Audio Systems: car radio, microscopic dust particles, laser diode

Question
i drive a 2004 sunfire. recently my cd player just quit working. i didnt do anything in particular to cause it to mess up, it just won't play my cd's anymore. i tried to use compressed air to get any dust out of the slot, but it still won't work.

Answer
The most common cause of this failure is the laser diode within the optical pickup housing.  You can try cleaning the lense of the pickup by using a cotton q-tip.  Merely flick the lense a few times  -  which will knock of the invisible, microscopic dust particles that may be lodged onto the surface.

I give this only a small chance of bringing it back to life, but worth a try.

There are other things that could be the cause:  digital decoder ic chip, optical pickup badly out of alignment and very dirty discs.

It is not economical wisdom to fix the unit; it would be cheaper to just replace it with an aftermarket unit from BestBuy, CircuitCity, Crutchfield.com, etc.

Hope this helps.
Cleggsan