CPS-III issue & Panic Attack !

[Warner]

Hi everyone,

I've just received a CPS3 motherboard with a game cart known as dead : JoJo's Venture.

The board is in very good shape in my opinion, no trace of rust and even the jamma connector shows no sign of excessive plug/unplug usage.
But I don'k know if eveything's okay, and for that matter, I'm asking for your help.

Here's my beauty :

When I plug my JoJo's cart and CD's, I have this :

Is it clearly the sign of a dead cart ?
Because we can see some pieces of "CPS3" and "Capcom" logos here and there in the middle of the scroll. That probably means something is happening somewhere...
Must I be worried for the mobo ?

====

I do have a second option for testing this mobo.
The seller gave me an old relic coming from somewhere close.

This :

It comes from 2013, and has been given, with the corresponding burnt cd, as "non tested".

When I plug this, here is the result :

Complete mess on the screen, and scrolling too !

I suppose the next step is to test the mobo with a cart that is clearly known as "working". I'll be working on that.

But, with those elements, can I be optimistic, or the first signs of scroll mean there's a hardware issue ?

Thx for the reading everyone.
++
Warner

 

[MostroVeneno]

Hey there
From the first picture the mobo seems to be running fine, it's showing jojo's garbled screen, seems a sync issue, try adjusting your monitor sync pot from the chassis. The other cart just seems a dead cart with no battery, maybe someone replaced bios there, left it uncomplete or just failed.

 

[Warner]

"adjusting your monitor sync pot from the chassis"

Thank you.

of course... i was thinking too close to the mobo.

i'm on MS8-29FSG, monitor sync can be done with which pots ? V-Hold, H-Hold ?

 

[MostroVeneno]

"adjusting your monitor sync pot from the chassis"

Thank you.

of course... i was thinking too close to the mobo.

i'm on MS8-29FSG, monitor sync can be done with which pots ? V-Hold, H-Hold ?

Yes, you can try those pots ( v-hold /h-hold ) from the chassis or the remote control as well.

 

[Warner]

It has an effect, but that doesn't correct the scroll completely...

 

[Aurich]

Have you tested your setup with a non-CPS3 game? Is your sync fine with another board?

The rainbow screen of noise you're getting testing that other SuperBIOS cart is very normal, these carts are picky about how they're plugged in. I've had to plug and unplug and push down harder or stop pushing so hard to find the sweet spot plenty of times. Don't assume it's bad, be more persistent in trying it.

 

[Warner]

Tested with CPS2 and everything's fine.

I'll test pushin hard, pushing soft, not pushing at all with the second cart.

thx for helping !

edit : i've just switched back to cps2, backtrack with the sync adjustements, and everything is back to normal. that's a good point, so far.

 

[twistedsymphony]

The first picture shows that the mobo is booting the problem is that the monitor is not syncing.
it's one of 3 problems
1. the monitor sync needs to be adjusted. Sometimes this needs to happen from board to board
2. the sync pin on the JAMMA connector is not making good contact, try cleaning the JAMMA edge
3. the mobo has a fault and is not outputting a proper sync. For this you would want to use a multimeter with a frequency function or an oscilloscope to troubleshoot and check the quality of the sync signal on the pin.

 

[benime]

Check on the bottom of the board, depending on the version you might have a little daughterboard (96682A-S) with an 74LS08 SOIC on it that's involved in sync generation.

I've seen mobos where this board is soldered directly to the 4 pins of the crystal on the top side of the mobo, and over time the pads on the daughterboard get lifted if it's not mounted flush.

Anyway, that would be a good place to start.

 

[Warner]

Check on the bottom of the board, depending on the version you might have a little daughterboard (96682A-S) with an 74LS08 SOIC on it that's involved in sync generation.

I've seen mobos where this board is soldered directly to the 4 pins of the crystal on the top side of the mobo, and over time the pads on the daughterboard get lifted if it's not mounted flush.

Anyway, that would be a good place to start.

I'm really not an expert, but it doesn't seem my motherboard looks that way.
Here the pictures :

===

About sync adjustment ; the sync's fine on cps2.

In this case, concerning the Sync adjustement, i've been full to the left, and back to the right, with H Hold and V Hold both, and clearly, it improves the screen image, but never stop it from scrolling in any situation.

But I've already had a cps3 plugged on this machine (JoJo's HFTF and an Old Darksoft Bios) and i did not had to go that high on v-hold to have a correct screen image. I remember nevertheless having to make sync adjustements at that time, but it was really short adjustments.

So i think it should work, and concerning the Astro, everything's all right.


About the sync pin, I will test cleaning the jamma pin 13. I had a look and it doesn't seem dirty or sticky... But i will wash it with some alcohol and test.

About, testing with an occilator, it appears to be way beyond my knowledge, I'm more a "sociology and arts" kind of guy, you know.
Maybe i'll find someone who know someone who can do it. I'm working on it too.

But for today, thank you all for all the help. That's very nice of you.

 

[benime]

I'm really not an expert, but it doesn't seem my motherboard looks that way.
Here the pictures :

===

About sync adjustment ; the sync's fine on cps2.

In this case, concerning the Sync adjustement, i've been full to the left, and back to the right, with H Hold and V Hold both, and clearly, it improves the screen image, but never stop it from scrolling in any situation.

But I've already had a cps3 plugged on this machine (JoJo's HFTF and an Old Darksoft Bios) and i did not had to go that high on v-hold to have a correct screen image. I remember nevertheless having to make sync adjustements at that time, but it was really short adjustments.

So i think it should work, and concerning the Astro, everything's all right.


About the sync pin, I will test cleaning the jamma pin 13. I had a look and it doesn't seem dirty or sticky... But i will wash it with some alcohol and test.

About, testing with an occilator, it appears to be way beyond my knowledge, I'm more a "sociology and arts" kind of guy, you know.
Maybe i'll find someone who know someone who can do it. I'm working on it too.

But for today, thank you all for all the help. That's very nice of you.

Yeah, your revision is newer. U1 on the bottom is where you should be looking. You could start checking with a multimeter; two of the input pins may connect to Pins 15 and 16 on the SSU, unless that also changed between revisions.

 

[Warner]

Thanks for that share, benime.

1/ Am i looking for a continuity or a voltage and do i have to do it plugged on the jamma ?
It seems to be an heavy task with very little pins, and working on both sides of the board...

2/ Pins 15 and 16 of the SSU are these ones (the ones soldered of course) ?
first pictures of the second post here : https://forums.arcade-museum.com/threads/dead-cpsiii-2nd-impact.285435/#post-2535814

3/ The helper in that case is suggesting to "suspect one of the large, custom QFPs on that board. Try putting a little pressure on them, in turn, while the board is running to see if it clears up the screen". Does it seem of interest ?

 

[benime]

Thanks for that share, benime.

1/ Am i looking for a continuity or a voltage and do i have to do it plugged on the jamma ?
It seems to be an heavy task with very little pins, and working on both sides of the board...

2/ Pins 15 and 16 of the SSU are these ones (the ones soldered of course) ?
first pictures of the second post here : https://forums.arcade-museum.com/threads/dead-cpsiii-2nd-impact.285435/#post-2535814

3/ The helper in that case is suggesting to "suspect one of the large, custom QFPs on that board. Try putting a little pressure on them, in turn, while the board is running to see if it clears up the screen". Does it seem of interest ?

1. Just continuity.

2. Yes.

3. You could try pressing gently on the pins on the SSU.

To repair this will likely require some fine pitch solder work, so if you are not up to that task it would be best to find someone to diagnose and repair it.

 

[Warner]

Be safe, i won't get close to that board with anything hot. Or maybe a red hot kitchen fork would do the trick ?

 

[twistedsymphony]

I've seen people solder using a coat-hanger and a blow-torch... a fork might be an upgrade!

 

[Warner]

Hello everyone and thanks again for the help.

I'm still around with my faulty CPS-III but I'm waiting for a supergun set-up to do some more tests. I think it would be smarter to stop testing directly on the Astro City MS8 and get some hardware to make it on a old CRT...

I hope it will get here soon but last news are bad news, the two superguns I was looking at, in France, are now unavailable.

 

[Warner]

What happened next... ? Well, it does NOT look good.

===

The seller sent me another mobo, with extreme care this time, for replacement. And i've tested it.

I plug the cart, the simms respecting their localization, and the cd reader.
And i had this (mobo 2 with JoJo1 Suicided Cart)

Spoiler: Remembrance of pain : mobo 1 with JoJo1 Suicided Cart

I've tried several time, cleaning and positioning the cart, for the very same result, gray screen and lines...

And to be sure, i've tested with the non tested 2013 darksoft cart, cleaning and positioning again.
For this :

disappointing...

So i got back to the first mobo, for the same results with each cart, gray one for the dead jojo, and green with the old 2013 darksoft.

Very-very disappointing.

===

But, during the tests the plug/unplug, i felt the cd reader had sometimes difficulties to eject the cd.

I watched closely, and the four pins connector looked "pushed in" the cd reader.
In fact, the cd reader seems to have sufffer during the trip.

I looked inside, and saw – at least – two soldered pins that had been crushed.

===

In French, we call this situation : "aller de Carybde en Scylla". When a situation get worst each time you're getting closer to a result.

The next move is to fix the SCSI cd reader, or find another one, and test again, i suppose ?

 

[Warner]

By a common agreement with the seller, it's gonna be a stop, return and refund.

It's okay for everyone but not without a pinch of sadness.

 

[BlinG]

Even if the CD-ROM is damaged, you should still get a boot screen giving you a CD-ROM error. What you're seeing on screen now is either a bad cart or worse... a bad motherboard

 

[Warner]

Sadly, i'd do the same statement...

As we see, we can understand a simple issue like the sync issue at the beginning of the post.

but when a motherboard is bad, with mess-screens, how can you know if it's the board itself, or the SIMM, one or several ?

Is there a catalog somewhere repertoring the weird screens, with the known issue each time ? (i suppose it's may differe from one mobo revision to another...)

Is it possible to know, how many, or which SIMM is wrong (if it's a SIMM issue) ?