Xbox DVD repair

Xbox DVD repair If your Xbox is freezing during games or returning the dreaded Dirty Disc Error you have a DVD drive problem.  If this all sounds like too much work you can always buy a replacement drive First off, DO NOT BLOW CANNED AIR INTO THE DRIVE WITHOUT OPENING IT! This will almost certainly make things worse, you just assure that the dust will be redistributed evenly inside the drive and this includes a coating on the optics you are trying to clean. Steps to take in order to resolve Dirty Disk Errors- 1. Use a standard CD/DVD Cleaner, they look like a normal CD but with two miniature brushes on them.  This will only clean the lens.  Sometimes this is all you need to be up and running.   2.Use this information to figure out what drive you are working with and what must be done to clean the lens in the next step. Determine the manufacturer of your Xbox DVD drive. Complete Tear Down Tutorials Thomson  Laser Installation Thomson Tray Alignment Phillips  Laser Installation Samsung 3. Clean the lens and mirror manually Tutorial (same tutorial as Thompson tear down) 4. Adjust the Potentiometer (pot) on the laser.  Thompson Tutorial   5. Replace the Laser in the DVD drive, purchase replacement Samsung Phillips and Thompson lasers. 6. If none of the above options revive your drive you can rest assured you have tried it all...  Get a new drive, they do go dead and its probably not your fault or the fault of your younger sibling-relative-friend that was messing with your xbox without your permission (yes I hear that a lot). Replacement Xbox DVD Drives You may notice that some of your games play fine while others do not.  This is usually because some games are on DVD media and some are on CD media.  CD's are single layer media while DVD's are multi layer media.  This means it is easier to read a CD than it is to read a DVD.  The concept of a DVD is to have several semi transparent layers of data.  It is sort of like taking a few CD's stacking them together and smooshing them into a single disc.  To read the 2-4 layers of data you must ignore the previous layers and pay attention to ones deeper in the disc.  Obviously this is a more complex task and more subject to read errors.  My description is not entirely accurate to keep the concepts easy to understand (if anyone would like to reference a technical explanation send me a link) For instance the double disk of Jet Set Radio Future and Sega GT 2003 is a CD while Munch's Oddysee/Halo is on a DVD.  Most often you will notice the bottom of the media is one of two colors, gold DVD's and Silver CD's.  It is not 100% that gold=DVD and silver=CD so if you find this rule of thumb to not be true in every case...  that's life. If you know you have a DVD problem because the drive will not open or close, stay opened or closed or makes grinding and popping noises... The number one quick fix for the DVD drive is to re-align the tray.  This is common with CD players, CD changers as well.  Many times just from normal use a gear will skip or something will jump track, unless all the pieces are in the right place at the time it powers up it will not work.  So by removing the tray, aligning the internal parts to their starting position and re-inserting the tray you can often bring a drive back from the dead  Thompson DVD Drive Tray Alignment Procedure