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Tekken Tag / Namco System 12, boot loop watchdog

i think your wrong,
i'm pretty sure the gamecode on sys12 is on the base pcb in the flash, the small board is just gfx data.
i remember dumping one and trying to dump all the pld's for mame.
 
maybe. I just said from the top of my head.
In any case if program Rom is on the motherboard pcb then that would mean that that's the board giving him trouble and where he should be looking for scratches, hits and broken pins.
 
Yeah, it's nice to a least eliminate the CPU board. Time to break out the magnifying glass and the probe I suppose
 
i dont know, but i had a battery that was internally shorted on a bandit once that stopped the whole computer initialising.
i cut the pin on it and the system sprang to life and almost made me drop the cutters onto the psu!!!!!
 
I also has experienced same symptom. turns out my sys12 has been converted from other one and rom board caps are failed. after recapping rom board it came alive.
 
xuserv said:
I also has experienced same symptom. turns out my sys12 has been converted from other one and rom board caps are failed. after recapping rom board it came alive.
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That is great to hear. Not surprising considering what I've seen of Namco's SMD caps. It seems like any time problems with System 11/12 turn up, we should start with a recap to be safe.
 
Nice @xuserv.

I found a KLOVer selling a TTT and SC both dead for 50 shipped. I took em! The SC was clearly missing caps and I figure with the other TTT I should be able to swap parts out to see which is really bad.

But I'll order some caps now, anyway. Might as well.
 
ekorz said:
Nice @xuserv.

I found a KLOVer selling a TTT and SC both dead for 50 shipped. I took em! The SC was clearly missing caps and I figure with the other TTT I should be able to swap parts out to see which is really bad.

But I'll order some caps now, anyway. Might as well.
Click to expand...
That is an awesome deal and if I were a betting man, I'd always place my bets on bad caps if it's an 11/12. You should have them back in action in no time.
 
The two flash chips on the bottom board generally got corrupted/erased/busted on these PCBs. These flash chips carry the program code. I've fixed a few of these boards and most common cause of the problem (especially if it partially boots) is fixed by re-flashing these.

Having a working spare around helps alot to check if the ROM boards are fine.

ROM boards are not interchangeable but CPU boards (top board) are.

The game specific code resides on the bottom board, two flash chips carry the program code and one obscure flash chip (never found a programming adapter) carry the sound samples.
 
yavuzg said:
The two flash chips on the bottom board generally got corrupted/erased/busted on these PCBs. These flash chips carry the program code. I've fixed a few of these boards and most common cause of the problem (especially if it partially boots) is fixed by re-flashing these.

Having a working spare around helps alot to check if the ROM boards are fine.

ROM boards are not interchangeable but CPU boards (top board) are.

The game specific code resides on the bottom board, two flash chips carry the program code and one obscure flash chip (never found a programming adapter) carry the sound samples.
Click to expand...
Ok so I can't, then, take a Soul Calibur base board and throw on a Tekken Tag rom board, and expect it to work? They both show up in MAME as a "System 12 Mother (B)" but I haven't been able to get any results swapping with known CPU boards. I just assumed that meant the ROM board was bad.

So I bought another TTT for cheap, as not-working, but it for-sure had a broken base board. I could see fried SMD components, I'm guessing it was in a cab when a monitor blew or something. It was a bit much for me to work with, so I saved the CPU and the ROM board (now i have two...).

Anyone on here have a TTT and want to test out my rom boards? I may just watch for a known-working one and go from there. At this point I'm pretty sure my original base boards were bad, and probably not worth fixing. I just was hoping I could swap it onto the Soul Calibur base -- but I think you're saying that wouldn't work.
 
No swapping boards between games is no guarantee for success. (Experienced that as well with a broken Ehrgeiz).
Better get hold of a TTT to test and isolate the problem.
Would happily do it with my TTT, but it will be cheaper for you to just get a more local board ;)
 
Yes, in a nutshell;

- CPU boards (top boards) are interchangeable for their respective family. Not interchangeable between system families (i.e. Sys11 and Sys12)
- ROM boards contain game specific graphics etc. Not interchangeable between "game titles". If swapped between titles, no boot at all. Black screen.
- Bottom boards are the game titles. Contains game code and sound samples (may be some other info also I don't know).


I once tried to revive a "supposedly" T3 board for a friend by re-flashing the code. It did boot up but with strange sounds. Then I realized the sticker on the bottom of the bottom board says TAG. It was indeed a TTT not a T3. Swapped the sound sample flash from a really dead T3 board and completed a "un planned" conversion... Friend insisted to have T3 rather than TTT for some reason...
 
i intend to make an ergeiz out of a T3 one day.
unfortunatly all my stuff is in boxes at the moment.
(my old area got gentrified!)
 
that Sys12 document in MAME is mine, done over several years ;-)
If you look at most MAME source files you'll see similar documented info about whatever game board or system the source is for, and that info was usually created by me. They are known as a "Guru Read-Me(tm)(c)(r)"
FYI, any S12 top board will work on any S12 bottom board.
a blue screen with a weird white Japanese character in the middle of the screen means the CPU (on the top board) can't see the program or the program is bad. Mainly it's a bad connection somewhere between program ROMs and CPU, but it can be a bad TSOP.
The most common failure on Sys11/Sys12 is loose chips on the top board, but since your top board is working it has to be something on the lower board.
Almost all Namco boards have bad soldering on all SMD chips (everything in this list starting at Namco NA-1 and onwards.... http://system16.com/museum.php?id=7) so I'd start by re-soldering the TSOPs on the lower board, which contain the main program.
 
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I should update this... not to say I solved the problem exactly but I found myself with another nonworking set, but between them I found a combination of rom/cpu/bottom that booted up. I did check the other ROM board and it also seemed fine, so the original bottom board was indeed the source of the issue.

While you can take any CPU board and put it onto any bottom board, I don't think you can pair any ROM board with any bottom board. At least, putting what I now know is a working TTT rom into a working SC bottom board -- doesn't work.
 
rom board contains gfx data, the program is on the lower board in the tsop flash from what i remember.
 
Yeah the bottom board containing the program makes plenty of sense as many of my Namco System 12 boards have a sticker with the program code on the very bottom of the board like SOC4 on my Soul Calibur Export board with Arthur.

I would imagine swapping rom boards between different versions of games (Soul Calibur to Soul Calibur for example) may be possible as long as the game does not have data that is too different. It just may cause glitches if data the program wants is not on the swapped rom board.
 
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