Within your CD player there will already be a quartz crystal fitted in a circuit similar to the one shown below:-

diag 1

The important components are the crystal, the two capacitors and the resistors which may or may not be fitted on the circuit board. The oscillator gate (D shaped symbol) will be within the IC that the crystal is connected to.

To remove the unwanted components unplug your CD player from the mains. Remove the cover and locate the crystal - it will be similar to the one pictured below with 11.2896 or 16.9344 marked on the case:-

Carefully remove the crystal, the two capacitors and the output resistor from the circuit board. It is best to use a solder sucker or solder wick (available from Maplins) to aid in the removal of these components.

Locate the main power supply capacitor for the digital cicuits. It will be quite large in size and be rated around 2200uF to 10000uF 16V. The positive terminal from this capacitor should feed a 7805 type regulator on a heatsink. Solder a wire from the capacitor positive terminal so that it can be taken to the NET Audio Clock module positive supply pin, routing the wire so that it does not get close to other circuitry. This is to keep noise pickup on the wire to a minimum.

The output of the NET Audio Clock should be fed to the input of the gate oscillator (the pin on the left hand side of the D shapped symbol in diagram 1) and the ground. The input pin may not be obvious if the output resistor on the gate is not present. To get around this problem a resistor is supplied with the NET Audio Clock. Solder the resistor to one of the holes that the crystal was removed from and then solder the other end of the resistor to the orange wire comming from the Clock Module output pin. The blue wire should be soldered to the ground plane (where the two capacitors join in diagram 1). Alternatively you could phone your manufactures technical help line for assistance in locating which pin on the chip the crystal is connected to is the input pin for the crystal oscillator. You may find that the clock inside you CD player is based on a standard logic chip such as a 74HCU04 or 74HC04. A data sheet for this is available here. The NET Audio clock output will feed the one of the pins marked 1A to 8A on the data sheet which the crystal on your CD player was connected to.

Firmly mount the Clock Module within the CD Player keeping the wires leading from the output pins as short as possible and also making sure that the casing of the Clock Module is not electrically connected to any other components or the case work. Mounting the module with blutak or M3 5mm standoffs is the best solution as in the photographs. Mechanical vibration can also cause jitter on the output of the clock, so please bear this in mind when mounting the clock module. Solder the wire from the main power supply capacitor to the Clock Module + pin making sure that the wire is kept away from the other CD circuitry as much as possible. The negative power supply wire is not connected unless the clock is being used with the Clock PSU module.

Once you have made sure that there are no short circuits plug the CD player into the mains and switch on. If nothing happens or it does not work then the Clock Module is most likely feeding the wrong pin on the circuit. Disconnect the CD player from the mains and swap the resistor over to the other original crystal pin. Once you have made sure that there are no short circuits plug the CD player into the mains and switch on. The player should now function as before.

Disconnect the CD player from the mains and remove the resistor. Solder the red wire from the Clock Module into the hole which you have just removed the resistor from. The Clock Module is now correctly fitted.

Replace the casework and connect back into your Hi-Fi.

Please download the Clock and PSU Connection details Here.

Happy listening!

NET Audio MiniClock MAster feeding the CD Players circuit board.

NET Audio CD Clock PSU Module feeding the Miniclock MAster module.

Twisted mains cable feeding the CD Clock PSU.

NET Audio MiniClock MAster and CD Clock PSU modules fitted inside a CD Player.