At what seems to be the same time. I have an appliance that I plug into the cigarette lighter and I turned it on and it didn’t go on. I jiggled the attachment to the cigarette lighter and the radio suddenly went off.
Ordinarily I would suspect a short or a fuse. But the thing is that the power works, to the radio at least. It lights up, and if I put in a CD it takes it in, though nothing else happens. The clock works if you push the button. So it doesn’t seem to be a power issue.
But the fact that both seem to have gone at around the same time makes me think it must be something other than the radio itself, which makes me loath to invest in a new one.
Car radios usually have two power circuits. One is usually only used to keep the memory intact when the car is shut off, and is constantly on no matter if the car is on or off. The second one usually powers most of the radio, and shuts off completely when the car shuts off. It may be that the buttons, etc. are powered from the constant battery source.
I would fix the lighter circuit first and see what happens. That is probably a fuse or a wiring problem. Since you were jiggling things you also may have jiggled the radio’s power connector as well, so if fixing the lighter fuse/circuit doesn’t fix it you may want to pop the radio out and examine its wiring and connectors.
All the stuff that still worked on the radio (lighting up, checking the clock, inserting/ejecting a CD) are probably things you can do without the key on, so they’re on a different circuit from the part of the radio that actually makes sound.
