In the past days Smitdogg posted on DU mailing list dumps from a bootleg of SF2CE where most of the program was splitted into the smaller size roms with the use of a custom PAL16V8H @11D to copyprotect it.He provided also the binary dump of this PAL so I took care to reverse it into a GAL16V8 device.The .JED was successfully tested on board by Smitdogg himself.Thanks to him for this contribution.
Another board from my friend Marco and another quick fix.Got from him this original Kaneko Blood Warrior PCB:
On power up the board showed the “RAM CHECK OK” message but instead of going into game it was resetting in a endless loop:
Boardset is made of a CPU board and ROM board.Having a Great 1000 Mile Rally which runs on same hardware I could verify that the CPU board was good so the fault was located on the ROM board:
So, I wen to dump the program ROMs and compare them against MAME files.When I tried to read the one @U124 (a 27C010), my programmer reported a bad contact on PIN32 (VCC) and gave me an empty dump:
Device was internally damaged so I reprogrammed another one.Once fitted it, the board successfully booted into game without any further issues and I could declare also this board 100% fixed.
My friend Marco sent me this Jaleco Cybattler PCB for a repair:
PCB was really in mint condition but when I powered it up I got this:
A blank screen and then the dark.First thing to do in this case is to analyze the main CPU, a 68000 on this board.The CPU was resetting properly but after few second /RESET pin was going from high to stay low, at same time also /HALT line was stuck in this logical state.This was a clearly sign of troubles with main code execution so I went to dump the two program ROMs (27C2001 devices) :
When I tried to read the one marked ‘2’ @IC53 my programmer warned me about a problem on PIN32 (VCC), ignoring this obviously resulted in an empty dump :
I programmed a new 27C2001 device and board booted properly but all the background graphics was missing or blocky:
Background graphics data are stored in two 4Mbit MASK ROMs (27C040 compatible) so I went to dump them and resulting files were good.But this didn’t convinced me so I analyzed them with my logic probe and I found that the one @IC67 had all data lines silent :
When I put my finger on the solderside of this MASK ROM I could restore the graphics :
I programmed the 27C040 EPROM as replacement of this bad MASK ROM using the MAME ROM set file and this fixed the board completely.End of job.
When I powered it up I was greeted by this screen:
This kind of error doesn’t necessarily imply that a RAM chip is faulty but also that it can’t be “reached” from the device which wants to read/write it.In this particular hardware the device in question is a custom ASIC sprites generator marked “FCU-2” also used in other Toaplan games:
I went to inspect it and found some lifted pins:
Blocking the PCB with a vise, I did a reflow of the involved pins
PAL UpdatesComments Off on Konami ’88 PAL dumps added
Dec162015
Today I dumped the PLDs from an original Konami ’88 PCB.Original devices were two unsecured PAL16L8 so I could read them with a standard programmer and then convert into GAL16V8 with PALTOGAL utility.Board was partially working but enough to test the dumps back and declare them as working.Anyway, a test on a 100% PCB would be appreciated from anyone who owns this board.
