Ms. Pacman/Galaga reunion PCB issues - missing starfield on Galaga
Hey guys,
I recently purchased a Ms. Pacman/Galaga 20 Year Reunion (Class of 1981) original cocktail arcade cabinet. Everything works great except Galaga and the main game selection screen are missing the starfield. Instead you just get a black screen in the background while playing Galaga. When the board boots up it display no errors and all ROM checks are good. Gameplay is perfectly fine and there are no graphic glitches except for the missing starfield.
I went ahead and purchased a used PCB on Ebay, swapped it out, and now everything is great. I took the 2 chips (U13, U14) off the defective PCB, placed them in the new board, and everything still worked just fine. I then took the 2 chips off the new board and placed them in the old board, booted it up, and it's still missing the starfield. Obviously all the chips are good and there's something wrong with the PCB itself.
Based on research I've done on this site and in general, it seems that sometimes the Galaga PCB needs more power. I've tried adjusting the power on my power supply, and my multimeter read 4.85v originally, and I adjusted it up to 5.3v...no difference, so power doesn't seem to be an issue here.
Anybody have any idea what could be wrong with the board? I haven't had much luck finding troubleshooting information on these reunion boards, mostly the original individual boards. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
Hey guys,
I recently purchased a Ms. Pacman/Galaga 20 Year Reunion (Class of 1981) original cocktail arcade cabinet. Everything works great except Galaga and the main game selection screen are missing the starfield. Instead you just get a black screen in the background while playing Galaga. When the board boots up it display no errors and all ROM checks are good. Gameplay is perfectly fine and there are no graphic glitches except for the missing starfield.
I went ahead and purchased a used PCB on Ebay, swapped it out, and now everything is great. I took the 2 chips (U13, U14) off the defective PCB, placed them in the new board, and everything still worked just fine. I then took the 2 chips off the new board and placed them in the old board, booted it up, and it's still missing the starfield. Obviously all the chips are good and there's something wrong with the PCB itself.
Based on research I've done on this site and in general, it seems that sometimes the Galaga PCB needs more power. I've tried adjusting the power on my power supply, and my multimeter read 4.85v originally, and I adjusted it up to 5.3v...no difference, so power doesn't seem to be an issue here.
Anybody have any idea what could be wrong with the board? I haven't had much luck finding troubleshooting information on these reunion boards, mostly the original individual boards. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.


