Capcom Three Wonders Repair Log

This board was sent to me by my dear friend Alf81. When turned on, all you got was a black screen and something that sounded like a burp from the speakers. As this game runs on CPS1 hardware, the thesis was, that it had committed suicide. But what does that actually mean?

Well, by the end of the Golden Age (mid 70's to mid 80's), the arcade manufacturers discovered, that if they made the games so durable that they lasted too long, the arcade owners would not buy new games. They then came up the idea to install a mechanism into the games, that would render them useless after some time. And even unrepairable by 3rd party arcade reppers. This is what is known as a suicide mechanism, but in fact the name is a bit miss leading, as it implies an active action; in fact it's kind of like the opposite:
(EDIT: Womble (RCM, AussieArcade, etc.) pointed out in a comment, that I'm on the wrong track with this theory. As he has far more experience than me, and as his explanation sounds more plausible, I think he's right. You can read it here.)
The principle is almost the same for all flavours. You take a part of the game code (usually vital for the game to run, but early examples also includes only the sound system ie Shinobi) and encrypt it before putting it onto the ROMs. Then you put the decryption key into a small block of RAM hidden inside some custom chip and add a battery on the board to keep the piece of RAM alive even when the game is turned off. At some point, the battery will run out of power, and the RAM will loose the decryption key forever. The game can no longer read it's own game code and is unplayable, and as the decryption key is gone, the game can't be 'fixed' by anyone else but the manufacture (at a high price).

Cosmetically the board seemed to be in good shape.

so right away I had a look at the usual suspect, the battery. On CPS1 systems, the battery as well as the custom chip containing the RAM for the decryption key, is placed on the little sub board called the C-board

So I tried putting a voltmeter on the poor thing and got this

This battery was surely stone dead! So what can you do? Well, when I said before, that suicided games was not fixable by any 3rd party repper, that was not entirely true. Cause here in modern times, ultracool software/hardware hackers (not me) have found ways to pre-decrypt the code so that it will fit on the ROMs. It is then possible to put the custom chip into it's non-decryption mode, and it will be able to read the (now) decrypted ROMs. The game will rise from the dead.
The #1 place to get these pre-decrypted ROM images is at The Dead Battery Society. Here you will also find instructions on how the make the appropriate hardware modifications to your dead game. I this case (CPS1), you have to first remove the battery, as it will not be needed anymore.

Then break the connection on two adjacent grounded pins on the custom chip and set them high instead. I'm not that good at SMD's, but with a little help from liquid flux, I managed to pull it through };-P

Next step was to update the ROMs. First I dumped the ROMs already on the board to find out what version it was

From this it was obvious, that this was a 'World' version. However, at present time, decrypted ROMs (30, 31, 35, 36) only exsists for the US version. So in order to make it work, I would have to replace the other region specific ROMs (29, 34) as well. As I don't like erasing the original ROMs of a game before I know that my rep works, I went hunting for 27C010's in the scrap pile, and started the cumbersome task of cleaning windows and UV-erasing the EPROMs. But after a couple of cycles, I had 6 working ICs

Next we program them,

slam them into the board,

and try it out

It's Alive! It's ALIIIIIIVE!!! MUAHAHAHAHA!};-P
Please notice though, that the select screen is a bit blue-ish. This is apparently a known issue with this game. However it does look a bit art. But the game-play is absolutely perfect.
As a last thing, I moved the old stickers over to the new ROMs,

and the game is ready to be sent back to it's rightful owner };-P

UPDATE:
My dear friend Charter McCloskey aka Alf81 has sent me these nice photos of him unpacking the game, turning the screen in his Egret, the game running, and a photo of him self showing just how pleased he is to be able to play his 3Wonders again };-P

Capcom Gun Smoke Bootleg Repair Log

All I used for this easy 'rep' was

my flathead screwdriver; actually my favourite tool...really love it <3

my trusty soledering iron

and a bit of common sense

I got this board as a part of the trade for this bootleg 1942 that I'd just recently fixed. I was told that the board booted and coined up, but when pressing start, it would freeze. The pinout (2 x 28) was a bit strange; not like anything I'd seen before (certainly not Capcom Classic)

(the key is at 8 like on Capcom Classic; pin 26, 27, and 28 on parts side is GND, but on solder side it's only 27 and 28). However the game came with a JAMMA adaptor that made it boot, so I just started by using that.

Just as described, that game booted up just fine

and also coined up

But when pressing start I got this screen

for a second or two before the game rebooted (the watchdog jumped up bit the main Z80 in the butt };-P). The same thing also happend when the game ran in attract mode and was to show the in-game sequence.

So I started with the basics: Visual inspection, dumping ROMs and reseating all socketed ICs. During this, I quickly found this area interesting

Somethig didn't look right; ROMs no 3 and 4 facing one way, while 5 was facing the other. When I pulled no 5, it was obvious by looking at the circuit lines, that it had been inserted the wrong way. Often this causes the ROM to get fried, as they are very sensitive to getting polarity reversed. So I turned it around, crossed my fingers, and got this

Even though the screen look garbled, this was the intro sequence for sure, and after that the actual game also ran...SWEET! };-P (no sound though).

I was finish with basics on the main board, so turned to the graphics board. Here I found this

This didn't seem right either. In the first row we have 7, 6, 8, 9 and in the second row 10, 11, 12, 13... Well I'll be damned, if that first row shouldn't read 6, 7, 8, 9 instead. So I tried switching the two

and now had a garble-free intro sequence

The game itself played fine, but the cowboy was only able to shoot forward and left. A quick look at the adaptor, and I saw, that only two buttons were wired on the JAMMA fingerboard. Now I couldn't find that strange pinout anywhere on the net, so I just tried poking a grounded wire at the different unused pins. And on pin 20 on the parts side

I hit the jackpot

So soldered an extra wire (the white'n'red one) on the adaptor

The last thing I needed for this to be perfect, was sound. There was already wires from two pins on the edge connector to SPEAKER + and - on the fingerboard. So from previous repairs, I know that it's smart to try and switch the wires (when working with a SuperGun and not a cab with a speaker) before trying anything else. And because we have an adaptor in play, luckily that's quite easy. And, PRESTO! the sweet sound of gunfire filled the room };-P

The game now plays perfectly, and I ended up with a pinout looking like this

If anyone out there has more info on this pinout, don't hesitate to leave a comment };-P

Taito Super QIX Bootleg Repair Log

Now this little bootleg of Taitos Super QIX had graphics issues. All the sprites had stripes through them; the same with some of the letters on the attract screen (maby they are made up of sprites too?!)

I started with the basics. Visual inspection, reseating ROMs...however when putting this 2732 back in place, I just got a solid blue screen

Tried popping out the ROM again. It was then I discovered, that the dumbass that had fitted the socket, had reversed it (notice, that GND and not Vcc goes to the upper right pin of the socket)!

The result was, as I feared, that the ROM was now fried. When trying to read it in the Top2005+, I got a "No chip inserted!" error. Ofcause I had forgotten to dump the ROM before I reinserted it and flipped the switch, so basicly, if I couldn't find the right image somewhere, I was frakked. So I went hunting the net for ROM sets. By googling a bit, I realized that my board was a special bootleg using a MCU with external ROM; the other ones have an MCU with inernal ROM. So the image I was after was called sq07.108. This image exsists in (at least) 3 version floating around the net. Tried burning one of them, but my Top2005+ would not burn 2732's with Vpp=21V. So I tried programming some 2764's with doubled image, and then afterwards moved some pins around to make it fit the 2732 pinout. None of them worked!
I was then so tired of the board, that I sentenced it to the scrap pile!

Months went by with other reps, but everytime I had my hands on the board while going through the pile, I thought of how sad it was to scrap such a nice board. So a couple of weeks ago I pardoned it. It had suffered a little bit durings its stay in the pile; the volume pot had been harvested for a rep (that I gave up on, as the game was TOO damaged, and was a football game). Besides that, it looked just fine.

Now I was pretty sure, that all the ROM sets I'd found wouldn't work, as it was the wrong images for my game. So I sent out a cry for help by posting threads, on different rep forums I usally visit, asking if anyone had a bootleg similar to mine.
Mainwhile I also had the thought, that maby the board (for some reason) would only work with a true 2732, and not a modified 2764. A couple of months earlier I had been so lucky, that an old friend (Jarl) had decided to donate me his old ISA BUS based EPROM programmer that actually IS capable of programming EPROMs with Vpp=21V. So tried one of the three images I had

With this EPROM the board booted up the self test and passed all tests and then went all black screen when the game should start. Now that was certainly a change for the better };-P So erased the EPROM again and tried one of the other images, and BINGO! I was back at square-one with a game that had sprite errors; Totally awesome!

Now sprite errors like these are often caused by bad RAM, so started poking the data pins on the different RAMs on the board. This board uses 4bit DRAM for sprites and backgrounds and they work in pairs to make up a whole byte. I had never encountered a board using DRAM before, so I was not too sure what to look for, as DRAM also has this thing about refresh. However, when poking this little fellow

I saw something that didn't look at all healthy; refresh or not

And when looking at its partner

with this dataline

I was convinced, that something was very wrong with the other DRAM! However, as my Top2005+ only tests SRAM, I had no means of testing it. So I decided on desoldering both ICs in the pair and fit sockets.

By trying diffenrent combinations of inserting 1 or 2 ICs in the different sockets, I was pretty sure, that the one with the fainted text was knackered. I went through he scrap pile, but didn't find any 41464...however I found this old PC mother board with alot of these 41256s

Now while 41464 are 4bit DRAMs, the 41256s are only 1bit...let's try and look at the math: 1 x 4bits = 4bits = 4 x 1bits; AHA! (this is the sound of Elgen getting one of his crazy ideas) Why not try stacking 4 of those 1bit DRAMS? };-P So harvested 4 of them and started preparing them. I found the pinouts here (here is a screen shot from my iPhone)

The 41256 has separate D and Q, so they would have to be connected

Next we stack'em and connect all the address and control pins

Now as seen on the pinsouts above, the placement of the addresspins are not compatible, so I prepared an old socket with solder blobs

and soldered the pins that where in the right place on; then routed the other pins using kynar; the only pins not present on the 41256's was the /OE (output enable), so I just left it unconnected

And now...the big test! };-P (Ooooh, so excited, I almost wet my pants)

AND IT FRAKKING WORKED!!! };-P

Even though it worked, I did order some real 41464's on evilBay, as the MacGyver construction is not very durable };-D But it was great fun trying and it was cool to see that only the one DRAM was dead.

Next problem to address was no sound. So started by refitting the volume pot, but still no sound. The output of the amp

looked fine though

But I traced the signal to the SPEAKER- pin at the edge connector; hmm precisely the same 'problem' as with this board; maby it's time to add a switch on the SuperGun? But I decided to switch the signals onboard this time again

and the sound was now perfect.

Yesterday the real 41464's arrived from the US

and the board still works fine with one of them

Case closed! };-P

Addendum: My cry for help on the different forums payed off! I got a pm from member Belike on Dragon's Lair Fans, that he had an untested bootleg SuperQIX (also with an MCU with external ROM) that he didn't mind parting with for small money. A couple of days ago it arrived. I haven't had time to test it, as the pinout is not JAMMA, but I did desolder and dump the ROM, and it has precisely the same CRC32 as the one from MAME I'm using in my own SuperQIX right now };-P