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Sanyo IMP-21J TRY General Maintenance

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Sanyo TRY from the front right

The Sanyo IMP-21J TRY shares its disc drive with the GoldStar GDO-101 and GDO-101M, so the drive procedures (cleaning, switches, the flexible cable, gears and the laser) are set out once, on the Goldstar GDO-101M General Maintenance page.[1][2] The sections below cover what is particular to the TRY: opening the case, its drive cable, the backup battery and the boards.

Opening the case

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  1. Unplug the TRY. The mains lead is fixed to the console.[3]
  2. Take out the nine screws that hold the case shut. They are ordinary cross-head screws.[4]
  3. Lift the cover carefully. The disc drive is screwed to the underside of the cover and stays connected to the main board by two cables; unplug them before setting the cover aside.[4]
  4. To take the drive off the cover, remove its six screws.[4]

Reassemble in the reverse order, making sure the drive cables are not trapped.

Disc drive

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The drive's two boards are joined by a 30-way, 1 mm pitch flexible cable that bends each time the sled moves, and its conductors crack. ConsoleMods recommends a replacement longer than the original: a 200 mm cable with the contacts on the same side at both ends, such as Molex 686630200001.[1] One owner whose cable had folded sharply at its connector cut off the damaged end, scraped the insulation back to expose fresh contacts and refitted the original stiffener; the TRY worked again. The owner judged that the cable, which needs its full length, could not be shortened a second time.[4]

The reading lens is on the tray.[5] Open the tray to reach it, and follow the lens and switch procedures on the GoldStar page.[2] The 3DO Development Repo lists the laser as the Sanyo SF-C93AQ, the same as the GDO-101's, but marks this as unverified; read the part number off the pickup before ordering one.[6]

Backup battery

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The 32 KB of save memory is battery-backed, and the battery is on the main board, with capacitor C53 beside it.[7][8] Read the cell type off the cell before ordering a new one. Check the area round it for corrosion; see Battery Explosion, Capacitor or Corrosion Damage.

Boards and capacitors

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Console5 and RetroSix, the usual sources of capacitor lists, have no list for the TRY's main board or power supply. Because the drive is the GoldStar's, its two boards may carry the same values as the GoldStar's CD interface board 1EA4B11A09900 and CD drive board 1EA4B11A09800; compare the board numbers on your drive with those before using the GoldStar list.[9][1] The main board has jumper pads JP1 (four pins fitted) and JP2 (not fitted). An owner who changed JP2 saw no effect.[10] Leave them as found.

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References

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  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 3DO:Sanyo Disc Drive Repair, ConsoleMods Wiki, 25 June 2025—link(accessed 2026-10-01) Community repair guide for the Sanyo drive used in the IMP-21J and the GoldStar models: failure points, symptoms, and the replacement flexible cable.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Goldstar GDO-101M General Maintenance and Goldstar GDO-101M Troubleshooting Guide on this wiki: the Sanyo drive procedures (cleaning, switches, flexible cable, SF-C93AQ laser change, gears), with their sources.
  3. ↑ Photographs by Evan-Amos (public domain): front, File:Sanyo 3DO TRY IMP-21J.jpg; rear, File:Sanyo 3DO TRY IMP-21J rear.jpg.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 3ＤＯ「ＴＲＹ」修理。, Ameba, January 2023—link(accessed 2026-10-01) Owner's repair: a TRY whose tray worked but which would not load games and whose start-up logo flickered; case and drive screws, and the drive's flexible cable trimmed and reused.
  5. ↑ 3DO, Wikipedia (Japanese)—link(accessed 2026-10-01) Section on the console models: the TRY's release on 1 October 1994 at ¥54,800 (citing Weekly Famitsu no. 330), open price from summer 1995, and the reading lens mounted on the tray (citing Dengeki Oh, 1 March 1995, pp. 152–153); sales section on its limited distribution through Sanyo's appliance shops.
  6. ↑ Laser assemblies, 3DO Development Repo—link(accessed 2026-10-01) Lists the IMP-21J laser as the same as the GDO-101's Sanyo SF-C93AQ, marked as needing verification.
  7. ↑ 【ハード】SANYO IMP-21J TRY, 3DO FAN (blog), 20 January 2021—link(accessed 2026-10-01) Release date, price and a full specification table (CPU, memory, video and audio outputs, drive, ports, size, mass, power). A community page; the table follows Sanyo's specification format but its source is not named.
  8. ↑ tzmwx, USBTO3DO-SANYO-TRY-IMP21J, GitHub repository, README (in Chinese). Optical drive emulator board for the TRY: 14-way 1.25 mm power and 30-way 1.25 mm CD-ROM flexible-cable sockets, and the instruction to remove capacitor C53 beside the battery on the main board.
  9. ↑ Goldstar GDO-101M Capacitor Replacement Guide on this wiki, from Console5's Goldstar 3DO list: CD interface board 1EA4B11A09900 and CD drive board 1EA4B11A09800.
  10. ↑ ISO: Sanyo Try IMP-21J service manual (3DO), AtariAge Forums—link(accessed 2026-10-01) An owner's search for a service manual, and the jumper pads JP1 (four pins fitted) and JP2 (unfitted) found while cleaning the board.


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