smoothhustler
Student
Awesome great to know!
DARKSOFT New CPSIII Ultra Simms! 8 times the size of a regular SIMM
- Thread starter Darksoft
- Start date
Breakaron
Student
Greetings everyone
Got an issue that will require a bit of background, so forgive the wall of text. I bought an Ultrasimms Kit from the last batch on High Score Saves. Got around to programming them a few months ago and they were working okay, but would occasionally boot with graphical sprite glitches. A few reboots and the issue would eventually go away. It wasn't happening consistently at this point, just occasionally. I hit up @cruzlink2 to install the A/V mod on my board and also address this ongoing issue. He fixed my botched a/v install and ran tests with zero issues - sends it back my way and the graphical sprite issues return, this time the issue was consistent on every boot. Cruz theorizes something might be wrong with the buffer chips and offers to swap them out for me to see if we can nip this issue in the bud once for and all.
Today Cruz got around to swapping all the buffers and reflowing the PPU - and the issue is still present. At this point we suspect maybe the ultra simms are the issue, so he tests his Custom SH2 Cart with his OEM simms and experiences zero graphical issues. Just to make sure, he also re-wrote the ultra simms and immediately the issue returns upon testing them again. At this point I'm at a loss as what else could be causing the issue aside from the simms themselves. Does anyone have any input regarding this issue? Trying to figure out where to go from here, as the ultra simms were quite a financial investment.
I'll link some videos Cruz took here:
Got an issue that will require a bit of background, so forgive the wall of text. I bought an Ultrasimms Kit from the last batch on High Score Saves. Got around to programming them a few months ago and they were working okay, but would occasionally boot with graphical sprite glitches. A few reboots and the issue would eventually go away. It wasn't happening consistently at this point, just occasionally. I hit up @cruzlink2 to install the A/V mod on my board and also address this ongoing issue. He fixed my botched a/v install and ran tests with zero issues - sends it back my way and the graphical sprite issues return, this time the issue was consistent on every boot. Cruz theorizes something might be wrong with the buffer chips and offers to swap them out for me to see if we can nip this issue in the bud once for and all.
Today Cruz got around to swapping all the buffers and reflowing the PPU - and the issue is still present. At this point we suspect maybe the ultra simms are the issue, so he tests his Custom SH2 Cart with his OEM simms and experiences zero graphical issues. Just to make sure, he also re-wrote the ultra simms and immediately the issue returns upon testing them again. At this point I'm at a loss as what else could be causing the issue aside from the simms themselves. Does anyone have any input regarding this issue? Trying to figure out where to go from here, as the ultra simms were quite a financial investment.
I'll link some videos Cruz took here:
cruzlink2
Grand Master
Yea guys it took me a while to figure it was the ultra simm themselve, I actually swapped the buffers by the simm, reflowed the PPU and reflashed the simm and verified them. It still exhibits the issues in the video I also went ahead and ran it for hours with normal simm with a custom sh2 cart and it was flawless. As you can see in the photos it's not a ppu to internal ram issue since the memory test check out.
Attachments
cruzlink2
Grand Master
I also wrote the ultra simm over and verified them all to eliminate that as an issue, but the graphical issues still persisted. I think maybe one of the ultrasimm maybe have a timing issue? or one of the voltage translators is bad?
Attachments
My guess is the cable connecting the simms has an issue. Seen it before.
Breakaron
Student
Do you know where I can get a replacement? Or should I message highscoresaves about it?
Have you check the simm sockets. I had a similar issue on sLpFhaWK's setup and some of the simm pins werent making good contact and needed to be adjusted
cruzlink2
Grand Master
I just checked that but it seems the lineup was good.
Attachments
you can't tell while the simms are installed, you need to remove the simms and see which pins are not springing all the way forward.
the pins making bad contact will look ok while the simms are installed the problem is that they are not pushing against the simms with enough force for reliabile connectivity.
withen you remove the simms you can inspect the simm pins as well to ensure that the socket pins are leaving little dimples into the contacts; that's how much force the socket pins should be exerting.
cruzlink2
Grand Master
Also tested them again after making sure they all line up nicely as suggested by @twistedsymphony but no dice.
View: https://youtu.be/Yc5A7TOxZ1s?feature=shared
cruzlink2
Grand Master
Also checked the simm in the memory menu and the data seemed stable.
View: https://youtu.be/xR7mjj6hDKc?feature=shared
cruzlink2
Grand Master
Ok guys I am almost 100 percent sure is ultra simm 3. I let the board rest and did a cold boot same issue with the graphics. Now since I was running 3S my boy @SnakeGrunger suggested I take my known working stock simm and start swapping them in with the ultra. So I took ultra simm 3 off and put my stock simm 3 and the board booted perfectly off a cold boot no issues. Also to make 100 percent sure I took another working board here and put the ultra simms in it and when it booted it gave me the same exact graphical corruption as the other board.
View: https://youtu.be/YyK2FUf3lZU?si=9Qutg1RYtu_Z9wjI
View: https://youtu.be/GoObfNn_IlQ?si=_czxT7WXKj3pED00
View: https://youtu.be/KMZ5txLc1Js?si=BCtCuVE_e8H9aiig
cruzlink2
Grand Master
Ok so I can order and replace the buffer chips on ultra simm 3 but not too sure which ones they are don't wanna order the wrong ones. @Darksoft I am link some links here and when you get a chance let me know and I'll fix it.
https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetai...=sGAEpiMZZMtOwpHsRTkso609E5AiHxlqTYuWYmHiNMQ=
https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetai...OwpHsRTksowcNrnGoqbRPOWx4n78kdha8DCpxLNZadg==
https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetai...=sGAEpiMZZMtOwpHsRTkso609E5AiHxlqTYuWYmHiNMQ=
https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetai...OwpHsRTksowcNrnGoqbRPOWx4n78kdha8DCpxLNZadg==
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You just beat me to it. It looks to me like one address line is not making proper contact. If the simms write and verify must be that.
In any case, I would like to point out that we want happy gamers, so we will get it fixed. @cruzlink2 do you have another cable for this? If not, we'll ask HSS to send you a new one. If that doesn't work, we'll fix or replace.
cruzlink2
Grand Master
I don't owe ultra simm so I don't have an extra cable this one is @Breakaron board, if it's just the wire that would be an easy fix I thought maybe the actual buffers were bad.
Breakaron
Student
Yeah send it to me. I'll message you my mailing address and I'll have Cruz send everything back to me and when the cables arrives I can follow up here if the issue is resolved. Thanks for all the help and input everyone, greatly appreciated. Shout out to @cruzlink2 for isolating the issue and all his hard work as well.
Maybe better to send the cable to Cruz "just in case"
It will be better if we send a cable and a simm to @cruzlink2 and he checks what's actually bad. Then he can send the bad part to @Mitsurugi-w
cruzlink2
Grand Master
Ok sounds good I'll send the board and cart back to @Breakaron Monday but keep the ultras to see if the cable really is the issue. He has a regular set of simm and needs the board to stream a tourney. @Mitsurugi-w got my address.
Thanks guys for the quick replies.
Thanks guys for the quick replies.
Breakaron
Student
Thanks everyone!