# Sony CD Player Hack / Mod for Aux Input



## firstorbit84 (Feb 25, 2006)

So, my wife's car CD player has been on the fritz for some time now, and I just picked up a cheap replacement Sony CDX-L600X off of Craigslist for $5 cause it didn't have the wiring harness and I really couldn't test it before I bought it. 
Once I got it home, I bench tested it and it seemed to work, except that there was a CD stuck inside. I opened her up to get the CD out, and now everything seems to work fine... 
However, my wife prefers to listen to her iPod rather than regular CDs, and this unit has no Aux input.... When I pulled the CD drive to get the CD out, I saw that the connector, which connects the CD drive circuit board to the head unit's main board, is clearly labeled:








You can see there that the box on the lower left side of the connector corresponds to the pins. The first four are: AU 5V, AU LCH, AU GND, and AU RCH.... I'm assuming that these mean Audio 5v, Left Channel, Audio Ground, and Audio Right Channel.... 
I'm not sure what the the 5V would be for in an audio signal, but I'm thinking that I could potentially just wire up a stereo mini-jack connector to the AU LCH, AU RCH, and AU GND connections, and then create a CD that just has one long track of silence to make the CD player activate those channels... 
Any other thoughts on what connectors I might be able to use to "trick" the CD player into thinking that a CD is playing when I really just want an Aux source to play??


----------



## wishuhadmyvw (Jan 7, 2006)

*Re: Sony CD Player Hack / Mod for Aux Input (firstorbit84)*

you could just buy a dual deck for 40 bucks that already has an aux input and save yourself time and hassle? but that's my thoughts, and to me time is money. 
GL with your hack, hope it works. if not, atleast it was only 5 bucks right? http://****************.com/smile/emthup.gif


----------



## firstorbit84 (Feb 25, 2006)

Yes, I do know the options out there... and the Dual Deck is actually down to $30:
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Dual...73975
I picked up a 1/8" stereo receptacle at Radio Shack for $2.50 today, so now I'm $7.50 invested... 
Later, if no one else has any real advice on which pins look like they might be useful, then I'm going to solder the 1/8" receptacle to the AU LCH, AU RCH, and AU GND, and see what happens...


_Modified by firstorbit84 at 2:53 PM 3-17-2010_


----------



## firstorbit84 (Feb 25, 2006)

*FV-QR*

Bump.... this hack worked BTW... I'll post up some pics later.


----------



## harry114 (Aug 4, 2010)

*help*



firstorbit84 said:


> Bump.... this hack worked BTW... I'll post up some pics later.


 by any chance do you have those pics / info on what colors i should use and what i should buy in order to do this please?


----------



## firstorbit84 (Feb 25, 2006)

sorry no pics, but here's what I did: 

Sorry for the late response. I haven't been on here in a while. Basically, I just used the printed box on the lower left hand part of the circuit board to tell me which pins did what. Then I carefully soldered up wires to the "AU LCH", "AU RCH" and "AU GND" pins, then I wired the other ends of those wires to a 3.5mm stereo audio input jack from radio shack, like this one: http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2103451&clickid=prod_cs# 

Then I drilled a hole in the back of the deck to mount the jack and ran an audio cable down behind the dash. Then I created a CD with just "Silence" as the audio track, which I got from here: http://duramecho.com/Misc/SilentCd/index.html I think I used the 32 min track twice. 

That's it. You just play the CD, and hook up something to the new Aux input jack. Hope this helps! 

Note that for some reason, my Blackberry didn't like the aux input cable and wouldn't recognize it, but it worked perfectly with my ipod nano.


----------

