AMenard Posted June 6, 2018 Share Posted June 6, 2018 (edited) Hi, I've bought an "untested, power on" A2e. Of course it doesn't work as expected. I bought it to try to repair it or worst case scenario, use it for spare parts. It does power on but I get this display: What are your opinion about what could be wrong with it? Edited June 6, 2018 by AMenard Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 6, 2018 Author Share Posted June 6, 2018 Good thing, all the chips are socketed. I've got some TMS4164-20NL on order. I also have an enhance kit which include new roms, video and CPU. Will take the board out tomorrow and check the trace to see if any defect is visible. Don't seem to be any electrolitic cap on the mobo so there's one less thing to worry about. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Osgeld Posted June 6, 2018 Share Posted June 6, 2018 try reseating the ram Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted June 6, 2018 Share Posted June 6, 2018 (edited) Ensure open Apple and closed Apple keys are functional. Continuity test the function from the key switches to the motherboard to be certain. Edited June 6, 2018 by Keatah Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 7, 2018 Author Share Posted June 7, 2018 try reseating the ram Will try that tomorrow. Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 7, 2018 Author Share Posted June 7, 2018 Ensure open Apple and closed Apple keys are functional. Continuity test the function from the key switches to the motherboard to be certain. Will try that also. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Osgeld Posted June 7, 2018 Share Posted June 7, 2018 Will try that tomorrow. Thanks. Also, I dont want to insult anyone's intelligence, but there's been a number of cases round here where people take "reseat your ram" to mean yank all the ram chips out at once without looking at them and placing them back in random orientation, which of course causes damage... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 7, 2018 Author Share Posted June 7, 2018 Also, I dont want to insult anyone's intelligence, but there's been a number of cases round here where people take "reseat your ram" to mean yank all the ram chips out at once without looking at them and placing them back in random orientation, which of course causes damage... Of course not! While I don't have much experience repairing A2e I'm still an IT tech with 20 years experience under my belt. I'm just more used to more modern tech while some of you have already debugged a few and saved them from the scrap pile . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 7, 2018 Author Share Posted June 7, 2018 (edited) I took a small video of the display to better show you the problem https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=32xRlahwJ2M Edited June 7, 2018 by AMenard Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 7, 2018 Author Share Posted June 7, 2018 Taken with my ipad so the dark bar is the ipad not the display. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted June 7, 2018 Share Posted June 7, 2018 Does it look the same after 40 seconds? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 7, 2018 Author Share Posted June 7, 2018 Ithink I may have a lead.... LS166 (SN74166N) which sit between the video rom and the ram gets quite hot while everything else is cold or barely warm after a minute. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 9, 2018 Author Share Posted June 9, 2018 I'll also have to find some plastic stand-off for the motherboard as most of them are broken off. I may have to use some brass one, with fiber washer if I can't find some originals. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shoestring Posted June 19, 2018 Share Posted June 19, 2018 (edited) I'm not sure replacing the serial register will fix the problem. That's part of the character generator circuit which is fed by the character rom and all your characters appear to be fine. The LS166 clocks the data from the rom into the video output, it does this serially. Based on your video it looks to me that bad data is crashing the 6502, several things that could be causing it. Edited June 19, 2018 by shoestring Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 21, 2018 Author Share Posted June 21, 2018 Receiverd 12 new ram chips. Will swap the old one tomorrow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shoestring Posted June 21, 2018 Share Posted June 21, 2018 How do the +5 voltages look at the chips ? If replacing the DRAMs doesn't help you could try The two LS244 address line buffers near the CPU. If you have a logic probe those are easy to troubleshoot. Verify roms at UE8 and UE10, those are tied directly to the address and data bus of the CPU. MMU @ UE4 The Output enables and DRAM RW enables.( UB8, UE1 and UE4 ) FInally try swapping the CPU. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMenard Posted June 21, 2018 Author Share Posted June 21, 2018 How do the +5 voltages look at the chips ? If replacing the DRAMs doesn't help you could try The two LS244 address line buffers near the CPU. If you have a logic probe those are easy to troubleshoot. Verify roms at UE8 and UE10, those are tied directly to the address and data bus of the CPU. MMU @ UE4 The Output enables and DRAM RW enables.( UB8, UE1 and UE4 )[/size] FInally try swapping the CPU. Will try that, thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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