XPost: alt.home.repair, sci.electronics.design   
   From: NONONOmisc07@fmguy.com   
      
   DVD can't be read, what to do?   
      
   Toyota Solara with Navigation, which means map DVD.  Two or 3 years ago,   
   occasionally I'd get an error message when car first started so radio   
   first tries to read the map.  I would either stop and start the car, or   
   later I realized I could eject the DVD and reinsert it and it always   
   worked the 2nd time.  (There is a separate CD drive for playing music.)   
      
   Bought a DVD cleaning DVD, which is a disk with a brush!  Used 2 or 3   
   times. Didn't help.   
      
   Changed from the 2005 edition of the map, that came with the car when   
   new, to the 2008 edition, the last year they made one.  Didn't help.   
      
   Both map DVDs look pristine.  No fingerprints, not even old ones that   
   have been wiped away.   
      
   In the last month, problem's gotten more frequent, but still worked the   
   2nd time every time.  Yesterday, didn't work until the 3rd time. And   
   today, right after I bought tires for a car trip tomorrow, wouldn't work   
   right at all.   
      
   I restarted the map, and the map restarted itself 2 or 3 times** for   
   each time I restarted, and never completely displayed the map, and   
   always insufficent for moving my location while I drive***.   
      
   A couple strange things, never happened before today:  1) Start of the   
   day, changing stations, which is usually instantaneous, took 5 or 10   
   seconds every time.  Changing volume, for which there is a knob   
   (although it's not a direct rheostat control) also took 5 or 10 seconds.   
   Changing from FM band 1 to 2 (6 memories each) also took 5 or 10   
   seconds. Saving presets took 5 or 10 seconds.  This delay phenomenon   
   never happened before and I don't see how it's related to not reading   
   the map DVD, but otoh, it's not a coincidence, is it?   (Once the radio   
   was on a station, the radio worked fine.)   
              2) Sometimes**** much of the map showed, but a quadrilateral   
   to the left of center, using about 1/5th of the screen, was dark and   
   blank.  But driving didn't move the map.  ****Or maybe all the time. Sun   
   was very bright.   
      
   How do I fix this?   
      
   Is there a better way to clean the head?   A more expensive DVD head   
   cleaning CD?   Maybe the one I bought didn't know how to work because it   
   was not a general purpose DVD or CD slot, but a dedicated map DVD???  So   
   the radio software was incompatible with, or didn't try to execute, the   
   cleaning DVD software.   Maybe NO cleaning CD knows how to work with a   
   Map DVD slot?   
     Or should I disassemble the radio and clean the head directly?   
   (Previous car had a 5-CD changer that broke. Major effort just to get   
   the CDs out, had to destroy the changer mechanism. Never did see the   
   head.)   
      
   Should I try cleaning the head again, even if it didn't seem to help the   
   first few times, because clearly now it's worse, so maybe even a partial   
   cleaning will be enough?   
      
   Should I use a liquid or solvent on the brush. I think it didn't say to   
   and I didn't last time.   
      
   There are junkyard radios, but would they be fully tested?  How can they   
   fully test a map that is meant to move when the junkyard car has no   
   engine or tires?  And no GPS antennna.    I presume the radio is tested,   
   but seriously, do they, can they test the map?   
      
   ***I've only used navigation twice in 5 years, once in the dark in   
   Charlston, S. Carolina, but I use location all the time.   
      
   **Convertible, top down, lots of sun, so hard to see the screen, but I   
   could see between attempts, in the center of the screen was a little   
   clock symbol, and the time on the clock was different each time!!!   
   Curious if there's a pattern, but had to pay attention to the road.   
      
      
   BTW, I just bought two new used tires today, so that I could go on a   
   4-day car trip tomorrow, and as I was leaving the tire place, or maybe   
   first thing this morning, that's when the map broke!  I love my map,   
   especially when wandering around places I've never been before, which   
   was the exact plan for the next 4 days.   What irony!   
      
   (I've liked maps since I was a little boy, loved them for the last 50   
   years)   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)