Scott Leopold
Supporting Actor
- Joined
- Nov 21, 2001
- Messages
- 711
I'm not sure if this has been brought up before, and a search didn't turn anything up, so I thought I'd ask. Our DVD player in the bedroom, which is the most used, has been freezing up in spots lately. There's nothing wrong with the discs, and if I scan back and play it over, it usually plays fine the second time through. I'm assuming it's due to the machine being a little dirty inside. I purchased it at Best Buy, and bought the extended warranty/service deal, which provides me with 4 free cleanings per year for the life of the extended warranty. However, I have some misgivings about this.
First and foremost is the fact that it'd be Best Buy doing the work. While I've never had them work on anything for me personally, everyone I know who's had them do any work on any sort of hardware for them has had a terrible experience. One friend bought a PC there, and had problems hooking up her scanner. After a little more than a year, she was on her 3rd PC--they had to keep replacing them after screwing up the work and not having anything comparable in stock, so she also got some free upgrades. Unfortunately, she had only had a PC in her house for a total of about 2 months, and 90% of that time the PC didn't work.
Secondly, It's an Apex 3201, and I've set it to be region free. I'm worried that BB might somehow reset this or mess it up during the cleaning.
Thirdly, how long would it take? I've never known BB's time estimates to be accurate. Also, my parents had to mail their player back to the manufacturer to be serviced (more on that next), and were without a player for over a month. I'm not sure that's a sacrifice I want to make.
Finally, are there any easy ways to clean your player yourself? My parents bought a cleaning kit that supposedly would clean the player. You put a solution on the disc, put it in your machine, and it cleaned it. This resulted in them needing to send the machine back to the manufacturer to have the laser replaced (this is what I was told by them). I'm just wondering if there's anything I can do to clean the machine properly, without running the risk of destroying it myself, or having BB do it for me.
First and foremost is the fact that it'd be Best Buy doing the work. While I've never had them work on anything for me personally, everyone I know who's had them do any work on any sort of hardware for them has had a terrible experience. One friend bought a PC there, and had problems hooking up her scanner. After a little more than a year, she was on her 3rd PC--they had to keep replacing them after screwing up the work and not having anything comparable in stock, so she also got some free upgrades. Unfortunately, she had only had a PC in her house for a total of about 2 months, and 90% of that time the PC didn't work.
Secondly, It's an Apex 3201, and I've set it to be region free. I'm worried that BB might somehow reset this or mess it up during the cleaning.
Thirdly, how long would it take? I've never known BB's time estimates to be accurate. Also, my parents had to mail their player back to the manufacturer to be serviced (more on that next), and were without a player for over a month. I'm not sure that's a sacrifice I want to make.
Finally, are there any easy ways to clean your player yourself? My parents bought a cleaning kit that supposedly would clean the player. You put a solution on the disc, put it in your machine, and it cleaned it. This resulted in them needing to send the machine back to the manufacturer to have the laser replaced (this is what I was told by them). I'm just wondering if there's anything I can do to clean the machine properly, without running the risk of destroying it myself, or having BB do it for me.