POG ROM Set

[rescue161]

I have three POG boards, all are 510.  One however has ROMs that are flaky.  I can swap the good ROMs to the "bad" board and they work fine, so it is that set of ROMs that needs to be replaced.  I have a ROM burner, but need to know the type of PROMs that I need to use.  Can anyone assist?  I imagine if I copy all ROMs and the security chip, then burn them to the new PROMs, I should be fine.  Otherwise, I suppose I could use existing ROM files to burn into the chips, but I still need to know what all of the chips are, including the security chip.  Thank you.

[Stayouttadabunker]

If you remove the label, the name of the chip should be etched or printed right on top.
Try posting some photos of your board.
Does yours look like this one?...>>>

[rescue161]

Yes, it looks like that.  Here is a picture of one of mine.

[Stayouttadabunker]

Peel the cheap label off with a sharp Exacto knife and clean off the residue adhesive with Goop.
You should be able to then read what chips they're using.

[rescue161]

Are they read protected?  Or is doable to read and then write the data to new chips?

[Stayouttadabunker]

I have no idea...I don't have x-ray vision. Take the label off.

[rescue161]

To clarify, I was asking if the POG ROM set is normally encrypted or if they are read/write protected.  I will have to take the time to peel the labels, and I'll do that, but I did not want to waste time in trying to copy something that can't be copied.  I hope that clears up the question.

[Stayouttadabunker]

I doubt it...betcha they've never expected anyone to copy their chips when they made them.

[rescue161]

I took the labels off of the EPROMs and they are M27C4001 and I was able to copy them.  All of them are very old and the legs feel like they are going to snap off at any moment, so I'm glad I was able to get good .BIN files of them.  With that said, I cannot read U45, the security chip, because they ground off the identification numbers on the chip itself and then placed goop over that for good measure.  If I knew the chip type, I may be able to read and save it too.  Does anybody know the type of chip that is used for U45?  Am I correct in thinking that the BIN files that I saved won't be any good without that specific U45?  Or will any U45 that is for the 510 set work?

Full disclosure:

I own three POG boards.  All three work and all three have 510 software installed.  All three are fairly old and one is starting to act flaky.  I am attributing this to the EPROMs having aging legs that are not making the best contact.  This post is supposed to be a "help me copy my chips, so I can retain what I currently have by burning my current images into new EPROMs."  It is not meant to defraud a company that stopped support of this equipment decades ago.  If after having this info this post is not allowed, then please delete it.

[rescue161]

Upon further investigation, it appears that the EPROM M27C4001-10F1 is obsolete, but 27C040 is a good replacement as long as it is 100nS or less.  At least the chips on my boards were 100nS, so I'm staying under that value.  I also learned that since I'm just replacing my own chips on the same board, that my security chip will be fine and everything will work once I replace the old aging EPROMs.

[rescue161]

Update!

I got my brand new blank EPROMs in and burned the images from my original chips and they work great.  I used TMS27C040-10JL EPROMs, which have better specs than my original chips.  As a bonus, everything stayed the same, configurations, progressive scores, even the money/credits that I had when I powered the game down.  So at least I didn't have to reprogram the entire game.  Now I no longer have to worry about the corroded legs on the EPROMs breaking off.  Some of the legs were extremely thin and they were not making good contact with the socket contacts.  One of the sockets was also in bad shape and would not even hold the new chip properly, so I replaced it too.  I was unable to locate programming info on U45, so I was glad to see that the game worked fine with the existing U45.  I'm just glad that it did not have corroded legs.  Now I just need to replace the Time Keeper and this board will be off to the races.

[rescue161]

I also found out that the security chip is an MC68HC705J1A.  Unfortunately, neither of my programmers can read/write those devices.