Diagnose Broken Game - Metal Warriors

Discuss hardware-related topics, such as development cartridges, CopyNES, PowerPak, EPROMs, or whatever.

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Goose2k
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Diagnose Broken Game - Metal Warriors

Post by Goose2k »

Hi,

I know it's SNES, but I feel like people here probably have some ideas.

I picked up a game that appears to be damaged: when I boot up the system it just goes to a black screen and nothing loads. Other games on the same system have no problem.

Normally I'd just consider it a loss and move on, but this happens to be one of the more sought after rare SNES games: Metal Warriors!

So I am wondering if there is any way to diagnose the problem, and possibly repair it. :shock:

I assume I would need a dumper or something, which I probably won't be willing to do.

I have opened it up and cleaned it with alcohol but it was actually pretty clean. The outside was pretty dirty, and it appears to have been a rental at some point.

The one part that looks odd to me is the bottom of the board, where the connectors are, is brown, as if its been exposed to something.
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Last edited by Goose2k on Mon Jul 20, 2020 10:31 am, edited 1 time in total.
lidnariq
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Re: Diagnose Broken Game - Metal Warriors

Post by lidnariq »

SNESes are pretty cryptic as to what's going wrong when something goes wrong. Could be the connection, could be the CIC, could be the ROM.

Since it's on a 1A0N board there's really nothing else that even could go wrong.
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Fisher
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Re: Diagnose Broken Game - Metal Warriors

Post by Fisher »

There's a big chance of the problem be just a broken trace.
You could try to check the continuity from the connector contacts to the ROM.
The CIC also has a good chance to have some broken trace.
There are information about the pinout of the connector and the ROMs here.
Hope you can fix it. :-)
Lo-Res
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Re: Diagnose Broken Game - Metal Warriors

Post by Lo-Res »

Like Fisher said, use a multimeter and check for continuity from the pins on the pcb and follow the traces to where they go.

You could also de-solder the rom and install it in the same pcb type of a cheaper known working game.
Ice Man
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Re: Diagnose Broken Game - Metal Warriors

Post by Ice Man »

Do you get a video signal at all? If not, it's the CIC.
If you do get a video signal but just black screen, it can be bad connection or the MaskROM.
Clean the contacts perhaps?
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