Punisher5.0 Posted September 8, 2017 Share Posted September 8, 2017 The story starts out when I was a kid I had bought a model one system off a friend. The only catch though was you had to put weight (like a book) on the end of the power plug going into the unit for the system to have power. I eventually sold that in a garage sale. Several years later I get a model 2 unit but this one has bad audio....wtf. I dealt with it though to play Road Rash when I had a hankerin for it. Fast forward to a week ago when I got an Everdrive and quickly found out that the messed up audio is just not going to cut it. It was completely killing the experience. Those awesome Genesis beats were full of distortion and super quiet......argh. Over the last weekend I decide to check out EBay for a cheap core unit and I found one for only $15 shipped. It looked a little beat up but I didn't care because I had good plastic from my other one I could transplant. It arrived today and I was pretty excited to come home and finally play some proper Genesis! Got it all hooked up and the controller is working like total crap.......you got to be f-ing kidding me!!!!!!! It's like a damn nightmare. I take it apart and found several broken solder joints from the port to the motherboard on the system. This was a great sign because that's what I was thinking initially and it would be an easy fix. I reflowed both controller ports and then added some hot glue to the plastic for better support to help prevent it from happening again. I then cleaned out the cart port while it was apart and fired her up and..... After 20 years I can now finally enjoy some Genesis without problems! Now to look for a 32X! 11 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
H454 Posted September 8, 2017 Share Posted September 8, 2017 Good to hear! Was it listed as broken? Or just untested - sold as is? Buying broken stuff and repairing is a great way to a little $ and kept an old systems going. The only listings I'm Leary about are the one pic, one sentence listings. If some doesn't care enough to put more than 30 seconds into a listing, than they probable have no qualms about trying to put one over on someone. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Punisher5.0 Posted September 8, 2017 Author Share Posted September 8, 2017 Good to hear! Was it listed as broken? Or just untested - sold as is? Buying broken stuff and repairing is a great way to a little $ and kept an old systems going. The only listings I'm Leary about are the one pic, one sentence listings. If some doesn't care enough to put more than 30 seconds into a listing, than they probable have no qualms about trying to put one over on someone. That's how this one was listed. It said working. I guess it didn't say fully working lol. The guy probably just hooked it up to a tv and saw that it turned on and felt that was enough. I'm not going to raise a stink about it because he surprisingly used two day shipping and got it out fast even with free shipping. At $15 there couldn't have been much left on the bone. It was fun diving into it too to tell the truth. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flojomojo Posted September 8, 2017 Share Posted September 8, 2017 LOL that story was a lot more interesting than I expected it to be from the title. It's not like Genesis systems are rare or difficult to obtain! But fixing them is harder. Well done! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+-^CrossBow^- Posted September 8, 2017 Share Posted September 8, 2017 That's how this one was listed. It said working. I guess it didn't say fully working lol. The guy probably just hooked it up to a tv and saw that it turned on and felt that was enough. I'm not going to raise a stink about it because he surprisingly used two day shipping and got it out fast even with free shipping. At $15 there couldn't have been much left on the bone. It was fun diving into it too to tell the truth. Yeah if the seller sent it 2 day priority shipping and it was free with the auction, then you got a great deal! I've shipped Genesis systems before and it ran me about $13.80 I think? Depends on how large a box and how much packing I use. I just sent an Intellivision back up to Washington state area and didn't like the box it originally came shipped to me in, so after fixing it up I sent it in a bigger box with more packing material and it ran me... $23 and some change to ship it 1st class. Priority would have been just under $30! so... you got a good deal on that Genesis whether it was working or not honestly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
keepdreamin Posted September 10, 2017 Share Posted September 10, 2017 Good job, that system definitely saw some abuse. Can't say I've ever come across a Genesis busted at the controller port solder pads. Wonder if the previous owner had the thing running on the floor and stepped too close to it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruce Tomlin Posted September 17, 2017 Share Posted September 17, 2017 Many years ago I found a Model 2 from a thrift store on which about half of the connector pins (including the power jack!) had bad solder joints. The ring cracks are very obvious in your first picture. My original Macintosh from 1985 also developed a ring crack on the video pin of the connector on the motherboard. That was my first ever encounter with bad solder joints, and it was really annoying until I figured it out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Punisher5.0 Posted September 18, 2017 Author Share Posted September 18, 2017 Many years ago I found a Model 2 from a thrift store on which about half of the connector pins (including the power jack!) had bad solder joints. The ring cracks are very obvious in your first picture. My original Macintosh from 1985 also developed a ring crack on the video pin of the connector on the motherboard. That was my first ever encounter with bad solder joints, and it was really annoying until I figured it out. I'm going to have to take it back apart and check out the power jack too. Sometimes I have to twist it to make a good contact. I also recently got a 32X and it works great except for the fact that it somehow feeds power through the video port to the Genesis so the only way to shut the system off is to unplug it. I have to go into that one eventually too. Going through all of this makes me appreciate Nintendo's quality more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+-^CrossBow^- Posted September 18, 2017 Share Posted September 18, 2017 I'm going to have to take it back apart and check out the power jack too. Sometimes I have to twist it to make a good contact. I also recently got a 32X and it works great except for the fact that it somehow feeds power through the video port to the Genesis so the only way to shut the system off is to unplug it. I have to go into that one eventually too. Going through all of this makes me appreciate Nintendo's quality more. The AV cable you are using from the Genesis to the 32x isn't an official cable then. The problem you are having is because your cable is supplying +5 volt on pin 5 of the cable I believe. So basically the power from the 32x is back feeding into the Genesis and causing it to stay on. Google around a bit about it and you will see. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Punisher5.0 Posted September 18, 2017 Author Share Posted September 18, 2017 The AV cable you are using from the Genesis to the 32x isn't an official cable then. The problem you are having is because your cable is supplying +5 volt on pin 5 of the cable I believe. So basically the power from the 32x is back feeding into the Genesis and causing it to stay on. Google around a bit about it and you will see. Thanks for the info. I was wondering if something might be going on with the cable. Why would they make it like that? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+-^CrossBow^- Posted September 18, 2017 Share Posted September 18, 2017 Only seen this happen from 3rd party cables. Console5.com sells the same cable, but he pulls the offending pin off the 32x connection side to prevent this. I use this cable from him on my model 1 and it actually looks better than the official sega cable with the required adapter. https://console5.com/store/sega-32x-mega-32x-to-genesis-2-or-genesis-3-av-link-cable-basic.html There is also a gold plated version but not sure if the extra $5 for it will really worth the difference in anything? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Punisher5.0 Posted September 18, 2017 Author Share Posted September 18, 2017 Only seen this happen from 3rd party cables. Console5.com sells the same cable, but he pulls the offending pin off the 32x connection side to prevent this. I use this cable from him on my model 1 and it actually looks better than the official sega cable with the required adapter. https://console5.com/store/sega-32x-mega-32x-to-genesis-2-or-genesis-3-av-link-cable-basic.html There is also a gold plated version but not sure if the extra $5 for it will really worth the difference in anything? I just pulled out the 5V pin in the cable and it works perfectly now. Thank you very much to alerting me to this. I feel a lot better using the system now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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