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Identifying original Pac Man board?


Pm3

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There's no good way to tell from that angle. Please pull the PCB and take some hi-res pics of it.

 

The monitor and power supply look original - which is good - but chances are that one or the other or both are the issue, assuming that the PCB (and its components) is in good shape.

 

What I can say is that there's no speed-up button on the player 2 side of the control panel, so it likely never received that common upgrade / modification.

 

If you drop in a coin (or coin it up via the coin mechs), does it play blind? I.E., do you get sound but no video?

 

Start with the power supply. Make sure it's outputting the voltages that it should be, and go from there.

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Thanks, I haven't put power on it yet just got it home, the guy I paid $150 to for it said the little light bulbs that light up the player control panels come on but thats all. I think I paid 100 too much for it LOL. I will troubleshoot the voltages this weekend when I have more time, and take better pictures.

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Found something not happy with, looks like it has been converted to ms pac.. what do I need to make it back original Pac Man? Is the Z80 cpu on the ms pac pcb the same as the original Z80? If it is do I just dissconnect the ribbon and take the z80 cpu off the ms pac card and put it on the Pac Man card? Also the ROMs on the Pac Man card, are they Pac Man or ms pac ROMS? Thanks!

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Edited by Pm3
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Yep, that's a Pac-Man PCB with a Ms. Pac-Man daughtercard. It can be converted back relatively easily, but Pac-Man PCBs aren't hard to come by, either. Right now, though, I wouldn't worry about that as much as just getting it working. The good news is that it powers up and you get what looks to be a stable picture, so there is hope if you're willing to invest some elbow grease.

 

Suggestions in order:

 

- Clean the entire thing inside and out, including the PCB and controls (separate them from the control panels). Trust me, it'll make it far better to work on.

 

- Check the PCB for loose ICs - try resocketing everything. If you feel up to it, carefully pull each IC, clean its legs with a pencil eraser (making sure to not leave any rubber residue behind), and plug them back in. May want to also hit the sockets with some QD Electronic Cleaner spray while you're at it.

 

- Look for signs of damage to the PCB and obviously-shot components while you're doing that.

 

- Check voltages at the power supply. Can't stress this enough. May also be worth replacing it with a switching power supply and adjusting the voltages as necessary.

 

Also, start with this Google search and go from there. I can tell you that all of the results on the first page are going to be very relevant.

 

Finally, there's always KLOV.

 

One thing that did stand out to me: there's a giant capacitor at the edge of the PCB that appears to have two red wires that have been cut coming off of it. It's been over a decade since I last owned either a Pac-Man or Ms. Pac-Man, but I know that's not right.

 

Late edit: I just noticed that you're missing an IC at position 4M. That is likely a contributing factor.

 

The good news is that both Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man are two of the most common arcade games out there, parts are available, and there's a lot of brain trust surrounding them. As a result, you're in a pretty good position to get it up and running again with some assistance if you're willing to give it a shot.

 

Whatever you do, don't just dump it. The monitor looks to be in working condition, and if you've got a solid, non-water-damaged (or hacked-up) cabinet, you can probably resell that as non-working for what you're in it if you decide that it's not something you want to pursue.

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Thanks, I took the video and screenshots before I pulled the PCB out. I pulled the 4m ram chip out after comparing my screen with pictures here https://www.mikesarcade.com/arcade/pactrouble.html It said cause for a screen similar to mine was bad 2114 video ram chip at 4M, well it broke all apart as it came loose, the pins were half gone or broke off inside the socket connector. I ordered 6 new 2114 ram chips and also new sockets if they need replaced.

 

I spoke with Mike at the site I linked above and he looked at the picture of my PCB and noticed those wires soldered on top of that cap and said it looked as if the previous owner or tech wired directly to the component instead of fixing bad edge connector.. I will work on fixing that edge connector if I can get the thing to work.

 

Thanks again, will do as you suggest and clean it up, hopefully the rest of the PCB chips are ok, the six 2114 ram chips in row 4 I ordered I read they are problematic so replacing all of those, 2 bucks each, hoping that fixes the problem. Also going to replace the fuse holders, some are not tight.

 

Havent found the troubleshooting info to test the voltages, where are they? Thanks for the help

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That's all I get, the new ram chip will be here friday, maybe I will send this card off to get rebuilt back to a pac man card.. instead of try to fix it

 

 

Swap the RAM and let's see what happens.

 

In the meantime: if you haven't run across it already, visit http://www.fixyourpacman.com/pacman-manuals/. Both the Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man manuals are there in PDF format, and should have the info you need re: voltages, etc.

 

One thing to consider about deconversion: you're going to have to fix the problems you're seeing now before you can do that in any sort of effective way. Ms. Pac-Man was basically an add-on to a Pac-Man PCB (that's oversimplifying things a bit, but close enough for the point I'm making), so any problems you're seeing now are likely to carry over into a deconversion.

 

That's not to say that the Ms. Pac-Man modifications aren't causing the problems you're seeing now, but we just don't know. From the standpoint of troubleshooting this thing, getting a working Ms. Pac-Man out of it then reverting it to Pac-Man is going to be your best (read: least-complicated) course of action. There are possibly multiple issues at play, and adding the deconversion into the mix at the same time would only add complication. Best to keep it simple to start with.

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Thanks.. I am thinking that pulling that 4M ram out may not have been the best thing to do to start troubleshooting.. done now though so I will find out if that is a problem.

 

I just watched this video of someone doing exactly what I need to, the revert back to Pac Man from Ms Pac and I believe all I will have to recon are the 5E and 5F character eproms like he had to https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rQEXAnsEQ9o

 

I will leave the Ms Pac card in for now and continue trying to get it working before reverting back to Pac Man, thanks again for the help!

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Going to go out today and check for that envelope that I know should be there... and than check for correct voltage at the power supply. Will take my new fuses out of the block and try squeezing the holders in without breaking them to make a tighter connection, I noticed at least one was not making a good contact and had to move it a little to get it to work.. next purchase will be fuse blocks I think

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Are the brown blobs a type of resister? I went to electronic school in the late 80s well radar jamming school, but I don't recall learning about brown blobs. Both types are labeled a "cp" and my board has what looks like resisters where the other board looks like a brown blob. Now I will go look on the scematic and see what a "cp" is...

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new ram didnt fix it, but it did reduce the amount of random junk blinking on and off, now its only 3 small figures that blink, no long line of stuff.. that puzzles me.. something isnt right. wonder how to test that video driver daughter card? power was a solid 5 volts at c2 and c3 so dont think its a power supply problem. I haven't touched a circuit card in over 20 years, did that in the military for a few years, than changed career fields, I will pull out the wiring diagram and see if I can make sense of it, and unfook my edge connector also that the last owner fooked all up.. im wondering if he has something wired incorrectly and gave up on fixing it.. he has a few wires pulled out of the ec and hard wired to the components on the board but I haven't checked the wire diagram to confirm any of its correct.

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Bought an original Pac Man board for $26. It has not been modified with Ms Pac, looks to be the original ROMS https://www.ebay.com/itm/Pacman-board-1-tagged-working-sold-untested-as-is-/223063779828?nma=true&si=mi7kilASQzjuznySvCHy5Nr1YTY%253D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

If it dont work I hear a guy named Slava fixes them for a fair charge.

 

I checked the volts on every chip on my board and all 5 volts, I did find one thing wrong with it, last owner wired two pins directly to component for some reason maybe edge wasnt connecting on those two pins.. but only one was correct, the orange wire from pin 3 from left side of the ec does go to the top of D8 but pin 4 the green wire traces from the ec to the top of D7 and whoever did it soldered it to the bottom of it, wonder if that is a prob? The pic was taken right after I cut the wires to pull the board out, since than I crimped connectors on the wires to test with, going to take the green wire off the bottom of D7 and solder it to the top of D7 where the edge connector pin trace goes and see what difference it makes, and order a new edge connector and fix that mess

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Edited by Pm3
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I am definitely not hooking the pcb I just bought on ebay up to this harness.. The mess below is the board that came in the game.. I think whoever worked on it was drunk and gave up and just sold the machine.

 

This is the mess I found, Pins 1 and 2 were detached from the edge connector and wired together and soldered to the ground side of C29, I don't see how that could be correct? Looks to me like they should be going to C7 and C8, not C29? The first thing I did was sever that connection.

 

Pin 3 detached from edge connector and jumped directly to unbanded D8, that was the only thing I see that he got right according to the wiring diagram, and I had the correct 7 volts AC there.

 

Pin 4 was soldered to the banded side of D7 which should have went to the unbanded side, I fixed that and am only getting 4 volts AC so that I have to figure out why I don't have 7 volts.

 

The second pic is from Mikes site, he has pinouts for AC and DC, I don't understand the DC pinout, I believe the AC pinout is the only one that pertains to stock original Pac Man is that correct?

 

I am not sure I am measuring AC volts correctly, if someone can refresh my memory please, easy from an outlet you put the fluke on AC and put a lead in each hole, but on the pcb I am not sure.

 

Also how do I measure the volts center tap?

 

Thanks!

 

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The ebay one is better..

 

All the sounds work in test mode, other one nothing in test.. neither board does the rom test, not sure how to do that, I was switching dip 7 to on not sure if that is it?

I will continue testing sunday

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Got Pac Man, the first board I gave up on, the ebay board had a bad 6F rom and a bad Vram addresser, shotgun troubleshooting the row 6 roms swapping between the two cards, identified bad 6F that got the game but still had garbage on screen, decided to swap Vram addresser cards and bam got a good game, but have to get good Pac Man character roms the ebay card had the original roms but 5E had a broken pin, also have to get a regular speed 6F, the one I have is a speeded up version and I like the regular original speed.

 

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Edited by Pm3
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