Help, my stqr wars is on the blink: literally

Black Matrix

Well-known member
Joined
Dec 21, 2006
Messages
3,290
Reaction score
35
Location
Greeneville, Tennessee
Hey All,
I just attemped a repair/upgrade to my Star Wars upright. I tried replacing the wiring harness connector for the pcb. It was working when last I plugged it in a week ago. Didn't bother to check it before the repair. After I replaced the, edge connector, Now, the spot killer will intermittanltly come on. Its mostly off, but the screen does come on and you can see the normal image on screen. I presumably have a loose wire that I have been unable to find with a visual inspection. Does anyone, know which wire or wires might cause this behavior. I hope someone can point me in the right direction.
 
Rule number one: If it ain't broke don't fix it.

Why would you mess with the harness if the game was working? Was the original edge connector burned or broken?
 
No, the edge connector worked fine. The edge connectors often don't make good connection which cause the AR-II board to blow. I had already performed a sense mod to prevent the AR-II from blowing. But if the connector isn't making good connection, the pcb will get hot and burn. So I was trying to bulletproof the game as best I could.

The short of it is I made the mistake of listening to M Spaeth who has repeatedly implied that one is a lazy slacker to perform the sense mod instead of replacing the connector.

Now my ESB is down. Thanks mark :(
 
well the sense is there for a reason.
i agree dont mod it.
if everything is working as it should then you dont need to do the mod. and the sense mod is not bulletproffing a game.

also if you belive you have a bad edge connector, why not fix the edge connector?
if that is the problem then fix the problem.
which is the best and only way to bulletproof a game.

but as that 80's guy said why are you touching it in the first place, the game was working fine. just enjoy it.

i dont have the scematics infront of me, but you should get them off the web. they are easy to find.
atari makes great schematics and you will know exactly which pins you need to check.

good luck
frank

i will check for you tommorrow night if no one has .
but you should download and print it out anyway.
 
I have a Star Wars UR and have never had one problem with the edge connector. I've never even heard that "edge connectors often don't make good connection which cause the AR-II board to blow". If the edge connector isn't making good contact there are ways to try and fix it without replacing it. Replaceing it should be your last option after trying everything else.
 
At the moment it looks as though the problem may be in the board itself. Haven't had enough time to really test multiple theories out yet. But I did redo the bottom video pins for the cable and swap in the ESB with a spare SW and it booted up as normal. So perhaps now is the question, does anyone know what could cause a working star wars board to repeatedly kick the spot killer on. As it comes on, you can see the game. But it may be resetting(I can't recall if it gets off the high scores screen.)
 
Back
Top Bottom