Glitchy boards that you can't repair, what to do?

ifkz

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I am a very novice board repair-er and I have had hit and miss results. I have had the best luck swapping out wrenched caps, repairing physical damage, and re-burning bad EPROMS. Anything past this has been awful for me. At what point do you throw in the towel on fixing glitchy boards?

Aero Fighters/Sonic Wings - huge PCB, bought it without sound. It was fine for a bit, but now I have bad graphics glitches, it is still playable. When the PCB is flexed, sometimes full sound will kick in. No visible board damage. Time for the scrap pile, I'm sick of it. Just replace it...it is a common and inexpensive PCB.

Raiden II - no visible damage, I've gone round and round with this one. I had another parts Raiden II PCB with a bad custom. My logic probe said I had bad RAM, so I swapped that out. I also tried to swap out a mask rom. This is another scrapper, and not easily replaced on the cheap.

Out Run - bought it dead (expensive set), was able to do some basic physical repairs and I got it into test mode. The self test flagged a RAM chip as bad, so I spent $12 and a couple of hours installing. Still dead, same chip is flagged as bad. Bought a Turbo Outrun boardset, am just going to swap everything over and call it a day.

What do ya'll do? Throw it in a box? Have a broken PCB sale to try and get your money out of 'em?
 
When I come across a board that is going to take a lot of time to repair and I don't need the board up and running right this minute I just throw it into my "later" pile.


Then, on days where everything seems to be going my way, I'll pull a board or two from that pile and ruin the excellent day...
 
yeah either or.. pass em on to another klover who needs a parts board, or keep em yourself for parts.

theres nothing worse then needing some damn chip and having to wait for it, knowing you used to have several on a board you just got rid of...
 
if i got in the mood, i'd continue to trace the culprit down. surely patience is needed.
 
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Throw it in a box? Have a broken PCB sale to try and get your money out of 'em?

Those are two options, among many more. Kinda depends on what you acquired them for...

The "throw it in a box" implies a few different future possibilities:
1) you might gain skill or fancier test/diagnostic equipment in the future, and then be able to diagnose and repair it.
2) you might rob parts off of it in the future (EPROMS, CPUs, custom ICs, sound amps).
3) you might trade the box of dead boards to someone else (who may repair it or rob parts off of it).

You might also send it out to someone who can repair the board. Likely not an economical proposition if you intend to sell it, but maybe OK if you really just want to play it.

If it's a JAMMA board, you could also let your kids practice soldering on it...
 
When I come across a board that is going to take a lot of time to repair and I don't need the board up and running right this minute I just throw it into my "later" pile.


Then, on days where everything seems to be going my way, I'll pull a board or two from that pile and ruin the excellent day...


Sooooo true!

Edward
 
We all have a "soak" pile of boards to work on again at a later date. Sometimes it's something really stupid and if you come back to it later you fix it in 5 minutes or less. Two of my favorites from boards I received that were already worked on and not repaired properly:

1) Wrong replacement chip soldered in place (gets two strikes against it - never solder in a replacement chip - socket it).
2) Scratched open PCB trace under a ROM socket from an errant screwdriver.

Now two of my favorites from my own stupidity:
1) Swapping roms in wrong sockets when I replaced them after cleaning and inspection.
2) Installing a chip upside down - that one can be painful if you touch the IC after it self destructs and becomes a coffee warmer.

Then you get to the real "tough ones" like intermittents when flexing the board - that's real trial and error. I generally take a deep breath and start with the basics - check for continuity and for especially for board shorts. Board shorts happen so easily - a scratch can carry solder from one trace to another and drive you nuts looking for it.

So you are in good company - start your soak box and work on something else for awhile.

Bill
 
Thanks guys...helpful to know I'm not the only one with dead boards that won't fix. Looks like my Sonic Wings is a problem child. Flexing at a point gets my sound back and 100% stable. This is a cheap board to replace though. I've already used some of my parts PCBs for sound pots and EPROMS. Glad I had two broken Outrun sets last night, I ended up having to use the bottom board due to unexpected problems with the 'good' set.

Soak box, I like that. I'll pad them so they don't get any worse...
 
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