Out of curiosity, I opened up the Magnavox NB530MGX Blu-Ray Player. I was surprised for a low end unit; there are more screws than a Yamaha RX-V665 receiver that need to be unscrewed to open the unit. They probably can cut 1/3 of the screws without affecting performance or rigidity of the casing.
Once open up, I am more surprised to find how the unit is assembled. As shown on the pictures, the unit has two large circuit boards, the green one below the Blu-Ray drive should be the digital control board and the brown one has the power supply and analog output connectors. Behind the front panel is the display control board. What is surprising is normally a low end or even not so low end player has the disc drive on one side and the control boards next to it, instead of two large control boards with one beneath the disc drive. By so doing not only add to the cost but may also lower the reliability as now they need more connectors. The only logical reason I can think of doing this way is the disc drive and the control board below it are actually a set that is made by someone else or shared with other models. Regardless, it does not appear to be the most efficient way to mass produce a unit low cost or otherwise.
Because the way the disc drive and the control board seems intertwined, I did not want to take the risk to break anything, I was not able to see most of the components on the board that is covered by the drive. What is visible is a Panasonic chip which I am again surprised to find someone tried both physically scratch out and using a maker to cover the marking of the Panasonic part. Those people at Funai or whoever made this board for them must be the paranoid type!
Well, while I wasn’t able to see what the major components are, it is nonetheless “educational” to see how a supposedly low cost unit by a large high volume DVD player maker was made.
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