Colony 7 is Alive!! But... random resets??

doodlesdaddy

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Donor 2011
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The original switcher had some cracked fuse holders, which i played around with and got the game to come up. So i went ahead and installed a new modern switcher i had, putting the -12 wire on the -5 volt spot. Game again comes up, attract mode, and i can add credits, coin counter progresses, marquee is on, coindoor lights are on, etc. Game will quickly reset about every 15 seconds. If i add credits, then start a game, it WILL NOT reset. All controls work, but when a shot is made that makes a boom sound, it will reset again. Monitor is a GO7 and has lines on it, probably needs to be capped.
Is this reseting a problem with the boards? Im pretty sure it has been turned off since 1991 or so, according to the guy i got it from. Should i just turn it on and let it run for awhile? it was on for an hour or so.

Please help!!! Im uploading a video of the problem on the other computer to show you guys.

Also, i tried to sell it as is, but nobody bought it. Im not gonna mention any names, but if you say your gonna Paypal, or send a check, why dont you follow through? Multiple people on here have said they want it, and where to send the money, but i havnt received anything!! WTF......... ok, rant over, lets get this fixed!!

BTW, its not for sale anymore, at least not at the 400 !!!!!

Ill get video up in a minute
 
That's neat.

I've seen that game somewhere, I guess I wasn't too impressed.

You've got a video RAM problem probably, judging by the horizontal bars on the screen. Reset could be anything. Do you have any way of reading/verifying the EPROMS?

If you make your way up to Columbia, bring the board- I can read the EPROMS for you.

You're going to have to find somebody hardcore that wants this machine bad. I've not seen much demand around our parts for obscure stuff.

Well, maybe Death Race...
 
Crap! i was hoping it wasnt something out of my league.....I doubt there are any replacement parts for this.... Im working on another game tommorow, so i think im gonna just turn Colony on and let it run for a few hours, maybe it will heat up and clear itself up, i dont know. I thought those bars would be corrected by a cap kit! I have a couple other GO7 monitors, but both have issues, one needs a flyback i think, which another one has, so maybe i can put one together!!!! We will see!
 
As was said, it looks like a video RAM problem. The video RAM is just a section of the the RAM chips. Not surprisingly the RAM test probably is finding it and then going on.

If you have enough (24) 4116 RAM chips try swapping them in 1 at a time until the problem clears. Or just swap them all in.

Colony 7 is Defender hardware with the sound, i/o and ROM boards collapsed onto the daughterboard, so normal Defender debugging applies. If you have (or can borrow) a working Defender MPU board, you can plug it in and see if that cleans up the image.

The ROMs are available in several of the MAME repositories.

The bars are from the board not the monitor. The curl on the monitor is from the monitor and a cap kit will help that.

The reboots are most likely a side effect of the bad RAM. The software gets hung up momentarily and then the watchdog kicks in and reboots the game.

ken
 
There is no guarantee that new RAM will fix all of the issues, but it should help you get to the next stage of debugging. 4116 RAMS can be found at a number of places at a number of different prices. One of the more reliable sources for me has been Unicorn Electronics (link to RAM page). I would probably buy the 150ns chips. I normally buy between 25 & 30 for a full set (you get a price break and have some spares in case you slip up and install 1 upside down :(). In your case you might be able to get by with less, but you will still get killed on shipping.

They are RAM chips and so don't need to be programmed (as opposed to EPROMs that do need programming). They are volatile storage meaning that when the power goes off, they lose their data. Which is fine, they will be reset the next time the game is powered up.

I am not sure that it will fix all of the reset issues, but again, if you have bad RAM (and all it takes its one) it is hard to find any real problems.

Debugging boards is just like fixing cars. First you need decent power (car: the battery, game: the power supply). Next you check the fuses (same for both). Then you check the operational components (car: fuel line, fuel pump, etc. games: the wiring, monitor, chips, etc.). If you find something wrong, you fix it. It may not get the game (or the car) 100%, but you are 1 step closer.

ken
 
Thanks for that explanation. I may try that when i get to this game. I had reseated all the chips before, so maybe i should check that again. Thanks again
 
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