Gottlieb Sys 80B Locking up

NeP

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I have a Hollywood Heat that sometimes plays fine, and sometimes resets. It also will lock up and not boot sometimes as well. When this happens, there is nothing on the score display, and about 10 or 20 lights on the top half of the playfield play through in a chase sequence, like a severely crippled attract mode - but with no sound and no display. Usually I will have to power it off for a while to get it back to working.

I have read through Clay's repair resources, and followed the trouble-shooting. The MPU is getting 5.1V. The lock-up happens when the external reset board is not plugged into the MPU. When the game is locked up, the +5V on 6502 is pulsing, about every second or half second.

So finally, my question. Does this sound like the watchdog reset section of the MPU needs to be rebuilt/replaced? I cut the original battery off, and there did not appear to be any leakage. But I know that it can be difficult to see. I also know there are eleventy edge connectors that could be re-pinned or replaced, but before i jump into that, I am trying to focus on one thing at a time.

Anyone have any thoughts?
 
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No, not that one.... The one that's actually soldered on the MPU. IF you do have it; try to press down on it a couple of times and report back.
 
Just to be clear, this is the board that I'm talking about that I disconnected while trouble-shooting.

Are you asking about the ROM board right next to it (to the left)? If so, are you thinking I should see if it's loose, or see if it affects the reset/lock-up by pressing down while it is locked up?

Either way, I'll try tonight when I get to my machine. Thanks for the suggestion.
 

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That's the reset board..... I always unplug those on ALL of my Gottliebs. Thy're useless for homeuse pins...

The one I'm talking about is just to the left of the reset board. There is a tiny little board stacked on top of the MPU board.... These are notorious for cracked solder joints.... This *might* be your issue.
 
OK, you may be onto something. I powered the game (with nothing but the display and power hooked up to the MPU) on and it was working. I pressed gently on the soldered on ROM board and got it to lock up. Power off, then back on, and it was working. It seemed like I could get it to lock-up by pressing the board gently, but not un-lock by pressing it.

After I left the game on for about 15 minutes (untouched), it had locked up and would not turn on again, despite powering it off and on.

It definitely sounds like a cold-solder issue to me. So I will try to re-solder the board connections (both the ROM to the board and the board to the MPU) and test again.
 
I removed the board, re-soldered the pins on the back, and then re-re-soldered the board back onto the MPU. After more than an hour of being on, I am pleased to report that it didn't lock up even once.

Thanks again for the tip!
 
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