Mystery game! Anyone recognize it?

larrylemming

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I picked this board up for a song, but neither the seller nor I can say for sure what it is. Sounded like it would be an interesting adventure. Any guesses?

Hints:
Z80 CPU with AY-3-8910A for sound
5 roms, 4 rams, and a plethora of 74LS logic IC's.
44-pin edge connector.
Several little logos on the board: a right hand holding a peace sign.
Date of 3/87 engraved in the board.

I'm going to start by tracing the power back to the edge connector, probing for a video signal, and going from there.
 

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Circular EPROM label stickers with single-digit numbers on them screams "bootleg" of some sort.

Try reading an EPROM and running it thru an ident utility. Seems much easier, and safer, than trying to guess the pinout...
 
Kudos to you, sir. I bought the identical Board #1. (Still doesn't answer the question definitely, though :p Although I know bootleg ID'ing is difficult.)

Unfortunately, I don't have a device programmer. I know I can get a Willem programmer for next to nothing, but I haven't read a lot of "good" reviews to date. I'd rather save my money for a proper universal device programmer, like a Dataman.
 
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I would just plug it in and see what comes up. You should easily be able to identify the power inputs and grounds by looking at the chip pinouts and power bus lines. Use a switching power supply to get +5V and ground hooked up, and any active edge card contacts will be video out. Just hooking up one of the RGB outs to a monitor (along with sync) should be enough to ID the board on a screen (isolation transformer *required*). 12V is typically used for audio and isn't usually needed to get a picture.

Using an old Apple II power supply, a handful of alligator clips from Radio Shack and a small selection of appropriate edge card connectors, I was once able to ID and test almost 300 unknown (and some known) game PCBs in about three hours. I ended up creating a permanent test rig with joysticks and a sound amplifier to fully test boards.
 
I would just plug it in and see what comes up. You should easily be able to identify the power inputs and grounds by looking at the chip pinouts and power bus lines. Use a switching power supply to get +5V and ground hooked up, and any active edge card contacts will be video out. Just hooking up one of the RGB outs to a monitor (along with sync) should be enough to ID the board on a screen (isolation transformer *required*). 12V is typically used for audio and isn't usually needed to get a picture.

That was my plan exactly. And I'm running the video through a VGA converter anyway, so I don't think I need the iso.
 
I am going to vote arkanoid bootleg.
in fact I think I have that same board.


I picked this board up for a song, but neither the seller nor I can say for sure what it is. Sounded like it would be an interesting adventure. Any guesses?

Hints:
Z80 CPU with AY-3-8910A for sound
5 roms, 4 rams, and a plethora of 74LS logic IC's.
44-pin edge connector.
Several little logos on the board: a right hand holding a peace sign.
Date of 3/87 engraved in the board.

I'm going to start by tracing the power back to the edge connector, probing for a video signal, and going from there.
 
Yeah I'm going to say Arkanoid as well. Look at some of the pictures of the boards I have in my ID thread. http://forums.arcade-museum.com/showthread.php?t=225318

I got at least 3 Arkanoid boards in that lot all look like that one.


After testing a rom the one on the right in this picture was Tournament Arkanoid. I have yet to build a test harness to confirm.

DSCF3630.jpg
 
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Bump for an update.

It's looking like is indeed an Arkanoid. I traced power back to the edge and auxiliary connectors, wired it up, and found the video signal, and got... a screen full of garbage. However, I did confirm that the pinout matched an Arkanoid pinout, plus there's "ARK" and a date in 1987 scratched onto the board.

I'm not convinced that the garbage screen is necessarily because the board is broken. The CPU buses appear to be buzzing away (on my scope). Plus, I'm only getting about 4.2V maximum at the board. I know this is low enough to cause issues. I'm running my test bench on an ATX power supply currently; I'm going to trade that out for a proper Happ switching power supply so I can bump up that voltage.
 
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