Greco headphone amp white noise issue

[joejoe]

My fellow tinkerers,

I have a nice little Greco headphone amp made in the 90s (I think). It works fairly well, *BUT* even with the guitar *not* plugged in, I get a subtle white noise in the background through the headphones.

It's runs on two AA batteries so it's not plugged into the wall.

Sound does come through when I plug the guitar in and the aux in works fine, too, and if I play a little loud I almost can't here it but the moment I stop playing I hear it and it drives me nuts.

How can I troubleshoot this thing? Do you see anything in the pics?

















Thanks for any sage advice.  :)

peace out,

Joejoe

[induction]

How long have you had it? Did it ever work without noise?

Without a schematic or more information, I'd suggest replacing all the electrolytic caps. If it's really from the 90s, it's possible they're starting to fail.

[joejoe]

thanks for the reply, Induction.

I've had it for about 1 day.  starting to think it's late 90s or early 2000s.  

[glasspak73]

the second pic down along the right hand side halfways down it looks like D5 is black like something could be wrong with it. Not sure if this helps but I noticed it looked burnt.

[joejoe]

thanks for the reply, Glasspak.

yep, good call. I got excited, checked it, and I think it's just writing.

busy replacing caps now.  hopefully I don't kill it. :)