TO run the CPU outside of the game you need a device that supplies ground, 5 volts and 12 volts. Usualy, scrounge it from an old, crappy computer, you can use a computer power supply, old hard drive power supply etc... Basically, anything and any device that supplies these voltages is useable. Old computer power supplies are most popular, and they are 5, 10 bucks (or free!) used, at mom and pop computer store in your town. Here we have an old, crappy CD drive giving us exactly what we need. Although not always true, manufacturers try to stick with color labeling the wires, black wire=ground, red wire=5 Volts, yellow wire = 12 Volts.
Find the power supply connector. Find black, yellow and red wires. USUALY (not always the case, so be careful), black wire is ground, red wire is 5 Volts and yellow wire is 12 Volts... If in any doubt, whip out your multimeter and measure just to be sure. Set it on voltage, put black lead of your DMM on the black wire and red lead on the other wire and measure. Around, 5 and 12 Volts should be seen.
Here we located the power wire cables and the wires are color labeled as mentioned above. If in doubt, again, multimeter in hand and test it, so you'll know for sure and there will be no surprises and damage to your board down the stretch.
To make it really neat, you could make a new Molex female connector, crimp it and make a nice connection, all nice and tidy, aesthetically pleasing, neat looking, blah, blah, blah...
Since all we really care is a working CPU board to have, we basically just stripped the wire insulation off of them. Effective and functional, yet simple, blue blooded and crude. Oh, well, what can I say, not much friggin' sophistication around here...
We are going to use alligator clips. Since we have many of them of various colors, we'll use yellow alligator clips with the yellow wire, red with red wire etc... Just in case and to simplify things, no other reason. Of course, if you're color blind, then this line of thought doesn't hold water now, does it. Clip one end of the alligator clip to the yellow wire that gives us 12 Volts.
Clip red alligator lead to a red wire giving us steady 5 Volts.
Clip black alligator lead to a black wire (if there are 2 of them in the connector EITHER one is fine. If it's black, 9 times out of 10 it's ground in these types of devices). If you see some redish residue on my fingers, don't worry, I did not get electrocuted. I just had some spicy Cheetos®... Hey, stop laughing and bug off, Cheetos are addicting! Even after I washed my hands twice that Cheetos crap will not come off.
Now, get your CPU board on the bench. Connector J210 is the only one we'll be using on this board and basically the only one we need. Find a connector J210 on it. Look at it, talk to it, exchange business cards and chat about the weather to it. Okay, just find it, skip the rest.
On the board there will be written a small number 1 by it, just like in the picture. That is the Number 1 pin on that conector, remember that, please. Now, connect black lead (the other end of alligator clip) to the pins 1 and 3 (pin 2 is "key" and it's missing). All good? Look at the picture, if unsure. You can bend the legs a bit, so you'll have the necessary space. Bend them back to straight position when done.
Clip the other end of red alligator clip to pins 4 and 5. The space is sort of tight (depending on the size of your alligator clips), but make sure they are not touching each other. This is absolutely essential. AGAIN, make sure they do not touch each other!
Another detail image of connections so far, be patient, meticulous, check and recheck your work so far.
Connect yellow (12 Volts) alligator clip to the pins 6 and 7. Again, make sure they are not touching the other pins/alligator clips in ANY WAY.
Very detailed image of all connections we made. Remember, if you mess up and clip wrong voltages to wrong pins you will fry something on your board and cause a short, and labor, parts and repairs on these boards are expensive. So, be slow, careful and meticulous and keep checking and rechecking your work to minimize the chance of a screwup.
Okay, have a break now and call your Aunt collect. Let's focus on something else, removing and inserting the ASIC chip, the heart and the apple of CPU's eyes. You won't believe how many problems "magically" disappear after removing and reinserting this chip.
However, using a screwdriver is, as the name of the tool suggests, screw driving yourself into having to buy a new chip.Please don't use a screwdriver, it might harm the ASIC chip, and they are not easy to find and generally pretty expensive. It is a proprietary Wms chip design, not readily available off the shelf. It will easily get damaged by using a flatblade screwdriver. You need to invest 10 bucks and buy a chip removal tool.
So, on this board (a different dead board than the one used above) the ASIC is missing. Let's reinsert a new one then demonstrate how to take it out safely and securely.
Inserting it in the socket is no big deal, you will hear it & feel it clearly snap into place. Make sure that you're careful, as, again, this chip is highly sensitive, expensive and not easily available. It is also important to have the orientation of the chip right. If you put it in backwards, it won't work and the board will never boot. In addition, you may ruin the chip, so orientation for any chips is important.
Press down till you hear it snap in place, level and flush in the socket.
So, we need to remove it out of the socket. Okay, We'll use this tool contraption (10 bucks tool, but worth it). Again, you will likely damage your ASIC chip if you use a screwdriver so don't, telling you for the 4th and last time! You may be successful with it, you may not, but it's not worth it to find out, really.
Insert the leads of the removal tool exactly as shown.
Make sure it's reaching in fine and it's actualy grabbing the chip itself, all nice and tight.
Squeeze the leads. Don't apply pressure like a psycho serial killer strangling a victim, be gentle but firm, nice, but mean business and you will have it out of there safely. So, squeeze the leads then pull it up. Ta da! Here is ASIC safely out of the socket.
Here is the bottom fo the chip. Delicate little sucker, this ASIC is...
Another closeup here.
This chip is marked as bad and will be thrown away and replaced with a new one. More than likely that was our problem with a non-booting board. IF the ASIC is bad, the board is dead and it will never boot and the game will not work.
Extreme closeup with tool leads still on, so you can see how it works and why it will be a screwup to use a screwdriver to pry it out. Gotta do it right, or don't do it. As you can see, these tiny leads protruding from the chip are highly susceptible to breakage. You can see now why screwdriver poking around is more than likely going to do some damage. Anyway, let's get back to our board stuff and alligator clips here.
Last check to make sure it's all connected. Turn on the Frankenstein's contraption. Watch 3 LED lightbulbs on the board. The board bootup sequence when looking at them from top to bottom (if it's actualy a working board) is as follows: All 3 LEds briefly flash, top LED turns off, bottom LED stays lit and middle LED is pulsing rapidly on and off. If that's the sequence you're seeing, then that board is working fine and it will boot up in the actual game. Anything else, you got a problem and it's time to investigate.
Enter multimeter and Logic Probe into the picture. Logic probe just needs ground and 5 Volts to run, so, you can use its own alligator clips to hook it up to your power source. We hooked it to our CD thing where we are running our alligator jumpers described above.
This is the hookup for the Logic Probe. Multimeter has its own battery and doesn't need to be hooked up on anything, it's self-sufficient. WPC schematics and knowing what to look for, is sort of essential here, that's beyond this pictorial. If there is a demand, another pictorial could be cooked up, so let us know, will ya?
VIDEOS OF THE CPU BOARD WORKING OUTSIDE OF THE GAME!
That's basically it. Click here to see the bootup sequence of a properly working board hooked to an external power supply and outside of the game. If we hook up a display board and a DMD, we'd see the attract mode for the game right on your workbench! Cool, huh?
NOTE: Dial-up users are sort of SOL since their connection will be very slow. It'll get there eventually, maybe tomorrow, maybe next Tuesday. But, they know that already.
Uses QuickTime plug-in. Filesize: 5.4 Mb
Click here to see the bootup sequence of a properly working board hooked to an external power supply and outside of the game with Logic Probe poking around looking what's working and what's not. Much easier to diagnose the problem when the board is on the bench, then inside the game, which is the whole point of this little pictorial.
NOTE: Dial-up users are sort of SOL since their connection will be very slow. It'll get there eventually, probably on Tuesday (dunno which one). So, patience young Jedi on a dial-up, the force is sorta with you, but not really, it's just slow. Uses QuickTime plug-in. Filesize: 7.3 Mb
If you have any questions, please email us and we'll try to help you. Remember to do all these steps safely and frequently check and recheck your work.
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