I can sucessfully install this power board? I have never soldered anything before and I am not sure if this is required for installing a new power board. Also, I am not sure if I can remove the existing power board without damaging the wires or connections? I would appreciate your thoughts here. I am up for the task, especially to save several hundred dollars, but I don't want to further damage the TV. I did appreciate your vote of confidence in the first message, but I just want to clarify my capabilities and what is needed to replace this power board. Please let me know what you think. Thank you again.

Regards,

Joe Cosentino

Good job on the deletion of the redundant post. Looks like it was never here...

I have had to do that on occasion, because the time lag for getting a post I had submitted dragged on and on and on, and finally I bailed out into doing the send again, resulting in a double post. Fortunately they make it easy to clean that up, here on these boards.

Everything - EVERYTHING - is plug-in on this PS board, so you don't have to worry about soldering anything, in order to get it in and out.

Since you have never done any soldering before, probably best you not start out on this board as your first project. But others are saving ALL $ outlay by resoldering it themselves. That would save you more than just a couple of hundred!

But in your case it's probably best you get the new board, or send yours to me and I'll resolder it for you. I charge $250 for that service, once it is in my hands. Since there's S&H to factor in both ways, paid on your end, and you are inexperienced at TV repairs, you may as well get the new and fully tested one from Pioneer and put it in. I have no way to test the boards I resolder, unless I am already at an owner's home on location, doing his. And using his TV for testing my resolder job.

When you pull the plugs out of the old board, at each plug's location be sure and hold the board down near the plug's jack, so you don't bend the board. You don't have to release the board's metal carriage and remove it - you've got to take the board off the carriage anyway and put the new board in its place, so just undo all the screws holding the board in place and leave the carriage where it is, mounted to the TV. You may have to search for all the screws that need to come out on that board, they are all over the place. Most have a little white "carrot" pointing to the screw in question, if it has to come out.

Other than that, there's nothing more complicated about this than you'd find in a simple car maintenance issue, or putting a bike together for your kid, if you have one.

Good luck!

Mr Bob

rkumar

11-26-06, 12:57 PM

For a CRT RPTV, having a digital interface like DVI or HDMI will not improve your picture. May make digital fixed pixel sets look their best, but for CRT, component or RGB deliver the absolute best pic you'll ever get or need to get on your CRT set, regardless of format. And avoid needless transcoding of analog to digital.

I use a Sammy 841 DVDP in my system for my year 2000 component-only Panny and have one brand new factory boxed one left, that can be hacked to OP 1080i/720p - or anything else - on component. The hack results in a message that says "HDCP FREE!" The one I have on the shelf is available if anybody out there wants it. The other one stays in my system!

I have also heard the Oppo's may be able to do this, but have no personal experience to verify that.

If you can find an older Momitsu 880 or LiteOn LVD 2001 or (Bravo D1, maybe?), they both OP'd 720p/1080i on component native. No hacks necessary.

Mr Bob

I have the same problem as the OP was explaining. Is anyone aware of a conversion method that accepts HDCP to convert from HDMI/DVI to component? Or, is there an add-on to the pioneer hdtv that will make a HDMI/DVI slot available? It is a shame to see that everything is moving to digital with copy protection. There must be some way to overcome this issue so that this perfectly fine TV doesn't become obsolete in a few years.

PamW

11-26-06, 04:17 PM

I have the same problem as the OP was explaining. Is anyone aware of a conversion method that accepts HDCP to convert from HDMI/DVI to component? Or, is there an add-on to the pioneer hdtv that will make a HDMI/DVI slot available? It is a shame to see that everything is moving to digital with copy protection. There must be some way to overcome this issue so that this perfectly fine TV doesn't become obsolete in a few years.
We just purchased a Playstation 3 and to hook it up we had to purchase (sigh) the Monster HDMI to component with optical audio. It works for us like a charm! I just hate the fact that I was unable to find a cheaper similar quality product for our needs.
http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Monster-Component-Digital-A-V-Kit-for-PlayStation-3/sem/rpsm/oid/166290/catOid/-16762/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

Mr Bob

11-27-06, 12:56 AM

We just purchased a Playstation 3 and to hook it up we had to purchase (sigh) the Monster HDMI to component with optical audio. It works for us like a charm! I just hate the fact that I was unable to find a cheaper similar quality product for our needs.
http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Monster-Component-Digital-A-V-Kit-for-PlayStation-3/sem/rpsm/oid/166290/catOid/-16762/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

Not an unreasonable price, tho, for something that does what it does. I am surprised to see it at all! And glad...

It DOES work on things other than Playstation, tho, to convert HDMI to component, right?

Mr Bob

PamW

11-27-06, 08:10 AM

Not an unreasonable price, tho, for something that does what it does. I am surprised to see it at all! And glad...

It DOES work on things other than Playstation, tho, to convert HDMI to component, right?

Mr Bob
I don't know if it works on other things.

We watched Ice Age The Meltdown the other night on Blu-Ray and the picture was incredible! I could count Manny's hairs -er - furs(?). The detail was terrific - Comparable to my OTA HD...maybe better!

Eholm

11-27-06, 01:31 PM

Hi All,

I am another PRO610HD owner that has suffered through the cold solder issues on the power supply board. The problem started about 18 months ago. The screen would start flickering blue, flash and then be normal for several minutes to many weeks. The problem got progressively worse over the next 14 months, occasionaly the pop would be followed by a shutdown that required me to turn the power switch off, wait a few minutes and then turn the set back on.

Then about 4 months ago the set popped loudly and shut down. When I turned the set back on the picture was a series of blue/green/red, washed out, bowed lines. The picture filled about 60 to 80% of the screen. I turned off the Set and waited an additional 20 minutes. The set turned on again and looked normal.

Two months ago, after having read this site, I resolved to reflow the solder joints on the power supply assembly. I focused my attention to the joints for the various wiring harnesses E5, E4, E3 etc. I also addresses virtually every other joint that appeared suspect. I reinstalled the board and the set turned on. The picture even seemed to be better than before. Not so washed out.

All was well for a few weeks, until the set began to pop and go into shutdown again. No Blue Flash, no real warning. Again, I would go through the power off wait power on procedure. Sometimes I would get the blue/green/red, washed out, bowed lines. But, the shutdown would only happen when the set was initially turned on. After it warmed up, it would be fine.

Finally, last week, the set popped and shut down, permanately. I took the back panel off and noticed a blown 5amp fuse on the power supply board and two red led's. One on the power supply, the other on the convergance assembly, the 2 layer board on the left side.

Well, again after reading this board, I surmised that my STK IC's had gone. I had some overnighted to me and replaced them on wednesday. The set turned on and looked great. Clearly the convergence needed tweaking, but Turkey Day footbal took precedence.
On friday I reconverged the set and thought I had fixed everything.

Well sunday afternoon, the set popped after about 6 hours of viewing. It turned right back on and was fine, but I am sure this will continue to happen.

I have noticed one thing about the set that I have not heard described here: The On Screen Display - Menu, Input Mode, Screen Mode - all have very slight Jitters. For example, when I change the input mode of the set from tv, to input 1 the OSD is not completely stable. It jumps up and down very slightly. Furthermore, when the set is cold, the screen seems to have the jitters as well.

I am beggining to suspect that something is up with my deflection assembly, but is it possible that the power supply is still the issue? Any and all recommendations are welcome.

Thanks!

Mr Bob

11-27-06, 01:40 PM

I don't know if it works on other things.

We watched Ice Age The Meltdown the other night on Blu-Ray and the picture was incredible! I could count Manny's hairs -er - furs(?). The detail was terrific - Comparable to my OTA HD...maybe better!

Well, I'm in hope that somebody else checks in and says this PS thing will work for us normal folks who don't play games. Only movies!

:p

Mr Bob

Mr Bob

11-27-06, 01:55 PM

Hi All,

I am another PRO610HD owner that has suffered through the cold solder issues on the power supply board. The problem started about 18 months ago.

...

Two months ago, after having read this site, I resolved to reflow the solder joints on the power supply assembly. I focused my attention to the joints for the various wiring harnesses E5, E4, E3 etc. I also addresses virtually every other joint that appeared suspect.

Many many cold solder joints will be bad even tho they don't LOOK bad. I have found this over and over again, thru the years of repairing these things. That's why I no longer stop with those I can see.

Well sunday afternoon, the set popped after about 6 hours of viewing. It turned right back on and was fine, but I am sure this will continue to happen.

I am sure you are correct.

I hope your letting things go so long without remedy didn't cause the convergence probs you had to remedy later come to the surface, but we can only tell from your progress report here - which unfortunatly would seem to indicate that the longer you Pio owners wait to remedy this PS board problem, the more likely it is that other problems will eventually domino-effect themselves into the scenario.

I have noticed one thing about the set that I have not heard described here: The On Screen Display - Menu, Input Mode, Screen Mode - all have very slight Jitters. For example, when I change the input mode of the set from tv, to input 1 the OSD is not completely stable. It jumps up and down very slightly. Furthermore, when the set is cold, the screen seems to have the jitters as well.

I have seen this a lot on internally gen'd graphics on RPTVs. It is not a big issue, since it does not appear when you are watching the much more critical program materials we view. It may have roots in things still wrong with your set, but whether it does or not, you need to focus on the still intermittent problems with your set, and let this jitter thing take a back seat. It's a back burner thing, you needn't worry about it. Hopefully it will be remedied when the intermittent probs are.

I am beggining to suspect that something is up with my deflection assembly, but is it possible that the power supply is still the issue? Any and all recommendations are welcome.

Thanks!

I think it's still your PS board, that it still has cold solder joints you have not remedied yet. But don't delay, or your defl board may get domino-effected, like your convergence ICs possibly did.

Mr Bob