Getting a PP up and running

jmduncan

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In the next few days I am going to be bringing a PP upright back from the dead. When I picked up the cabinet it was pretty much complete, except for the boards and ARII's which were taken for repair and never returned to the previous owner.

I have some ARII's on the way and am picking up some boardsets. My concern is how should I go about hooking everything up?

Should I install the ARII's fire up the machine and check voltage before I plug in the edge connector?

Everything in the machine is original (or at least has some age to it) so I was wondering if I should do anything else before firing it up.

i.e. sense mod, solder wires to F3.....

As usual thank you for the help!
 
PP

Any new game I pick up even if I bought it as working, I check & test before powering the boards.

Always go on the side of caution.

Good luck with the PP!
 
You'll need some sort of load to accurately measure the voltages without the boards. Do you have all unknown boardsets, none that could be "sacrificial" per se?

As far as getting it working...once you determined you have a boardset that seems like its working, I would do the sense mod (although some argue that just bypasses the fact that that edge connectors need to be replaced), but on top of that, do the 5V line mod where you connect all the 5v test points and then all the ground test points on each board with some wire, and tie those to the 5v and grounds off of that boards edge connector. That way it bypasses the bad edge connector pins that are probably bad and were questionable even when new, at least for the amount of current these boards need.

The reason you have to specifically use the 5v line for each board from that boards proper edge connector is because each AR powers each board seperately, you can't just tie them all together. When I did mine, I used molex plugs - that way you can still remove the boards if you need to.

Last but not least, you can always just unhook the DC side of the power brick and use a switcher.

Just search for pole position 5v mod I'm sure there's tons of pics and posts.
 
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I may have a sacrificial set to do some testing. I will be picking up " Miscelaneous PCBs... (consider all not working but one set of PPII which work with graphics issues in mountains)" from a KLOV member tomorrow. I was kinda on edge with the sense mod and 5v line mod since there seem to be so many opinions on the topic, but I was looking for some better pictures of the 5v line mod before I went making any connections. I completely understand the directions and the purpose, but I guess I always like to be able to visualy verify that what I have done is correct. I have never liked letting the smoke out of anything that cost me money..... I will do some more searching within the site for the 5v line mod and post some pictures and stuff as I get rolling along. thanks for the advice.
 
@supertechnoboy, I have watched your video several times and found it very useful. Thanks for posting a reply here.

@orion3311, I have an old PC power supply laying around and was thinking of installing it to bypass the ARII issues, but again I cant seem to find a concrete way of hooking it up. I understand disconecting the DC side, but is there something that needs to be done to disable the circuits on the DC side so the ARII will not continue to generate the 5v and cause issues? Also what is the best way to power up the switcher?
 
@supertechnoboy, I have watched your video several times and found it very useful. Thanks for posting a reply here.
Glad you liked it! Orion3311 is correct, there are lots of different opinions on the sense mod.

Here's my opinion: By adding four jumper wires (+5 and GND from each ARII to each PCB) you can fix all of the voltage sensing and edge connector burning issues. This method leaves your ARIIs AND your harness completely intact. If someone wants to replace the edge connectors later, all they have to do is remove the four jumpers, and they're back to a stock machine. In my opinion, this is easier than doing the sense mod, or re-pinning the edge connector, or hooking up a switcher, and it has no detrimental effects on the original equipment.
 
Thanks again. I should be working on the machine in the next few days and I will let you all know what I decided to do and how things worked out.....
 
So couldnt I just pull the pins from each ARII connector, then pin in a new wire and run them to the +5V and GRD test points on each board? I would still have the harness in tact and be bypassing the edge connector as well......
 
Sure why not, thats a little more work than just splicing into the existing wiring but it would mean fresh clean wire (preferably a little heavier - I used 16ga) and not cutting anything. Works for me.
 
I thought you may say that. Where can I find a downloadable manual so I can look at the schematic for the wires to pull from the connectors? (+5V is red/white I think)
 
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