New Life Games Tech Forums

Hey Guys,

                  Just wondering if you guys can help me out, I did a EPROM change on my MK6 the other day now I am having all these errors come up.

 ***Main Door Mismatch
 *** Note Acceptor Door Open
 *** Coin Optic Fail
 *** Cash Box Optic Fail
 ***Lab Board Disconnected
 *** P1-P6 SEF Fail.
                                       I have check the board is in heaps of times now, do you think there could be a problem with the board?.

Is it a nsw machine and do you have a lab comms board in.

Yeah it is a nsw machine, it has a lab comm board in it but I never touched that and the machine was working before fine, it only happen when I swapped over the eproms, which I have done before and they worked fine. I did check the lab comms board to make sure it was clicked in ok. Could it be something in the machine settings?

Could be bent pin on EPROMs . What is programme number on EPROMs .is it 5.2 or mk6

Hi, this sounds silly but you did reset the static ram, it would of complained and asked you to when you go to the audit menu? (although you did say you have done this before)

Also, the door errors, while still in the errors screen, if you close the door do those errors clear? (those should clear)

Is it still a NSW game and the previous game was NSW also?

If you jackpot reset the optic error should clear?

Strange, could you take a screen grab?

Hey mate I am Pretty sure it is mk6 when i get a chance I will take a photo of the board and upload it

Hey Lovepokies yeah i reset the static ram like i did last time when I put eprom chips in, it goes to the game screen but then it comes up all the erorrs, when you go to the errors menu when you try to clear them they don't clear. I will get a couple of photos and show you what they look like.

Yeah it would be MK6 because they don't have the 'lab board disconnected' as an error in the lockups for MK5.

I don't think the board would be faulty, it's not a bent pin on the eprom either. (the MK6 system has several CRC checks and you won't get this far, also a faulty board does strange things, not specific errors like these normally, plus you said it was running fine before, a faulty board resets itself, or won't boot unless you bend it slightly, random crc errors, forgetting sram etc but you never know, this might be the start lol)

A photo of the lockups screen would be better, also try running your previous game or another one just for testing purposes.

Also, if you set the game up properly, close the door and do the jackpot/reset key (or if you made a button instead) I want to see a photo of the errors then.

Cya

Have done a lot of conversions and have got actually into game with bent pin on eproms

I have attached a couple of images

and here

I have tried sticking the original eproms back in and still get the same errors

As lovespokies33 has said you should get a ram error that has to be rest by pressing 2 play buttons with the door and logic cage open if not I would look for bent pin on back of main board or eprom or main board or lab board has gone faulty. Can you give me EPROM numbers and system numbers will see if they match

Gaming1, its not the eproms now, it's passed this now. Also NSW games don't have version numbers that need to match anything like USA games set chips etc. Except he could be running a really old system though, but that specific game is 2004 and he has the clock in the bottom left, so that would be a newer system version 21+ or higher.

He has also clearly already reset the ram and setup the game options.

Actually there are no other errors now (except the doors but its probably open, we can easily look at that later if that wont clear.)

Also if he can't get a game that WAS working now, it's clear the comms board is not being detected for some reason, it's related to this. (*** Lab board disconnected).

So try turning off the machine, pulling the comms board out and installing again, wiggle it around don't be too soft, but not too rough either, check for bent pins on that board also as gaming1 said, it's possible they are bent or mashed, but you would have trouble getting it in in the first place.

I can't remember if the machine will handle a live install of the card (you shouldn't do it anyway) but if there is a loose connection we might be able to test, in the lockups screen wiggle the comms board in a methodical way, don't pull it out, but just apply random pressure and wait for the error to clear, also in between use the jackpot reset. (some errors must have a jackpot/reset to clear).

Do you have another game board? even an old MK5 board, this will confirm the comms board health..

Good luck, let me know how you go.

Hey pokies yeah i tried another comms board I had that was in another machine that was working fine and it still came up the same error when i tried it in this machine I have noticed with the comms board you can feel it click in but with the main board you can't but it must be picking it up cause it's getting into the game

Ah ok.

These boards only need power and and video connected and will still boot up pretty much, it is actually possible that the main board is not getting a connection, properly, so yes you can have the main board 'half assed' in and it will do this.

I suppose you have tried the obvious process of elimination then? as in, what happens when you chuck that main board into the other machine and see if the comms board works?

This will narrow things down.

The board

Your photo is pretty low res, so it's hard to read anything much! -  except you have an original MK6 board.

Anyway, what happened when you swapped the main boards from that other machine to this one and vice versa - you need  to do both, the results will narrow down things.

The other machine is a mk5 are you able to swap the boards?

Yup you can certainly swap them.

MK6 was designed to 'upgrade' MK5 cabinets with minimal fuss. - however you need to actually do a few little mods to make it playable, but that's another topic. (door switch reversed, sound volume must be set to the lowest or disconnect 1 speaker as the MK6 boards have a weak ass audio amp compared to the MK5 and over time it can burn out if you have the volume too loud on those MK5 speakers etc You need a new bill acceptor loom and it needs a firmware upgrade (if you want the bacc that is), and some other stupid thing, but its pretty easy stuff.).

Anyway! Put the MK5 board into the machine we were first dealing with, just go straight into the audit screen and see if the lab board has failed, if so then it's something haunted with the backplane connection, it will put the lockup *** next to each P1 - SEF Fail, P2 etc etc.

Don't worry about the other lockups, just look at the P1 P2 etc.

Once you do this, let me know the results, because it will determine what we do next.

Oh whoops!

I forgot! If the comms board DOES fail, then NSW MK5 games WON'T BOOT into the game, it will just show the startup tests and restart for ever.

*Anyway* let me know how you go..

Ok mate so just stick the MK5 board in as is I don't have to sawp any chips over from each board?

Just swap the main board AS IS. Don't swap the chips those are NOT compatible.

ok will try now

now both r not working

What do you mean both? We were only testing the MK5 board in the first machine.. so when you say 'not working' did the board show boot up text? You might need to adjust the CRT screens vertical adjustment stretch, as the text would be off a bit because the MK6 uses a higher res.

Ok i swapped the boards it came up for a lil bit but then the machine turned off now i stuck the mk5 board back in it's machine and i have a rolling screen and no sound, and the other machine just keeps looping rebooting

It's hard for me to tell how technical you are, so I am conflicting going between telling you every step or just what we are trying to achieve..

Ok, so when you put the MK5 board into the MK6 machine that we were originally talking about, what did it do exactly?

Got the rolling screen off the queen but still no sound,
something interesting with the mk6 i had the cage open and that was the only error, when i shut the cage all the other errors came up and the i tried to just slightly wiggle the board and about another 5 error came up

Hmm ok, so with the MK5 board with queen of the nile, you put that in the the MK6 machine, it booted but the screen was rolling? that can happen if you don't adjust the CRT down the bottom, or you might be unlucky and that screen might need other adjustments to handle the MK5 video, but don't worry about that for now as this was only as a test..

So was it THIS board (the MK5) that you wriggled and all of a sudden more errors came up? were they the P1 SEF errors or others? (I expected other errors to show anyway).

nah i stuck the mk6 board back in and when I had the cage door down that was the only error when i put the cage door up all the other error came back, so the i wiggled it and heaps of other errors came up.

The mk5 board I stuck back in it original machine but now I have no sound on that one....strange

I'll help you via PM now otherwise this thread will be too long and not really interesting for others, it looks like your MK6 machine has a dry joint or bad connection on the backplane, when you changed the eproms you 'upset' things, remember these old machines have been on for years and who knows the history or treatment etc. Its very common when people think they are doing the right thing and 'clean' arcade machines, often the dust held things together lol.

Lovepokies33 just to let you know there is another loom you can put on the speakers when you do a upgrade so as it does not blow the amp ic  on the processor.

Hey Gaming1, yup that's right :) all that loom does it put the speakers in series to reduce the load on the amp.

Did you ever come accross a bad backplane? I only came accross bad boards that when you bend them they 'work' or with heat etc they fail...

Yes not very often usually some one has forced the board and damaged it but on the the odd time have changed one after upgrade.dont bother repairing just throw away have heaps

The bend part is usually dry joint on CPU sometimes bad track

Yeah, I have seen boards with little mods, usually a random little wire from the CPU behind the board and back. But I have the theory that once there is cracks in these multi layered boards they are forever haunted. As you say, just get another board.

Hi Guys,
Looking at the MK6 board,, Is it an XP board???. Low res pic so not 100%, if it is a standard motherboard, you may want to install the small wafer comms board on the left side of the motherboard.
Cheers.
Jas.

Can I ask why that's only if you want printer for those programmes or am I missing something

True True, Just trying to eliminate possible errors.

The 72 pin simm has nothing to do with this.

The board is clearly an original MK6, even with the blurry photo you can see the difference in design and the give away port right next to the eproms.

Anyway, as it stands the MK6 board is screwed or the back plane has problems (very rare). When he closes the cage, the very movement of this and weight from that heavy door causes errors to suddenly appear. If you apply a small amount of pressure on the board the video starts to fail and screen rolls, and it reboots. It struggles to boot when hot but ok when cold. All these are classic signs of a board that is stuffed. Its possible for a bad dry joint on the backplane..but I doubt this.

The only way to quickly solve this, is with a spare working main board. Obviously if it too fails then its a matter of looking into it further, but there is not much more, the whole system IS the main boards. SO the only thing it can be is a backplane with dry joints (did I mention rare?) or a screwy PSU, but putting a small bit of pressure on the main board with a finger or closing the logic cage clearly rules this out.

Sounds like you have a mother board problem. Can you put the original mk 5 processor back in its machine or was it just a spare