PE+ no signs of life

[Chris-socal]

Hello friends
I acquired a PE+ that is in good condition overall. Someone was obviously doing some upgrades such as updating BV and attempting to install a multi-game board before I bought it, not working. There is no life from this game board. No button lights, the reset button doesn’t do anything nor does the reset key.
I swapped in a known working board and it works fine, therefore we know the Power system works fine.
I have never worked on a multi game version of a PE+ so Im hoping someone will see something on the board that is obvious.

Oh, I forgot to say that I checked 5v on multiple components throughout the board and it checks out fine.

Thanks for your eyes on this.

Chris

[Badbaud]

No voltage usually means the diode CR25 (1N4002) is bad but also check the transformer outputs to make sure it is working.

[Chris-socal]

Hi Alan
All voltages checked out fine.
5v on all the ICs.

[jay]

What you have is not a Multi-Game Chip set but a daughter board as an add on to a standard Superboard.

The daughter board basically has 5 data chips that share a common Program chip and compatible set of graphics (CAPX, MGO, MRO, MBO, MXO)
The program chip and graphics are installed on the main board and the daughter holds the data chips.

Try taking any one of the data chips on your daughter board and pop it onto the superboard directly and ignore the daughter board for now.
Does this work ?

Is your other board (the one that worked) also a superboard. If so you could also move these chips over to it.
I will have to look at my boards at home - is the RAM chip supposed to be empty ? For some reason I though there should be a CMOS chip there.
Again you should be able to compare to your other board to see if that slot is empty on it.

[Chris-socal]

I will try that. Thanks for the ideas.

Both pictures are the same board, I just removed the daughter board so you could see underneath. The daughter board goes into both of those slots, pins on the bottom of daughter goes into those two empty slots. The chips are on the daughter board.

All sockets are populated.

The board that works is a basic board with no daughter. Pic attached of the board that works.

Chris

[Badbaud]

A CAPX2174 chip will give you a more vivid splash screen.

[jay]

Both boards are basically the same. They are a superboard.
The daughter board should work with either of them.

Lets start with some simple tests.

1. Your non-working board is missing the Ram chip that is installed on your working board.  I double checked mine (I have 5 superboards) and all of them have the Ram Chip. Your system is not going to work without this chip. I have never had one missing so I can't say if you will simply get an error on the screen or if it will remain blank and not boot (which I believe is the situation your in).

2. You can try moving the RAM chip to your non-working board, and take one of the data chips from the daughter board and put it in the empty data socket.
Just remember to orient the chips the right direction. There is a small hole at one end of the chip and that matches up with the knotch on the empty socket.

See if this works.

[Chris-socal]

Hi Jay
Im confused, isn’t the RAM chip on the daughter board?

Either way, I moved the chips from the working board (including the RAM) onto this board and the board still does nothing. The only proms I didn’t move were the MBO,MXO, MRO, etc. I assume those are universal? Or do they need to move together?

Im thinking there must e a component with a problem other than the game chips.

Chris

[BrianT]

Yes, Chris you are right, the RAM chip is on the daughter card.

So 1 thing you can check: Just swap all chips & daughter card to working board and the working board's chips to the non-working board. Fire each one up.  In the working board works with the daughter card & chips you know they are good, if it doesn't then that's the problem.  If the non working board starts to work then it's definitely the daughter card and if it doesn't then it's something on the non working main board.

You must of course make sure all pins in the daughter card are properly inserted into the sockets pin receivers. I've had problems with those and pins bending and or breaking off.

BrianT

[jay]

Sorry I missed that the RAM chip had been moved.

The MXO, MGO, MRO, MBO and the CAPX chip are a graphics chip set and are not quite universal.
Different games use different graphics sets. If you use the wrong set the colors / fonts / cardbacks will appear incomplete or just downright strange.
With that said, many games do share the same graphics set.

Thats the foundation of the daughter board. You have a common Program chip (which is the Operating system) and different data chips (card games) that all share the same graphics set.

I have attached the master list that BrianT compiled (this might not be the latest greatest version but its pretty good).
It will show the compatibility of which sets go with what graphic sets etc.

[BrianT]

Check this post and grab this one, as it is little newer with more information on program ROMs and graphics sets etc.:  https://newlifegames.com/nlg/index.php?topic=2547.0

[Chris-socal]

Thanks both.
But just to be clear, based on what I recall reading throughout the years, none of these mismatches will prevent the board from coming to life at all. I have seen multiple mismatches posted and what we normally see is a jumbled screen or weird text…but the boar boots.
Right now I just need to figure out what, if anything, is bricked on this board.

Chris

[jay]

You are absolutely correct......The graphics may look wonked but a wrong graphics set will not stop the board from functioning.
Bad / Blank or damaged chips are another story.

If you take the set from your working board and put them in the non working board - and it is still dead then we know its not the chips.

You can go the other way as well - put the daughter board on your known good working board and see if the menu with the 5 games pop up.

I am however thinking that its not the chips but you should establish that all the game chips are good......

Given that the machine appears to be dead with the new board it would seem like its not getting power.
Try swapping trays. It could easily be the transformer in the corner that is bad. Or the wires or the connector.

[Chris-socal]

Jay
The game works fine with my spare board.
Because I only have one tray that fits this machine I swap the working board onto the bad boards tray… so we do know that the cabinet and power all work.

It is something specific to this board.

I swapped all the working chips onto the bad board and still nothing.

For the sake of being sure I will put the non-working boards chips into the working board. Its a lot of moving but necessary to narrow this down.

Chris

[Chris-socal]

Jay
I swapped all the chips (Game, data, M’s and CapX) and the daughter board onto the known-good board. We have life. We have a mismatch, but we have exactly what I would expect.
I am planning on driving up to KLar next week, maybe I can have Alan put itbin his tester. There is something wrong on this board.
Here are pics of the progression of events.

Chris

[jay]

Looks positive.
Did you try swapping boards between trays to see if it’s a power issue ?

[Chris-socal]

Yes.

[Chris-socal]

Brian, Jay
I cross referenced all of the chips to Brians list. XMP00017 game is correctly matched for a wing board. The capx and M chips are correctly matched also.
Maybe I need to do a RAM clear.

It sure makes things complicated when there is more than one problem, but at least I know the cabinet and power supply are working. I have a spare board I can use until I get the game board looked at. I really wanted to clean up the machine and sell it quickly but the universe has other plans.

Chris

[jay]

The CMOS error is easy to clear.
Open the door, press and hold the white Self Test button for at least five seconds, close the door, turn the jackpot reset key.

A clear chip will do the job as well, and I think the S+ clear is compatible but it should not be necessary.

[Chris-socal]

It clears but as you can see there are no graphics after clearing the error. Look at the last image, the game even plays….you just can’t see anything. LOL