Posted by Non-entity on 12/21/05 02:01

Probably a stupid question, but not long ago I bought a Philips PET-1000
portable DVD player. Nice picture, a few shortcomings. The question is,
what causes the cabinet to get very warm toward the right side of the unit?

I have two "home" DVD players, one old Sony and one of recent vintage, and
thinking on it, their cabinets get quite warm. I always figured that it was
because of the internal power supplies, but the portable has an external AC
power supply that steps down to 9 vdc. The cabinet on the portable gets far
warmer in a few places than the small external AC step-down unit.

CD players I've had generated little to no perceptible heat, other than what
I'd attribute to the internal power supplies. Then to make things a bit
more puzzling, the DVD drives on my computer seem to get barely warm. What
creates the heat in the home and portable DVD players? I do realize the
flourescent tube on the right side of the screen of the portable makes the
flip-up lid warm, but still not so warm as the chassis makes the bottom part
of the unit. I've tried to search for answers on the internet and just see
mentions that "this DVD player generates a lot of heat" but never see what
component(s) is (are) the culprit(s). No wonder portable DVD players need
hefty battery packs! I have noticed that when playing a DVD on the computer
the motor seems to "spin" much faster (sounds like a fan) and the DVD
probably requires a higher precision, higher power "laser" - but I really
don't know any of this, just guesses.

Thanks -

Bill

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