kalevan
Member
My latest trouble with Pacman is easy to describe: nothing happens when it's plugged in.
Skip this paragrah if you want to get right to the "good-parts." Some history here: I have recently had some trouble with the machine displaying garbage. I found that a leg on the brown socket connecting the board to the z80 had broken off. I decided that I would take this opportunity to do some fall cleaning, so I ordered a few sockets, a new fuse block, and set of fuses. After resocketing the board and reconnecting the z80 daughterboard, I disconnected the power supply, cleaned everything, replaced the 4x fuse block and fuses, reconnected everything, and attempted to power up this afternoon to find my Pacman flatlining completely; nothing. No lights, no power; apparently I messed something up.
I've spent the day afternoon searching the web and reading a number of threads here and there which describe problems similar to mine, but to be honest, I don't understand how to check for where my power is failing. I have a multimeter, but it remains mostly a mystery to me. I can check for continuity, but that's about all I can do at this point. I know the fuses are still good, but I need a crash curse in checking Pacman's vitals if I'm going to be able to see where I went wrong and have any hope of fixing it.
I have found schematics, but again, truth be told, I don't know how to read them and put them to use. I've read a few threads here that say what to check, but I'm boggled as to how to check it, so I'm going to throw myself at the board's mercy and ask for some very basic troubleshooting for dummies here. Would anyone mind telling me where to begin digging for answers and how to begin? I've been to Bob's site and Lawnmowerman's site, but what I could really use is some basic tutoring in how my multimeter can help me find the source of my Pac's woes. I've already taken the switches into account; my backdoor kill-switch and the top-mounted power switch have never worked - they seem to be bypassed. Turning it on/off has always been a matter of plugging it in/pulling it out.
I see this in the troubleshooting guide: Check the transformer's primary connections, and look for 117VAC. It also says I should check the secondaries and correlate the readings with the legend on the side of the transformers. I'd love to, but how? I know what the transformers are, but I don't know what primary/secondary connections are.
Thanks in advance for any help you can give. I'm going to keep searching tomorrow after work, but I'd appreciate any helpful advice that can be offered in the meantime. I understand that this question probably seems very basic and easy to many here, and am a bit embarrassed about being as clueless as I am!
Skip this paragrah if you want to get right to the "good-parts." Some history here: I have recently had some trouble with the machine displaying garbage. I found that a leg on the brown socket connecting the board to the z80 had broken off. I decided that I would take this opportunity to do some fall cleaning, so I ordered a few sockets, a new fuse block, and set of fuses. After resocketing the board and reconnecting the z80 daughterboard, I disconnected the power supply, cleaned everything, replaced the 4x fuse block and fuses, reconnected everything, and attempted to power up this afternoon to find my Pacman flatlining completely; nothing. No lights, no power; apparently I messed something up.
I've spent the day afternoon searching the web and reading a number of threads here and there which describe problems similar to mine, but to be honest, I don't understand how to check for where my power is failing. I have a multimeter, but it remains mostly a mystery to me. I can check for continuity, but that's about all I can do at this point. I know the fuses are still good, but I need a crash curse in checking Pacman's vitals if I'm going to be able to see where I went wrong and have any hope of fixing it.
I have found schematics, but again, truth be told, I don't know how to read them and put them to use. I've read a few threads here that say what to check, but I'm boggled as to how to check it, so I'm going to throw myself at the board's mercy and ask for some very basic troubleshooting for dummies here. Would anyone mind telling me where to begin digging for answers and how to begin? I've been to Bob's site and Lawnmowerman's site, but what I could really use is some basic tutoring in how my multimeter can help me find the source of my Pac's woes. I've already taken the switches into account; my backdoor kill-switch and the top-mounted power switch have never worked - they seem to be bypassed. Turning it on/off has always been a matter of plugging it in/pulling it out.
I see this in the troubleshooting guide: Check the transformer's primary connections, and look for 117VAC. It also says I should check the secondaries and correlate the readings with the legend on the side of the transformers. I'd love to, but how? I know what the transformers are, but I don't know what primary/secondary connections are.
Thanks in advance for any help you can give. I'm going to keep searching tomorrow after work, but I'd appreciate any helpful advice that can be offered in the meantime. I understand that this question probably seems very basic and easy to many here, and am a bit embarrassed about being as clueless as I am!
