A Tale of Two PS2 Slims - Faulty Retro Console Restoration

In this video I repair two PS2 Slims, which are part of a set of four that I purchased during a recent faulty console lot. This is a pair of SCPH-75001 PS2 Slims, both of which do not read disks. In fact, when a disk is inserted in the drive, there is no indication that the disk is spinning or that the laser is moving. The drives appear dead on both units.

One of the units is a virgin PS2 Slim with an intact warranty seal. The other has been opened and worked on previously, made obvious by the missing screw covers, mismatched screws, and electrical tape instead of rubber feet on the bottom of the unit. Never a promising sign when working on an "untested" system, but figured I'd give it my best shot.

I started with the worst of the two systems, given it's my first time working on a PS2 and I'd rather learn on the worst of the two units. I do a full tear-down and test all the fuses, none of which are blown. Upon closely inspecting the lid sensor (there are two lid sensors on a PS2 Slim) I discovered that the front door sensor was intermittent. A shower with some contact cleaner seemed to bring it back to proper operation.

To my surprise (and delight) the second PS2 Slim had the exact same issue, with the exact same lid sensor. What are the odds! It goes to show that this is a function of poor design, and electronics tend to have common points of failure most of the time, rather than unique and fringe complex failures (happens but less often). Further testing showed that the previous owner of one of the units had improperly adjusted the drive potentiometers, which when correctly set, resolved all the playback issues the unit was having.

This was a fun (but lengthy) repair. I underestimated the effort it took to fix two systems at the same time (even though they ended up having the same issue) while recording decent footage to take you folks along for the side. No double repairs in the near future!

🎵 Music
Bensound - Dreams

Affiliated links below to some of the tools I use if you'd like to support the channel:

🖥 Composite and S-Video on my Mac
(Catalina 64-bit drivers can be found on the manufacturer's website)

🔧 Toolkit

🖌 Soldering Essentials

🔍 Soldering Add-ons

🔥 Thermal Compounds

[joshuadj]

Lol "If you don't want to void your warranty" I'd be impressed if they offered a 15-year warranty. But in all seriousness, good video.

[thumbscake]

I burnt out my whole laser trying to adjust the cd, could you list the ome ohms for both the dvd and laser and tell me whats to high or too little for both, theres so much conflicting information on google

[Taquito]

at the moment i have the Problem with my ps2 slim that it wont read DVDs But it reads CDs
can you help me with that ?

[wsketchy]

Someone probably messed with the potentiometers thinking they were undoing screws

[momfiethehunter]

Good job on finding out about those switches. Also very creative with making some new clock batterys, currently preparing for a planned power outage by fixing up some old 12v car batteries so I can use them to power my wifi router as well as my tv and ps4

[itamarazulai]

I've just discovered your channel,
your content is informative and interesting.

[gamechep]

You're a PS2 wizard! You not only repaired them to perfect health, you also rescued the consoles from becoming e-waste!

[bufordmaddogtannen]

A few PS2 revisions had a design flaw where a spike in voltage would short the laser coils, and in turn would fry the LA6508 chip. On slim models this could happen by opening the drive lid while the disk was reading.
This could also happen when using scratched discs as the console would try to increase the power of the laser to try to read the disc, resulting in the coils overheating.
IIRC Sony tried to address this by adding a pack of diodes in parallel before the coils.
Another option was to perform a "romeo mod" which would power the LA6508 chip with 5V instead of 12V.
So what I'm saying is use clean disks and try not to play too much with the lid switch once a disc is being read. 😉

[Norrecito]

Great work with those switches! :) Very informative repair indeed.
The funny thing is that there are many pot tweaking videos on YouTube (for different consoles) but tweaking the potentiometer never solved anything for me. (Tried on 10+ systems by now)

[migue]

The first console that I bought with a lot of work and savings, the previous ones were bought by my mother v:
I still have it in its original box, it is the model scph-90001

[nathanmead]

The battery inside PS2s are only for the clock, the system configuration and game saves are stored on the memory cards which are flash memory in SONY memory cards.

[johnDingoFoxVelocity]

actually there are two models of the ps2 slim for future use and repair model 1 ps2 slims have a dial up modem port still model 2 ps2 slims dont

[Drwfox]

"15 years after benn release, someone finally poped that cherry"...
I swear that's not what this video is about, mister FBI guy!

[murraykriner]

Well done. Rarely see anyone grasp so completely the repairs they undertake like you do. Bravo.

[BMR]

your videos are like when I first discovered Voultar's channel.... very talented well put together videos man! I'm really enjoying your content!

[ZathrusGizmo]

AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME!!

As a former computer industry service technician I applaud you for your EXCELLENT video and diagnostic skills. Bravo! Do you have a Patreon account I can buy you a well-deserved beverage for your efforts???

I recently had my PS2 apart due to the clock battery dying (mine is the onboard CR2032) as well as the dreaded DRE issue. I muddled with the trim pots too to get the drive reading again, but I didn't have the ohms values available to me. Your video gives me the values to check for now, thank you! Do you have a link to the PS2 service manual (it's a techie thing 😉)

Again, THANK YOU VERY MUCH for doing this EXCELLENT video! I l subscribed, of course, and will now check out your other videos.

[optimusp]

That’s one of cleanest battery job I’ve ever seen.

[MajesticFreak]

You make a great job with your videos
I really enjoy it and learn new things
I hope u will do more videos like that with different consoles
Keep it on

[hashrulsubzero]

I've never thought seeing someone using a car product to restore PS2's faded black plastics. Awesome!

[shoeflaps]

Really common issue this, especially after people started tampering with the sensors to get the slims to boot backups. First thing I look at if a slim isn't reading games.