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Cary CD 306/200 laser assembly

Hello, I have had a Cary 306/200 CD player in my system for a number of years. It has recently begun to refuse to track discs and instead displays the dreaded ‘No Disc’ message whenever a CD is loaded. I have been in contact with Cary tech support who tell me that they no longer repair these units because they can’t obtain the laser assembly that is specific to this model. Does anyone on Audiogon have a line on where I can obtain a Philips L1210/68 laser assembly which is the drop-in replacement for my current unit? (I believe that Philips also refers to this assembly as a CDM12.) Any thoughts you may have on where to purchase one would be much appreciated. I have already successfully disassembled the CD player and have removed the old laser assembly, so it won’t be that difficult to pop a new one in place.

asteel1
sostupendous
3 posts
 

A quick search of ebay found these two sellers:

 

 

Hope you can get it up and running again soon. That is a grail player for HDCD fans due to the PMD200 decoder. 

asteel1 OP
2 posts
 

Thanks so much for doing some research on my behalf. Unfortunately, though they bear some similarities, neither of the options you discovered are drop-in replacements for the Philips laser in my Cary CD player. Cary has a cast aluminum disc tray that will only fit with a specific Philips laser. I have posted a link to a photo of my current laser below so you can see the physical differences between the various laser assemblies. Thanks again for the effort.

 

sostupendous
3 posts
 

Hard to tell 100% but this looks like a match. Going through the seller's feedback it seems like he's listing these parts correctly.

asteel1 OP
2 posts
 

Thanks much. This laser head bears looking into. 

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