Arcade & Retro Repairs & Mods, all new recipe, with no added MSG...

o1s1n

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117736992#Comment_117736992

The remote itself is 36 years old and I reckon those batteries must be in it about 20 of those years. Apart from a little bit of discolouration on the tip of the positive side, there's zero corrosion and they actually look like they're new! Hard to believe.

Unfortunately the tape deck itself won't play tapes. It powers on, the coal bunker remote will cycle through all the channels, you can insert and eject tapes, but the drum doesn't spin or do anything.

I just discovered yesterday that Liam Hearns is still running Town Hall Electric at the top of Bray mainstreet. Absolutely amazed by that, it must now be one of the longest running shops in Bray. To put it in perspective, we used to buy C64 tapes from him in there.

Might drop this player into him and see what he can do :D

eddhorse

Absolutely fantastic 👏 bravo

CiDeRmAn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117737348#Comment_117737348

Always beware of discolouration of the tip.

Seek the advice of a professional, especially if it is accompanied by a crusty discharge that also discolours the immediate surroundings

Skerries

👀.

Colonel Panic

My precious launch JPN Saturn is starting to show problems. I've only owned it a few months :(

I think it's power cap related. If it's been off overnight and I press the power button it lights up but there's no image. If I toggle the switch, it boots.

Via a scaler, you can see loads of noise in the image on the home and Action Replay screens which goes away after it's warmed up! I plugged another Saturn into the scaler and it's grand. The noise doesn't really show on a CRT.

I've tried with two step-downs. My Maplins special I use for all my retro, and the industrial one I got for my arcade cabinet.

So, should I replace the PSU with a modern equivalent, since it's a 100V or replace the caps on it?

KeRbDoG

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117682797#Comment_117682797

Belated update on this Neo Geo AES.

I picked up a beefier PSU (adapted to centre negative) to power supply as when I moved away from the JAMMA adapter board the PSUs I had couldn't also support the 161in1 cart I had. This is a 5V very early model and doesn’t cope well with the extra loads as mentioned before.

Unfortunately a colour then dropped out, I already had a recap kit coming. When installing that one of the colour paths was indeed broken so patched and all is well.

I got a second AES from O1s1n which had some problems, wouldn’t boot the only original cart he (then I) had, and the 161in1 cart would fail to boot. Found a broken trace to the Z80 and discovered the board itself was a EUR console and the origin cart was JPN so wouldn’t boot with the original bios ;)

Trace to Z80 fixed (audio only right?) and UniBIOS installed. Boom, working treat. Need to fix a first gen MVS board which was a donor for some video ram, hopefully Aliexpress delivers soon.

o1s1n

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117845707#Comment_117845707

That's weird about my old AES! It was a Jap model that I bought from a seller in Japan.

Delighted you got it working. I'd say I must have broken a trace using that MVS to AES converter thingy.

KeRbDoG

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117854134#Comment_117854134

Ah, now I'm doubting that assertion - your indeed right, it is a JAP model.

Maybe that Z80 line was causing the original bios to freeze when it couldn't reset it.

The trace was broken a few cm from the cart slot so I don't think did the damage, just looked like corrosion on one trace. Previous owner, small drop of pop and then over time it just got eaten away

Colonel Panic

Wife took the baby out visiting, so I got to solder the PSU bits together and stick them in my Jpn Dreamcast. I also put in a battery holder and a replacement fan.

Putting the fan in was SUCH a pain on this DC. It's a VA0, so I needed to literally take the main board out and flip it to unscrew the original fan! Next up I need to decide on what ODE to get.

Steve X2

I eventually got around to 3D printing one of these floppy disk cleaning helper tools. I've come across a load of Amiga disks that wont read on anything, this will help clean them up(along with some isopropyl alcohol and cotton buds). A very simple design that I highly recommend.

I edited the grip tool a little from the source as I like the grip, but not how he designed the slots. Takes about 40-60 mins to print everything.

Link for anyone who needs it: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4978640

Steve X2

I swapped in the Amiga 600 hard membrane I posted in the Gets thread yesterday. It's definitely a quality bit of kit, with the weakest part being the ribbon cable(just like on the old membrane). But at least with this design if the cable ever gets damaged or wears out its a quick and cheap common replacement(not like the old membrane).

All done.

Inviere

Lovely Steve, what's that Furia board? Some type of accelerator?

Steve X2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117968448#Comment_117968448

Yes, it upgrades the cpu from the 68000(7MHz) to a 68EC020 running at 33MHz. It's also got an 68882 FPU in there along with 9.5MB of Fast RAM. Nice little upgrade for gaming with WHDLoad and general workbench stuff. I've got a 1MB trapdoor upgrade in there as well with clock and running everything from SD card.

It's a great little setup for running the stuff i mostly do on all my Amiga's. For heavier stuff I'd use my A1200 or A4000, but i don't really have much of a need to power them up these days.

Colonel Panic

Installed a Fenrir mount from Laserbear.net to deal with the annoying gap when the lid is open. Not a big deal, but consoles look more complete with ODEs installed.

Inviere

Yeah looks very neat, finishes it off nicely.

Optimus Prime

Has anyone ever replaced a screen on a original gameboy ? Have one here spare and thinking of replacing it with a better brighter screen. Anyone have any recommendations , I see battery mods available for it too..

current screen has some vertical lines which I see can be fixed but would like to get a Better screen in it.

geotrig

get a backlight and bi vert screen you wont regret it

Inviere

There's even full IPS replacement screen kits out now, pricey, but they look amazing.

KeRbDoG

I'm currently trying to repair an Amstrad CPC 464 which Ciderman bequeath to me - was missing the Z80 and the AY-3-8912 sound chip. Those replaced and diag rom in...no joy...so RAM replaced...no joy :( Could well be the ULA chip.

Might anyone have an Amstrad CPC 464 or similar in some sort of dis-repair or unwanted'ness they want to part with? :D

Inviere

Not retro whatsoever, but I took my PS4 Pro apart to see what the thermal paste and thermal pads were like. The paste was quite poor, very poor contact patch, and the paste had taken on a rubbery consistency. The thermal pads seemed cheap/worn out too, so I replaced the whole lot.

The below are the second set of thermal pads, the original ones. I forgot to take pics of the new ones in place!

Back together and it seems a bit happier now, more quiet and efficient.

Dr Bob

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118582165#Comment_118582165

Bugger , just saw this now , I have a spare you're welcome to if you still need it , (I have two one that works , and one that works but has a dodgy keyboard due to a cracked PCB , so I'll have to make sure I dont mix them up )

Dr Bob

BTW anyone here know much about amps? I've been more about fixing old audio stuff lately , and I can do the basics (you'd be amazed how many dead tape decks just need a belt change , and also a thorough cleaning out of rotted belt sludge ) , but I'm working on an 80s Sony separates system , and the amp will only work for a split second sometimes if you adjust the volume, or will sometimes play at max volume but really distorted . Going to dive in and see if theres anything obvious , but just wondering if its a known issue?

Inviere

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118796326#Comment_118796326

Hey Bob, if Kerb doesn't want that I'd be interested myself....ive a 464 here that's really badly beat up, in need of a good few spare parts

KeRbDoG

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118796326#Comment_118796326

ah cool - it'd be great to take the dodgy one off you, happy to pay+Parcel Motel - let me know

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118796828#Comment_118796828

I'm sure I'd have bits left over if I do get it, you'd be welcome to them

Inviere

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118797682#Comment_118797682

Cheers Kerb 👍 1st thing on the list is a replacement shell....the one here has burn marks, is bowed in the middle, and is pretty beat up. After that I'll possibly need a keyboard as it's bowed too, but can't test it yet as I've no psu currently.

Dr Bob

Grand , I'll be up in the attic in the next day or so and will dig it out .

MrVestek

Dangit!

I noticed what appeared to be a surface mount capacitor on my floor last night. Curious as to where it may have come from I finally realised that it must have broken off of my Tekken Tag board when it fell on the floor the other day.

Crap. Well that's going to be fun to try to fix. I hope the capacitor itself is still good. I'm not going to chance plugging the board back in until I've had a proper change to try to reattach the cap.

It's erh... all good experience I suppose?

Thankfully it doesn't look like there's any damage to the actual pads so... bit of flux and desolder wick should clean them up nicely.

Kinda hoping that this cap is ok though because it seems to have a little dent in it.

Ohh well... that's teach me to not leave unfinished board projects lying about the place when I'm not working on them! (literally all I was waiting to do was attach it to some PCB feet and mount it to some MDF. Whoops!

Inviere

Looks like a clean break, as you say flux and desolder will fix things up nicely. What are the values of the cap itself, I may have a spare

MrVestek

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118801084#Comment_118801084

That would be amazing. I can't really tell from the cap itself as it's a bit scruffed... I fear that I may have walked on it at some point without realising.

Having a hard time tracking down the board schematics too.

If anybody here could tell me what kind of SMC capacitor is needed between C4 and C5 on the board I'd greatly appreciate it. 🙂

The Last Bandit

Looks like its just a decoupling cab based on the pads its connected too and the partner smaller cap in parallel, 100uF I think. Board will probably work fine with out it but best to replace it anyway.