A moment with Chris Thompson

Our Sony multi-function remote was getting old, so we decided to try the Logitech Harmony 880 remote after reading good reviews (note the 880 design is a few years old however). I ordered the remote on eBay in a bulk shipment from China, new refurbished for around $95. It definitely had some quirks we had to work out, the biggest being it wouldn’t charge on its base.



The Fix:
Since we ordered this from China, I figured I should try to fix this myself before sending it back. The remote wouldn’t charge on the base, the connection was flaky and the remote would stop charging after one minute it seemed. Adding weight to the remote to help make the connection didn’t help either. First I tried opening the base up to see if I could raise the connectors. I didn’t get far, there’s no easy way to open the base. Read the rest of this entry »

Since the repair of my Phillips 42 inch plasma TV went so well, I decided to research if there’s any Kenwood VR-407 repair for the remote sensor. It was great for years, then slowly, sometimes wouldn’t receive signal. Then after a while it worked again.  I had tried different remotes so I knew the remote wasn’t the issue. The cause of the issue is poor soldering on the 3 optical sensor leads, which appears to be a common issue on Kenwood receivers.

The 1st two pictures are the board to the front panel, I removed the receiver’s cover (about 6-10 screws), then partially removed the front board (several yellow screws, some cables had to be unplugged – I wasn’t able to completely remove the board).

Read the rest of this entry »