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Odyssey 2 keyboard not working


TheCoolDave

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Hi,

 

I have 2 of these systems. The one I have I wanted because it has removable controllers (and it has a no gloss keyboard). The keyboard does not appear to work, when I turn the system on I just get "Select Game" but, pushing 1 or 2 does nothing. Same on a 2nd keyboard.

 

I opened it, disconnected the ribbon cable and cleaned the connectors on it with no change. I opened a 2nd console, cleaned the connectors and I still get nothing on it.

 

Is there a trick on these to reset the keyboard or it possible something blew that is causing the keyboard to fail ?

 

I was about to pull the silver cover off to pull the keyboard to see if there is any noticed damage or something that could be shorting it out but, figured I would post here first... I've been working on this for 2 days and not getting anywhere with it...

 

ANY idea on this one ?

Edited by TheCoolDave
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Make sure there are no tears on the ribbon cable, I ll need to double check but I think it connects to a hex inverter , so that could be bad

 

They are both smooth right from the top of the case.. No pinches/tears or anything like that.

 

I'm wondering if there is a circuit level thing wrong.

 

So close but so far...(I got the A/V mod done and it looks great....well at least "Select Game" on a black screen)

 

What is this hex converter you speak of ?

Edited by TheCoolDave
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it is going to be the chip that the keyboard header is connected to,

 

I was hoping not to take off the bottom shield but, I guess I am going to have to... sigh. I noticed one chip kind of popped up a little (not the one directly connected to the header but, the solder connections look fine) , so I might check all the connections below and add a little solder to each one to make a better connection.

 

Here I goes a 1/2 hour of soldering to get it off.. Hated they did this on early consoles... a few screws would of done fine !

 

Looking over the board, no popped or pregnant caps, or another no parts looked burned out... It over all looks good, a little spot of rust by the edge were the shield is but, to be expected from a console from the late 70's to early 80's...

Edited by TheCoolDave
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You are inserting a working game, correct? I've also seen where the cart or cart port is dirty and the system just locks up there when you power it on...

 

Could be weak power supply locking it up also.

Edited by R.Cade
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You are inserting a working game, correct? I've also seen where the cart or cart port is dirty and the system just locks up there when you power it on...

 

Could be weak power supply locking it up also.

 

Yes, a working game, I tried 3-4 of them, these are cleaned games that I have had from when the systems were new. I also cleaned the slot, so every game I drop in gets "Select Game" in color.

 

I have 1 OEM power cord and I have a modern cord that fits the voltage perfectly. I am using the modern cord but, tried the OEM with no change.

 

It seems like it is going to work, just when I it says "Select Game" pressing 1 or 2 does nothing at all, on both systems.

 

Any other ideas or should I be shopping for a 3rd system ?

Edited by TheCoolDave
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I once had an O2, and I disconnected the keyboard ribbon cable for some reason. Maybe the keyboard wasn't working fully already. Can't really remember. But I couldn't get the keyboard to work at all after that. Ended up giving it away for parts.

 

It's just strange that 2 systems are doing the same exact thing... Are these keyboards really funky once they are unplugged ?

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have spent a LOT of time trying to figure this out and now I hit a brick wall...

 

I am hoping others can point me in the right direction here.

 

So I have 2 O2 systems doing the same exact thing. I noticed one looks like the ribbon cable is kind of browned out in some parts, using a voli-meter, I noticed that it's not getting a full signal through one of the pins, I tried one of those conductive pens to see if I could get a signal across but, not strong enough... VERY disapointed as this was the flat finsih keyboard that I really wanted. The glossy keyboards tend to get scrached up. SIgh...

 

My orginal console, has the controllers attached and has a glossy keyboard.

 

So my old system (that I have had from the 80's), I did a volti-meter test on the each of the pins, everything gets a connection I did a quck A/V mod to it and use that for testing going forward.

 

BOTH consoles show the SAME EXACT result (using the one with attached controllers and one that has plugin controlers.. Putting in 3-4 diffent games. If I press 0-3 nothing happens. BUt, if I hit the RESET button, the screen flashes like it's reseting the system.

 

So, we found a schematic for the Oddsey 2. and it appears that the keyboard connection goes through 2 chips before hitting the main CPU, these chips are under 0.50 each, so I was thinking about replacing them as one could be burnt out...

 

All in all, what do you think is wrong here.. Seeing that BOTH consoles do the same exact thing (reset button is the only thing that reponds) What would you think is wrong...do I have a bad keyboard, or bad chips.. or ? I was thinking about just trying to find a 3rd console...

 

Thoughts ?

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Ive run across this problem a few times but the culprit is usually the membrane keyboard. Ive had a few dozen 02s and about a quarter of them had keyboard issues.

Im not saying it cant be the chips but in my experience the keyboard is the likely problem.

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Ive run across this problem a few times but the culprit is usually the membrane keyboard. Ive had a few dozen 02s and about a quarter of them had keyboard issues.

Im not saying it cant be the chips but in my experience the keyboard is the likely problem.

 

I pulled the silver edge off so the keyboard is opened but, it' seems glued to the case. Is this removable ? It's just a membrane keyboard, they can be fixed if they dont get damaged removing them...

 

It's just odd that they BOTH do the same thing. I really want to get to the bottom of this console and try to get it resolved. I'm almost tempted to buy a 3rd console just for parts if it does not work...praying for a working keyboard....

 

Are these consoles this bad with the keyboard and is this a very common problem with them ?

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I think the way you figure this out is to somehow isolate where you think the problem might be and then do some additional testing. Don't get frustrated if it takes time. You CAN figure this out. Identifying those 2 chips is a great start. You could try replacing those for sure.

 

You say you have a working O2 with a working keyboard right? Why not try one of these keyboards that does not seem to work on THAT O2? Also try the known working keyboard on one of the O2s that does not seem to work.

 

Another thing I might try would be to connect a breakout board to your working O2 and try to figure out how to trigger a button press. Lookup the pinout first. You'd ideally have a donor ribbon cable. You could cut off one end of the donor and feed the wires into the breakout. Then just hook up some simple buttons to try and trigger a 0 or 1 (or anything). If you can get just a simple button press to work on one of the broken O2s then you know there is a problem in the actual keyboard.

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I think the way you figure this out is to somehow isolate where you think the problem might be and then do some additional testing. Don't get frustrated if it takes time. You CAN figure this out. Identifying those 2 chips is a great start. You could try replacing those for sure.

 

You say you have a working O2 with a working keyboard right? Why not try one of these keyboards that does not seem to work on THAT O2? Also try the known working keyboard on one of the O2s that does not seem to work.

 

Another thing I might try would be to connect a breakout board to your working O2 and try to figure out how to trigger a button press. Lookup the pinout first. You'd ideally have a donor ribbon cable. You could cut off one end of the donor and feed the wires into the breakout. Then just hook up some simple buttons to try and trigger a 0 or 1 (or anything). If you can get just a simple button press to work on one of the broken O2s then you know there is a problem in the actual keyboard.

 

Thanks for the vote of confidence here :)

 

I did find a LITTLE progress last night.... When I orginally setup this for testing I was testing with 4-5 games, As I was just going in circles with this, I put away boxed games and only kept one out. So the keyboard I supected was good (the glossy one that I hate), so with the old hardware (my orignal with the controlers attached)...and the same result, so I tried a few more games and BANG, it was able to select a game... Controllers didn't do anything but, it was progress forward. I think this is showing the keyboard works.

 

So, I took my other board (the one with plug in controllers, THE ONE I WANT TO USE), pulgged in cables, Droped in a game, power it upm the "Select Game" shows on screen. Hitting 1 or 2 does nothing like it did on the other system. I did notice the ribbon cable for the keyboard sits very lose as it could just fall out.

 

I will take a very small screw driver and try to bend a few of pins up that hold the keyboard to see if this makes any progress here.

 

The big question is how much MORE time to do I want to invest here, I have tons of hours now working on this. This console is not like a NeoGeo AES console that can be $500+, it's one that can be, with a little work, find one for under $50 ($30-40 for untested is not too hard to find)...

 

I wanted one with the non-glossy keyboard and with the controler ports on the back of the system....

 

I'll post another update tomorrow..

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So, the one with removable controllers will not detect the keyboard. It will hit reset but, hitting the reset button seems to have some affect. On the one I want to use the pins are damaged, if i put a keyboard ribbon cable in, it just pops out.

 

After a few weeks playing with this, I pretty much gave up... As this is NOT an expensive console, I made an low offer on a minty looking one (FAR better looking than any part I have) and like 10 boxed games and it was accepted. Another untested but, this comes with the original box and it looks clean (no moisture damage so it looks like really good odds I'll get a good one), so odds that with a little cleaning this will be the one I use.

 

I'm going to try to get one working out of the both of my older ones, I think the original one kind of works and I should be able to tweak that one... The removable controller one, parts or t parts for someone who needs it.

 

Now i need to rebuild the controllers, as none of the ones I have seem to work...

Edited by TheCoolDave
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