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CPS3 with bad Character Ram

cruzlink2

cruzlink2

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Guys any idea where on the board the character ram is? Have a friends board that even though the darksoft menu shows fine and it writes a game fine the graphics show up all garbled up. I went through the normal channels first, took out all the sims and cleaned them using a rubber eraser then some 99% alcohol with qtips. Also cleaned the cart and the cart slot, went as as far as re-flowing the PPU but same result. When I do the memory check it shows all sims good the only thing that comes up NG is the character ram but I have no idea where on the motherboard that chip is.
 
Sim 1 is always bad on a Darksoft SuperBIOS just FYI (because the CRC hasn't been updated/patched).
UCaFx0q.jpg


Like you I have no idea where the spright data is stored, but that RAM chip will likely need to be replaced (is it possible a trace leading to the RAM was damaged/severed).
 
Hmmm, looking at that image of the PPU feet it really seems like that's the issue.
Have you noticed any graphical changes whatsoever while reflowing?
 
None to be honest if you noticed I tried straighten the pins as best as I could the reflowing . After I used my meters continuity mode to make sure I had not bridged any of them I am almost sure the character ram needs a swap. Or maybe is a broken trace as you said, kind of sucks though cause I don't know it's location on the board.
 
You could heat/lift just the bent feet off the board, expose some copper from further down the trace by lightly sanding off the masking and solder some k30 jumps in.
It won't look pretty (even if you do a good job) but it could potentially solve the problem of a damaged trace or pad.
 
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