ROM swap potential damage?

p1899m

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Hypothetical question. So want to try and see if I can make a venture, pepper II or mouse trap board into an Exidy Hard Hat. Although not confirmed all signs point to the fact that all these games were basically the same board set with different roms. I believe the rom image files are in MAME. If I were to get someone to burn me the roms for Hard Hat and more or less took a hit and miss approach randomly plugging the chips into sockets I know are for Rom chips but, may not be the correct location for the particular chip I am plugging in. What would be the most likely scenario. Or should I say the most likely worst case scenario? Would I damage anything? Just the roms or possibly other components? Any ideas?
 
Your best bet is to pull the schematics for those games and look to see if they are the same hardware. The schematics should also give some indication of the ROM numbering so yo should be able to figure out which ROM goes where.

Also take a look on the board itself. A lot of games have numbering on the board itself.

ken
 
According to www.arcade-history.com, the high level specs sound encouraging. Hard Hat, Venture and Pepper II all have similar hardware:
Main CPU : M6502 (@ 705.562 Khz)
Sound CPU : M6502 (@ 894.886 Khz)
Sound Chips : Custom (@ 894.886 Khz)

Screen orientation : Horizontal
Video resolution : 248 x 256 pixels
Screen refresh : 57.00 Hz
Palette Colors : 8

According to SPies, they all used the same hardware platform:

-------------------------
'Universal' Game Board V2 (xxL logic, xxA audio)
-------------------------
Kreepy Krawlers 1980 ???
Side Trak 4/1980 6502 STL, STA
Targ 6/1980 6502 HRL, HRA
Spectar 11/1980 6502 SPL, SPA

Mouse Trap 12/1981 6502 MTL, MTA
Teeter Torture 6/1981 6502 <prototype>
Venture 1981 6502 VEL, VEA

Pepper II 6/1982 6502 77-0008,77-0007 PTL, PTA
Hard Hat 1982 6502 HHL, HHA
Fax 6/1983 6502 FXL, FLA
Fax II 1984 6502 FXL, FLA

Just need to find the schematics and you should be able to nail it down.

Oh, and as a side note, Mousetrap, Hard Hat and Pepper II (and a bunch of other Exidy games) were all programmed by Larry Hutcherson.

It is also available on the ultimate arcade II (http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11231741)

ken
 
All the common 24 -pin roms except 2708 and TMS2716 should be ok to plug in, the worst that should happen is the board won't run if you put the roms in the wrong sockets.
Dick
 
I pulled a couple of the manuals off the net and Pepper II & Venture look to be the same board sets. The drawings are identical and the parts lists look to be the same with the same components in the same locations. I haven't found a Hard Hat manual, but then I only looked for about 10 minutes....:bebored:

ken
 
If you can find a Hard Hat manual that would be incredible. Although I know the production #'s were pretty low and it's possible no one has made this manual available as of yet.
 
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