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Urabutbl

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So yeah, my CPS2 has been working absolutely flawlessly since I got it two(?) years ago. It's connected to a G board, so it was a dawdle to put together. I never had any problems with either my boards nor my sd-card (a Kingston 8gb). Then last night, since I've been doing a fair bit of work updating my ST-V multi the last few days, I thought I might as well update the roms on the CPS2 sd-card as well. Opened up the kit, got the card, deleted the old games folder (after backing it up) and drag-and-dropped the new and improved ROM-set in place. And yes, I know now I should've formatted the card, but I did not. I also used the base ROM-pack, rather than the full-size complete one, as I just want to play the games as I remember them (thanks, Smokemonster!)

So, stick the card into the kit, boot it up, and it boots to ProGear with weird colors. I power-cycle and re-seat the board, and now Progear looks fine, but the LCD is showing me only the top line. Not working at all, it just says "Now Playing". So I put my backup 'games'-folder back on, and now the LCD works fine (I can choose my game and flash it), but the board does not. Now the screen alternates between all white, all orange, or all dingbats.

So I hit the forums. The obvious answer is that the SD-card got corrupted. I reformat, but no joy. I short the EXC5 by using first a piece of wire, then a screwdriver and finally the tip of my penis for luck, but no joy (that last one's a lie). I also start the kit without an sd-card, but same result.

I then tried four different sd-cards, reformatting them all completely using the standard format-command in Windows 10, with FAT32, standard settings, no volume label. I tried a 2gb generic (which worked fine in the ST-V), a 4gb SanDisk (worked fine in the ST-V), an 8gb Kingston (the old card, now properly reformatted), and a spanking brand new 16gb SanDisk. Still.... nothing.

I've obviously wiggled the board and power-cycled a million times by now, hoping it's a bad connection, but nope so far. I also have no idea whether I'm shorting EXC5 properly.

Anyway, should I:

- Remove and reinstall the entire DarkSoft PCB?
- Snip the capacitor at EXC5, like kuze did (and EXC1 too?)
- Get some sort of tool for formatting sd-cards (I have a weird memory of someone posting one of those specifically for CPS2 multi-cards on here, but I can NOT find it again...)?
- Get naked, smear myself in peanut butter and mustard, and sing a ballad version of Hard Rock Halleluja whilst crying and tweaking my left nipple with a crimping tool?
- Some other genius plan? Please? At my wits end here...
 
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Solved it! After I ran out of mustard I had a think, and realized that while I had freed my B-board of its shackles, my A-board was still stuck inside its ABS prison. I never thought that would have an impact, I mean I could SEE the connection between the boards was good... Except I opened the A-board and saw that somehow, two small plastic supports had snapped. These probably gave the A-board an extra millimetre of resistance, meaning the connection was there... but just off by a smidgeon.

Anyway, I still think the original problem was a faulty sd-card, but when Progear had wonky graphics, I probably pressed down too hard, and snapped the supports. Once I removed the B-board, the pressure holding the supports in place was gone, they fell over inside the case, and when I came back with a fixed sd-card, there was just too much give in the A-board for a proper connection.

Oh! There was also a dead spider inside the A-board - something which could've gone much worse than it did, seeing as I bought the board from Australia...

Right, I'm off to put my A-board through the gentle rinse-cycle on the dishwasher...
LfrRT


LfrRT
 
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