Flashed a light-on with a weak laser and worked fine after adjusting the POT(with a multimeter, not like other tools that say "turn a little bit at a time" as a measurement). It worked good for a couple months, but as usual, once they start to go its just buying extra time. So, I bought a new laser, replaced and worked great for a week. I was in the middle of playing a game (dead space 2) and the console reset out of nowhere by itself. Just as the xbox logo and swirls start to load it resets again, and does this repeatedly with the center green light flashing the whole time. Left it alone for a day, came back and can get it to boot sometimes, but the center light flashes constantly like its trying to open tray and it says "opening tray" on screen, but doesn't open. If I push eject manually it will open, then close immediately and still says opening. Sometimes it only opens halfway then draws back in. My only thought was that solder on trace cuts may have cracked or something, so I used some de-soldering braid and removed, cleaned with alcohol and resoldered. Any clues? Did the chip on PCB of drive die or something? It is acting possessed. Oh, and I booted it with top off of the drive and laser is moving and lighting for a sec when it looks for disc, so laser is still functioning (not that I would think that would make it repeatedly try to eject and/or reboot repeatedly anyway, just trying to give all info since it started a week or so after I changed laser)
there is several causes that may have those effects, but from personal experience i would change the belt on the tray motor, if it is week it will cause those symptoms, if it is not going all the way in, the drive is waiting for it to close and it does not, its a cheap fix if that is the problem, i buy a bag of belts for like 9 dollars that has 20 in it.
sorry I have been really busy with college and haven't had time to get back to the xbox. I am thinking that the problem may be my soldering on the pcb after trace cuts. I originally used some trace glue and after a couple months it apparently started to degrade and stopped reading discs. thought it was laser, but turned out as soon as I scraped glue off, cleaned with alcohol and soldered it worked great again. well a few weeks later it started doing this. I had exact same issue with another I did with glue so I soldered it too. It started working great again too. well, I just heard back from that friend yesterday that his reads discs fine still,but drive is acting crazy not opening or not closing sometimes, and sometimes coming partway out and closing immediately. This is exactly what mine is doing, but mine wont even spin a disc either. just eject acts all crazy and light flashes in center repeatedly. SO.... I feel like it is probably the trace solder that is not providing steady consistent power, correct? I tried resoldering mine with no luck. I am using some really old solder that i cannot even read the tin/flux ratio on label (think it might say 60/40, hard to make out though mostly rubbed off) and an old cheapo weller model sp-23 25w-120v iron. I have noticed that the solder acts weird when trying to apply. It sticks to the iron and doesn't want to let go to stay on he traces and melts in middle but forms like a film over whole outside (kinda like you would see on old pudding or something) and that outer film doesn't want to let go of iron. i.e. it doesn't become shiny, looks really dull even after heating. Any suggestions? I am not a pro at soldering, but I am not horrible either and I know that either solder or iron are not functioning properly here, suggestions from someone that has soldering experience/ lite-on flashing?
did you use flux?
solder wont go bad because its old, as long as its rosin core its fine.
no issue with you iron, either its hot onough to melt solder or not and you can tell when you work with it if its melting as it should, the reason it sticks to the iron is the lack of flux or paste.
wont you take a pic of the board with the trace cuts, i could use a good laugh.
