Another embarassing newbie question: How to re-seat ROMs

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Another embarassing newbie question: How to re-seat ROMs

Hi,

I have a Sega Turbo, when I bought it the seller brought it to my place and moved it into my gameroom. He fired it up and noticed that some of the cars on the screen had artifacts, sort of lines around them that shouldn't be there. He popped the back off and pulled out a ROM chip and set it back in, which cleared the issue up.

The little lines have returned around some of the cars, and I'm pretty sure I'm not such a clutz that I can't resolve this without blowing my house up, but I just want to be sure there's not some basic process in pulling out the ROMS I should be aware of.

Can I just literally grab them and pull them out? Or do I need to finesse them out with a small screwdriver? Once I pull one out, is there something I can do to improve the connection between the chip and the port it plugs into (bend the legs in a little, clean them somehow, etc)?

Obviously I'll have the game unplugged when I do this, and I'll be doing them 1 at a time, though I do plan to do all of them at once rather than doing 1, turning the game back on, repeat, etc.

Any advice on how to do this without making a total rookie blunder would be very much appreciated!!

Regards,
Ryan
 
Definitely more towards the finesse with a small screwdriver. If it's a long chip, 2 screwdrivers. Especially if they've been in place for a long time, there's a fine line between "it ain't moving" and "holy cow I've completely pulled that side up and the pins down the other end bent, so you have to be careful when doing it. Very small increases in the application of pressure until it gets moving, then down to the other end to balance it out so it comes out as straight as possible. If you do bend pins (and you probably will until you get the hang of it) if they're not too far out of line, I've just used the end of a set of needle nose pliers and very gently bent them back into a straight position with a silent prayer that the leg not break.

Once you've got the chip out, you can get crap off of the legs with a simple pink pencil eraser. There's a few other methods that others will probably chime in with, but the pencil eraser thing has worked for me with leg pins and finger boards. Again be careful when doing that as the pins can bend or even break if they've been bent too much/too many times.

When you're ready to put them back in, the legs can be oriented wider than the socket when you've gotten it out of the socket. As always, being gentle with them to get them into the pins in the socket goes a long way. When you're fully seating them into their final position into the socket you'll want to make sure you don't bend the pcb in the process, as it can take a bit of strength to get them firmly seated. Have the board on a flat surface, or in the case of a board stack with a daughter board they're going into, pull the daughter board by itself and lay it flat. If flat isn't an option, you can support the underside of the board with a finger so that the pressure is just taking place on the socket instead of flexing the whole board, though be advised you can poke the hell out of your finger if the leads for the socket come out the back of the board far enough. A moment's pain is a fair trade for not cracking a pcb in my book, but I'm always paranoid when putting roms back in.
 
the other thing that i use is a very small wire brush the size of a toothbrush and lightly brush the legs of the rom.

and as far as removing the roms, the small screwdrivers snapon trucks and car dealers give out (the pocket kind) work well. what i do is put the screwdriver tip under one side, move it slightly, do the other side, and keep back and forth till the chip comes loose from the socket. the trick is to move it while moving it as little as possible, so you don't bend the legs all to one side.

also, if you use the brush method to clean the legs, don't apply pressure. just pull it gently across. i usually hit the legs after with a small paper towel to get any crud off that might have gotten loosened.

if the legs are real nasty and black, dipping them in tarn-x will clean them up.
 
Thanks very much! Some good advice there, I feel pretty comfortable going ahead with this. Excellent advice.

Regards,
Ryan
 
I often use a kitchen fork. Use one or two of the prongs, slightly bend them to a curve if they're to flat.
Get one side a good ways out and then go for the other side. Keep a finger on the end of the other side to make sure you dont give it to much torque and rip out the legs.
Ive broken about four of the chip remover tools and gave up on them.
 
+1. All good advice. One thing, if you want to use a wire brush (I do), go to an auto parts store and get a soft brass detailing brush. Like toothbrushes, they come in all different degrees of hardness. I have found the soft brass ones work the best. The are a little gentler on the legs.

One trick that I have found works very well with straightening chip legs out is to have a small flat piece of metal (like a clean putty knife) that is wider than the chip is long. You put the chip on its back, hold it in the center and put the metal piece between the chip and the legs and gently bend the legs out, just a little so they are all straight. Then do the same on the other side. If the legs are too wide, then just lay the chip on its side on a hard surface, like a table top and roll the whole chip towards the legs bending them slightly. Then flip it over and do it on the other side. It makes it a lot harder to over flex a single leg when you do all of them at the same time.

When replacing old chips with new unused ones, the rolling the chip on its side trick works very well to gently align the legs with the socket.

ken
 
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