Robotron - never lose a man

morphis72

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My Robotron has an interesting issue that I'm not even sure how to tackle. I picked this up non working and replaced the ribbon cables and the molex connecters. voltages are good and the game boots with no errors. The self test also finds no issues. I was about 15 minutes into the best game of Robotron I have ever played when I realized the reason I was doing so well was because when I died I didn't lose a life. I could just keep playing forever. If i reboot the game a few times this bug goes away and the game plays normally. But almost every time I boot it up after it's been off for a while when you start a game you can't lose a man.

Anyone got an idea on what to do here?
 
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That's an interesting one. When it's in this mode how many men does it show left? Is it possible you are losing men but you started with some ridiculous number like 255 men? Since it can only show a limited number it may look like they are not going down even though they are. If this is the case I would start by looking into the NVRAM, maybe the number of extra lives setting is not working properly.
 
I like my new JROK Robotron, even though a minute or two is the longest I ever last.
 
That's an interesting one. When it's in this mode how many men does it show left? Is it possible you are losing men but you started with some ridiculous number like 255 men? Since it can only show a limited number it may look like they are not going down even though they are. If this is the case I would start by looking into the NVRAM, maybe the number of extra lives setting is not working properly.


Hum, when it starts the score is at zero and I think there are maybe 10 men or so at the top of the screen. Not the normal 3.
 
Verify the EPROMS, it's possible you're not necessarily not losing lives, but rather you have an enormous amount of them.

You might need to reburn the chips or you might need new chips in general
 
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Following. I experience the same issue with my Robotron from time to time.
 
Had something similar on my Sinistar - unlimited guys.

The scores, etc. weren't saving either, after the lithium battery upgrade.

Replacing the CMOS took care of everything.

Are your scores saving properly? If so, you may need to do a factory reset and see if that helps you.
 
it's CMOS corruption. often times it'll crank the difficulty to like 15 (which is amusing on Sinistar). the infinite lives thing is basically a corrupted setting in the CMOS where it's supposed to assign a value of how many lives you have, instead of it being like 5, it's 82537825725. or, it could be a bad CMOS, as also noted.

if ever you encounter a game that loads but immediately resets when the high score table comes up, it's the same thing. corrupted high scores will cause the game to reset.

just go into the settings mode and force a factory reset, clear bookkeeping totals, and high score table reset. make sure you have good batteries installed. if you have the original AA holder, ensure that it's actually working (measure from the - in the lower right corner to the + in the upper left, or more accurately, from ground to the last pin of the CMOS)

if you have corrosion or outgassed batteries or a broken battery holder by way of the terminals dying, you may entertain going either the lithium or NVRAM routes. (necessary cleanup if the diodes or traces have corrosion will have to be done first with lithium)
 
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