TECH: TSPP Back to life......but.....hummmm
Pint...@gmail.com
Ever wonder, "What could go wrong next"?
I have a TSPP here in the shop that was brought in with a problem. An
hour or so out of the box, yep-right out of the box! it crashed.
Dead, no worky. Blanking flickering on I/O Board. Watchdog issue.
The owner arranged for a set of boards from the seller to solve the
problem. No big deal, right? Well, I told the owner that I would not
install the alternate set of boards until, "I rang out the cabinet and
playfield". Standard for a game that reportedly just died. Also I
was told over the phone that the board "fried". I was expecting a
burn hole in the I/O Board. Not so.
After checking it out and not really finding anything worth worry I
called Chas at Stern for any information on something I might need to
know. Not much new. He suggested I replace the PAL at U213. Sure
enough the machine sprung back to life. Thank you Chas for the
shortcut!
But.......
Right flipper dead. OK, tested the circuit and then changed Q16
Mosfet. Flipper works. This repair allowed me to keep the I/O Board
with the game serial number still with the machine. For the future
Purist!
But......
Noticed TV is completely lit, or not lit at all depending on the last
reset. Hummmm......Tried the test menu in Portals....Nada......not
much you can do with that thing. Data is fed into that little PC from
what appears to be the Aux conenctors of the I/O Board. (Not
confirmed but it looks like it). So, I tried the other I/O Board. No
change. Decided while I was at it to try it with the other CPU. No
change. I looked for any thing I might have overlooked and came up
empty. It looks like data is cascaded across the 74ACT574's to get
the scrolling effect. SMT technology takes it off my bench anyway.
Anyone gone farther into troubleshooting or theory on this little
devil?
I guess another call is in order tomorrow morning. If you own and love
this game get a spare TV pcb while they are available. Another thing I
noticed was the sockets on both CPU's for U213 were not the best as
far as pin security. The chips slide in and out too easily for my
blood.
Mario
Pinthetic
brt...@adelphia.net
Just out of the box,,Shouldnt it still be under factory warranty? i
had a tspp nib,, had a blemmish in playfield and translite and stern
sent a new one of both. Why pay someone to fix it when it still has a
warranty?
c...@provide.net
right? did stern provide that chip, or did you burn
it yourself? Also did they give any indication what
that chip does?
On Nov 9, 1:55 am, Pinthe...@gmail.com wrote:
PINAHOLIC
>
> - Show quoted text -
Stern just sent me a new pf for my spidey which had a small chip in
it. Dood business practice.
PINAHOLIC
>
> - Show quoted text -
I meant good business practice.
Pint...@gmail.com
>
> > > On the PAL at U213, i assume that's a custom PAL
> > > right? did stern provide that chip, or did you burn
> > > it yourself? Also did they give any indication what
> > > that chip does?
Can't answer this one just yet with any in depth information but I
suspect it directs selection at the Eproms for data. With the
defective PAL there was a data freeze. No activity on the address bus
and what looked like a fetch that wasn't answered. This resulted in a
missing pulse to the watchdog and shut down the I/O Board. I'll post
more later or answer you directly.
>>>Just out of the box,,Shouldnt it still be under factory warranty? i
>>>had a tspp nib,, had a blemmish in playfield and translite and stern
>>>sent a new one of both. Why pay someone to fix it when it still has a
>>>warranty?
Yes it is under warranty but what got lost here is the seller sold
over the internet and the game is not in his general area, so he can't
service it himself. I take it you installed the playfield and
translite Stern sent you yourself.
This is a pitfall for a seller when the game fails when fairly new.
You have to get someone else to check it out for you. This means you
have to pay someone, especially when the buyer is not savy to pinball
repair. Good question though. I think some people who sell over the
internet forget about service after the sale until it bites them in
the kiester.
Mario
Pinthetic
Pint...@gmail.com
The machine was run for several hours after the inital repair, (which
was mostly the replacement of the PAL at U213). The Color LED TV
problem still exists. Supposedly a new pcb is on the way for it.
Here's where things went wrong again. After the customer took home the
game it ran for the night and then earlier this afternoon it failed
again. It was returned and all the LED's were out on the CPU/SND
Board.
Checkout revealed a blown F3. This is the 8 vac infeed to BRDG21. This
becomes 10 vdc on the other side and is fed into the Vreg. So....no +5
means no CPU. Upon fuse replacement the machines controlled lamps
followed the blanking LED, one second on, one second off. No DMD.
Similar issue, watchdog problem. On a hunch I felt the PAL at U213.
It's pretty hot to the touch! I had the spare CPU from Stern that I
borrowed the PAL I used the first time around, but I now had two bad
PAL chips. I then remembered I had a spare board on the shelf and
extracted the PAL from it. It has the same part number. This time I
used the spare CPU and inserted the PAL. The game came up and has been
running most of the day.
A little more information on this IC. This PAL is the "variable"
version, 16V8Q. This simply means it's an advanced version of the old
PAL series that originally was pretty basic. This newer series can set
some pins as Input or Outputs and it looks like there is a lot more
inside to play with. I have yet to find out if it is has been made a
"secure" device, odds are it is. This IC handles chip select for the
ROM at U210 and the RAM at U212 among other things, so you can see if
it has an issue this board won't boot. Stern refers to it as an
"address decoding PAL" in the T of O.
I have also noticed if you have the earlier version of the Simpson's
PP manual it is missing the schematic for the Color TV pcb. The newer
manual has it. FYI.
Mario
Pinthetic
On Nov 9, 9:55 am, Pinthe...@gmail.com wrote:
> > > On Nov 9, 9:26 am, c...@provide.net wrote:
>
> > > > On the PAL at U213, i assume that's a custom PAL
> > > > right? did stern provide that chip, or did you burn
> > > > it yourself? Also did they give any indication what
> > > > that chip does?
>
> Can't answer this one just yet with any in depth information but I
> suspect it directs selection at the Eproms for data. With the
> defective PAL there was a data freeze. No activity on the address bus
> and what looked like a fetch that wasn't answered. This resulted in a
> missing pulse to the watchdog and shut down the I/O Board. I'll post
> more later or answer you directly.
>
> >>>Just out of the box,,Shouldnt it still be under factory warranty? i
> >>>had atsppnib,, had a blemmish in playfield and translite and stern