The disc came out. Part of the drive came with it.

The other PlayStation from Langley had been easy: a cotton swab and a clean-up, and it was reading discs properly. This SCPH-7501 came in the same box, with a different complaint. The seller described it as a "laser issue, loads to PlayStation logo then shuts off".

It was made in October 1998, and my half of the two-console order came to C$37.50, including tax and shipping. There was a patch of sticker residue on the lid, but the first thing to find out was what happened after that logo.

It started well

I tried an audio CD first. It played fine. Then Final Fantasy Origins, which loaded a little more slowly than it should have but otherwise ran without a problem. I got into a battle, so this was already further than the seller's description had led me to expect.

Slow loading had been a small problem on the other Langley console too, and cleaning its lens had helped. I tried that here, then put the game back in.

This time, it wouldn't get past the PlayStation logo.

That was a strange result after a game had just been running. My test had ended with the logo stuck on the screen; I hadn't seen the console shut itself off as the seller described. Then I went to take the disc out and got a much more visible problem.

The part that came with the disc

The black centre piece of the drive came out with the game, still sitting in the hole in the disc. That's the hub the disc clips onto. It was supposed to stay in the console.

I can't say whether that loose hub explained all the earlier trouble, or what condition the old laser was in. The sequence also doesn't tell me why reading got worse after the lens clean. What I did have was a drive that read unreliably and now had a part coming off in my hand. I decided to replace the reader.

Inside

With the console open, the inside looked better than I'd expected. There was a little dust, but nothing that made the job look more complicated. I removed the metal shielding to get a look at the board.

The top looked good. The underside was dirtier, so that needed some attention before everything went back together.

I cleaned it up and checked both sides again. This part of the job was straightforward, which was welcome after watching the disc test go backwards.

During reassembly, I fitted a brand-new disc reader. It cost C$25. The sticker residue on the lid was gone too, as the before-and-after photos show, and the console was ready for another try.

An old save and one more movie

For the next test, I picked Final Fantasy Tactics. Loading an old saved game would give me a reason to check the memory card at the same time. It worked: the save loaded and I was back in the game.

Then Legend of Dragoon, for a movie test. That played too. After the earlier stop at the logo, seeing both a saved game and a video sequence run was a much better place to finish.

So this one did need a replacement part. C$37.50 for the console and C$25 for the reader put the total at C$62.50, and console #2 was working again. The first successful boot had been encouraging, but I'm glad I kept testing.