I drive a '98 Honda Accord, with a factory installed 6-disc changer. The disc changer itself is a trunk-mounted unit. A few weeks ago, it stopped recognizing CDs. When I pop the magazine in, the unit will scan each slot in turn and decide there’s no disc. There’s no error message, just a “00 disc” display as though there were no CDs in there.
The local Honda dealer and the car audio places I called all just told me to buy a new one. Does no one repair electronics anymore? Do I really just have to replace it? It’s an awfully nice sound system.
It might be a partially viable business if manufacturers would publish full technical and repair manuals for every piece of electronics they sell, but they don’t so it’s extremely impractical to even attempt to repair electronics. My guess is that the lens is dirty or out of alignment.
The expertise and parts necessary are so rare that the cost involved would far outweigh buying a replacement unit. Especially since 6-CD changers are themselves somewhat passé, what with iPods and MP3 players that plug in to car stereos these days, or head units that play MP3 tracks directly (so that one disc equals many more than 6 CDs would have).
What’s really annoying is that the changers are controlled remotely by the head unit using protocols specific to the manufacturer’s line, so you’ll have to get another Sony changer, possibly the exact same model (especially if it’s one that Sony made especially for your car’s stock head unit). My suggestion would be to scan eBay or Craigslist for a used one of the same model from a system someone is dismantling while selling their car, one that you can just swap in at relatively low cost.
You may as well perform first order checks, though; I had the same thing happen to my Alpine changer in the trunk of my car, and just blowing some air into the player after ejecting the six disc “cartridge” did the trick. If that doesn’t work, try unplugging everything, unmounting it, opening the drive door and blowing air through the interior, then plugging it back in (without remounting it). If it plays, you can remount it, otherwise, it’s time to let it go.
I wonder if this may be caused by the cold or freezing temps? You say it stopped working a few weeks ago, depending on where you live that could be just when it got too cold.
I say this beacuse I had a 10 year old Ford Taurus with a factory trunk changer that stopped working over the winter, but was good to go again in the spring. Only thing is that I didn’t have it for a full year, so I was never able to test my hypothesis that it was temperature related. Still, from my limited sample, it worked in the fall, stopped working or worked sporadicaly for a few months that just happened to be winter, and started working again in the spring. Same symptom as you are experiencing, just told me “no disc”.
Huh. That actually makes sense, it stopped working right around the time I put an 80lb bale of hay in the trunk.*
*Just call me Naja “inappropriate use of tools” Nivea"
Let’s just pretend that’s a semicolon up there, shall we?
run a cd cleaner through it. If you decide to replace the unit may I suggest one with a USB port. You can buy an 8Gb flash drive for $80 and that will store 4 days of continues music on it. If you have an mp3 player then get a stereo with a jack to recieve it.
Hey thanks, guys. I will try canned air and running a cleaner disc through it.
I had thought about an MP3-player-plugin unit but the thing I like about the 6-disc player is that I can skip around a reasonable selection of music without having to look at it, unlike the little menu screen and multiple tiny buttons on my mp3 player.
I also had been told that aftermarket audio equipment is something like a break-in magnet, anyone know if there’s any truth to this?
if it’s in the trunk no so much. you can get aftermarket radios that have a removable face plate, and work with a trunk mounted changer.
If you are somewhat handy with tool, dismount the player, and remove the cover and then go to town with the can of air.
Reassemble.
Hey all, just thought I’d give an update. I tried canned air and that didn’t fix it, so I started poking around on the net to see if I could find a replacement for the trunk-mounted deck only, rather than having to replace the head unit, too.
Lo and behold, I stumbled across a thread on a car audio forum where, two years ago, some folks had discussed the exact same problem that I was experiencing, in the very same model. Apparently there’s a little set of two gears inside that sometimes gets misaligned, causing it to be unable to pull the CDs out of the magazine.
Some guy posted the fix instructions along with a set of photos. I figured it couldn’t get any more broken than it already was, so… what the hell. I took it apart, and sure enough that little worm gear was misaligned. I popped the teeth back into alignment, put it all back together, and now I’ve got a working audio system. 
Cheers!