Dts css mayday

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

The one with the baby-blue and black ribbon? That's an interesting looking little bugger... Sometimes you ask yourself where they source them from... It doesn't seem to have what Germans would call a "Sollbruchstelle" for venting...

It's a pity English doesn't have a cool world like "Sollbruchstelle"... "Intended breaking point" sounds so banal.

It's the only surface mount electrolytic on the entire board. I always just replaced it with a small leaded tantalum capacitor because that's what I could get locally.

[Stefan Scholz]

The one with the baby-blue and black ribbon? That's an interesting looking little bugger... Sometimes you ask yourself where they source them from... It doesn't seem to have what Germans would call a "Sollbruchstelle" for venting...

It's a pity English doesn't have a cool world like "Sollbruchstelle"... "Intended breaking point" sounds so banal.

they do. It's beloe, the whole cap lifts from the mounting pane.

[Marco Giustini]

I fixed an A-Open some time ago which had all the capacitors blown - including the SMD one. And as Elia mentioned, Datasat sent me the licence file for my unit at no cost - I just had to send them the MAC address. Good to hear that the backup file also saves the licence.

My other unit has an Asus MB and that failed in a different way: the VCore PWM controller failed and the 12V line was constantly drawing 9A, which eventually burnt some of the mosfets. Took me a while to figure out what was going on but it's a happy chappy now.

Back to the OP, I would plug a VGA monitor and see if the units boots at all. The display will display "Initialising" by default so that means a lot of things. If the MB boots up you may be able to see what the problem is. After all, it's a normal computer with a few extra cards in.

One other test you may want to do is to remove all the DTS cards from the unit - in case one is faulty and preventing the unit from booting up.
Finally, if the MB does not show signs of life, I would try another PSU before giving up.

But first you should visually inspect those capacitors indeed.

[Per Hauberg]

Hello, everyone -

Please excuse my silence for so long. During spring 2021 I suffered a relapse on my cancer, and have been very much down for a long period. It seems, I've been lucky, though, and I'm cured. My good friend, fellow Film-tech'er Alan Lyman of Copenhagen, has in meantime replaced many parts in the CSS unit - and tested in his local cinema. It works ! I have not had possibility to run anything on it yet, as there are very few prints in Denmark - and the on-and-off corona-closing hasn't made life easier. The DP70 was re-installed succesfully, though and re-presented in november with a two week reissue on OUT OF AFRICA - the original 1985-print for what that means, but still worthy. Nice color, great sound (with some disturbance in one reel - something magnetic been after it ?) nice boxoffice, and nothing but happy audiences.
It was a great pleasure. I hope, our our local conflict with Disney will fade out, so that we can have the pleasure of running "Death on the Nile" this year. "Pizza" is not yet confirmed for 70mm here, but I've heard so many negative words about it, that I might drop it. When just "re-inventing 70mm" for my local audiences, I should only be running film, that are sure to honour the format.
Kind people everywhere on the globe has been so kind to help with getting bits and parts for the old equipment - including the stuff, I had never used before. For example, my Kinoton platter was 35mm only, but now takes 70mm without other trouble, that the discs are not full-size, but 124 cm, as there is not space for anything bigger. Magna-Tech has helped me with DTS timecode readers for 70mm, a film cleaning unit and a fine, (brand-new) ISCO lens for 70mm, Sam Chavez was the man to contact, when parts for older Dolby units were needed, and kind friends in Britain and as far as Australia helped me with Film-Tech cleaning media and fluid, as F-T don't bother, but just refers to overseas dealer, long out of business.

Thank You all for good deed and advise !

- and a speciel HELLO to MARK GUDBRANDSEN: -I lost the contact, after You left FaceBook. I'm so glad to hear about Your recovery. Please contact me on per@mallingbio.com if You are for further contact.

[Gordon McLeod]

Hello, everyone -

Please excuse my silence for so long. During spring 2021 I suffered a relapse on my cancer, and have been very much down for a long period. It seems, I've been lucky, though, and I'm cured. My good friend, fellow Film-tech'er Alan Lyman of Copenhagen, has in meantime replaced many parts in the CSS unit - and tested in his local cinema. It works ! I have not had possibility to run anything on it yet, as there are very few prints in Denmark - and the on-and-off corona-closing hasn't made life easier. The DP70 was re-installed succesfully, though and re-presented in november with a two week reissue on OUT OF AFRICA - the original 1985-print for what that means, but still worthy. Nice color, great sound (with some disturbance in one reel - something magnetic been after it ?) nice boxoffice, and nothing but happy audiences.
It was a great pleasure. I hope, our our local conflict with Disney will fade out, so that we can have the pleasure of running "Death on the Nile" this year. "Pizza" is not yet confirmed for 70mm here, but I've heard so many negative words about it, that I might drop it. When just "re-inventing 70mm" for my local audiences, I should only be running film, that are sure to honour the format.
Kind people everywhere on the globe has been so kind to help with getting bits and parts for the old equipment - including the stuff, I had never used before. For example, my Kinoton platter was 35mm only, but now takes 70mm without other trouble, that the discs are not full-size, but 124 cm, as there is not space for anything bigger. Magna-Tech has helped me with DTS timecode readers for 70mm, a film cleaning unit and a fine, (brand-new) ISCO lens for 70mm, Sam Chavez was the man to contact, when parts for older Dolby units were needed, and kind friends in Britain and as far as Australia helped me with Film-Tech cleaning media and fluid, as F-T don't bother, but just refers to overseas dealer, long out of business.

Thank You all for good deed and advise !

- and a speciel HELLO to MARK GUDBRANDSEN: -I lost the contact, after You left FaceBook. I'm so glad to hear about Your recovery. Please contact me on per@mallingbio.com if You are for further contact.

Glad you are cured all the best for a full return to health

[Per Hauberg]

Hello again -

I think, I should tell You, that I've since my last post have been running "Dunkirk", "Tenet" and veteran "The Great Race", none of them doing same fine business as "Out of Africa", but except from money, which we don't talk about, it was a pleasure. Dunkirk and Tenet have been at the premiere cinema only, and were still new. Great Race (1965-print) very used, as it was last time, I ran it (1983?), but no trouble at all. Color faded, of course, but soundtrack impressingly fine. Both "Pizza" and the two newer Branagh's have flopped painfully in Denmark (especially "Nile"), so I won't bother. Hateful 8 print is still in Denmark, but my screen can nót become wider, and showing letterbox to show off 70mm gives no meaning to me.
I'm glad, the gear is back and running, but the pattern is clear: 70mm does not sell extra tickets in Malling as it once did. What made "Africa" a succes was that danish director Bille August last year made made a very fine portraitfilm about autor Karen Blixen, who is the main caracter in "Out of A", played the by Meryl Streep. I showed Africa just after a three months run of the new film - and bingo. Blixen and not 70mm did it, but I enjoyed running it

Thanks, Gord, for kind words !

[Marco Giustini]

I'm curious: what are those red strips on the print?

[Per Hauberg]

Hi, Marco - click on picture

[Leo Enticknap]

Wow! I would have thought that they would have given up on the licenses.

By the same token, Dolby will still sell you an upgrade license for a cat862 to the final version, even though they no longer support them in any other way.

I was about to opine that if a film about one of Denmark's most famous cultural figures didn't do well in Denmark, I'd like to know what would! The only other Danish author I remember from high school literature classes is Herman Bang: if I recall correctly, he led a pretty unspectacular life, without much in the way of exploring and exotic locations, and his novels were somewhat obscure and depressing, unlike Dinesen/Blixen's output.

In a similar vein, whenever I played a pink and smelly print of Earthquake, or a scratched and beaten up one of Pulp Fiction at the Egyptian and Aero, it would always sell out. I suspect that most of those who came did so for the nostalgia of seeing location shots of their home city 20 or 40 years ago, rather than for the merits of the actual movies.

Very good to hear that Per is on top of his medical issues.

[Marco Giustini]

Hi, Marco - click on picture

I did. That's why I was asking

[Per Hauberg]

Hi Marco -
The line between the pictures (logo only, - not the rest of the film, are so wide, that a projectionist, sometime in the long life of this print ( Mutiny on the Bounty, Ultra Panavision, vintage 1962) has not been able to cover for them with his normal masking, and he has then made a desperate try to cover these with tape. -A tape , that is now so greasy, that the tape sticks - even so much, that some of the stripes has moved from one side of the film to another, thereby not anymore covering what they were supposed to. I've only got this one reel, so this will not be bothering neither an audience nor a fellow projectionist, as it will be no great loss, that I have now cut this little piece out. When time is available, I will check the print - very exited to see picture quality - surely pink, and for the first time see, if my old UPAN lens is worth anything. -And to hear that great soundtrack again, if it has survived...
Greetings from Denmark !

[Marco Giustini]

are you saying that behind that tape there is a TRANSPARENT area and that someone tried to cover that up with tape to avoid it going on the screen?

[Per Hauberg]

That's it !

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

DTS-XD10 and the essentially identical DTS-CSS suffered from the bad electrolytic capacitors going around at the time. open the unit up and look on the motherboard and see if you have some "pregnant" electrolytics with domed over tops and some actually leaking (the more critical since they can etch away the motherboard. If you do (and there is a 90%+ chance you will), change them all out with like rating/sized capacitors and you'll likely find that your unit boots up properly again. It is possible to also have a HDD failure. Some drives will suffer from "sticktion" if they sit for too long. I saw this more on drives in the '80s and '90s more than later drives though (not in DTS but in computers, in general).

It is only the A-Open motherboards that have the capacitor plague issue. If you have the later mother board which is also a common brand and you are having problems with it, then you really do have a problem.