This PS2 slim was in a lot of broken consoles I bought, and it was my first time encountering one of these before. It was in working condition, but I noticed that it was very slow to read discs. I tore it down to give it a full clean, because it was quite dirty. I also measured the laser pots to see if they were within the correct values, which they were — although, they were right at the edge of what was normal. I decided to try adjusting the value, but that did not help. Unfortunately, cleaning it did not make the laser function any better either, so I then believed the laser was on its way out. Even though it was still reading discs, I wanted to replace it before it got any worse, so I ordered a new one online.
When it arrived, I was surprised to find that the replacement laser had the exact same symptoms. This communicated to me that the laser itself was not the problem here. I put the old laser back in place, and then tried to give everything a closer inspection. That’s when I noticed it — the ribbon cable itself had some oxidation around the pins. I gave it a thorough scrub, but it did not cause anything to change.
As a next step, I decided to order a replacement ribbon. I felt confident at this point that if the ribbon also didn’t work, then the issue was likely with the spindle motor or the sled motor, so I would probably just end up buying a whole new optical drive. When the new ribbon arrived, I replaced it, fully expecting this to be another dead end. I was surprised and happy to find that I was wrong, and that the disc I inserted loaded up significantly quicker. I tried a few more discs and they all loaded normally.
Lastly, it was important to me to adjust the DVD’s laser pot back to its initial value. Adjusting a laser pot can cause the laser to burn out much quicker, so it is not recommended. I was fine to try it in the pursuit of troubleshooting, but now that my console appeared to be working normally, I wanted to restore the initial resistance. I disassembled the optical drive again and adjusted the pot. Thankfully I had documented the original value (990 ohms), and I was able to get it pretty close to that (965 ohms). It’s crazy how much the tiniest little adjustment of the pot changes the resistance. Once I was done with that, I reassembled the console and gave it a final test. Everything appeared to be good as new, and I played some Monkey Ball to celebrate!