need circuit help plz

[jsb666]

hey guys i want to stealth my dvd-rw but i have no idea of how to move the eject button to somewhere else so i can cover the front of the drive. could anyone help me with circuits ect? thanks in advance :D

[XcOM]

the basic design of a CD.DVD ROM button is normally two wires, if you can get a soft switch button with a simple circuit closer. Just extend the wire to where ever you want to place the button.

[DaveW]

You don't always have to remove the button. When your stealthing the drive, you could make it so that pressing the front of where the drive is opens it, which might be a safer bet than trying to move the button.

Either way, it's a simple push to make button with 2 wires usually. It's not a big issue to desolder it, solder 2 wires in it's place, and simply connect them to something else.

-Dave

[XcOM]

that can always work, i would personally move it, but its all dependent on how much experience you have, and what your confident enough to do.

[jsb666]

Hey guys thanks for the help. Never thought it would be that simple so i did not want to take it apart incase i ruined it. I think i will be able to do it i have a little experiance with soldering. Only one way to find out:)

[XcOM]

good luck, take time, rember to clean the contact before re-soldering (Ect Ect)

[jsb666]

Right i opened up my DvD-RW and there was not two wires connected to the switch. the switch was connected to the circuit board by four pins.

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e57/jsb666/DSCI0007.jpg

Sorry about the quality of the photo my camera is terrible. I put a circle around the four pins to try and make it a tiny bit more clear. So anybody have any idea on how to connect a switch to that? I know someone will since there is a lot of talented people on these forums. Thanks :)

[onelegout]

Look on the other side of the board, look at what the outside 2 pins are. They are the only the metal case of the button and they serve no purpose in making the switch work They are only used to hold it to the board! :)
So ignore the outer two pins. just desolder all 4 and take it out, then solder a wire into each of the inner holes and you're good to go. But one thing is VERY important...

If you look at the board in the same way as in your photo, you will notice that one of the two effective pins (i think its the bottom one in your pic) solders to a large contact area and the other solders to a small track of metal contact. It's like a small line. The gap between the line and the large area is TINY and if you were to connect the two with solder, the switch would effectively be on all the time. So you must only use a TINY bit of solder and be very careful that you havnt bridged the gap between the small line of contact metal and the big patch which surrounds it!
I hope that you can make some sense of that! I would post photos of the board that I have next to me but my camera has no battery!
And Im sorry for not knowing ANY technical terms at all! I kinda taught myself this so I have no idea what anythings actualy called haha!
Peace
H

[xmastree]

So ignore the outer two pins. just desolder all 4 and take it out, then solder a wire into each of the inner holes and you're good to go.
Why take it out at all? It's a normaly open switch, just solder another remote one in parallel with it. Less chance of damaging the unit that way.

Another thing, I've seen ones with four pins arranged in a square, but they were connected in pairs.
Edit: ignore that, that's for switches which mount flat on the board. I just opened up an old CDrom and it's the same as yours. Ignore the two wider spaced ones, further from the edge, and connect to the other two. Stand by for a photo.

Here you go:

http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f341/chrispollard/cdbuttons.jpg

The upper two conenctions are the important ones. The one on the top right is the signal (you'll see it's isolated from the ground plane), and the top left is ground. The other two, as onelegout correctly stated, are purely for mechanical support.
You'll notice that three are all conencted, to ground. You can solder your other wire to any of those. Personally, I would put it between the two on the left, and solder it to both for a good solid connection.


Anyway, I would leave the switch in place and wire another one across it.