spy hunter problem

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by paul dianno on February 5, 2010 at 2:39pm

all channels out only thing that works is peter gunn

Rob Carroll said:

In test mode, do any of the 6 channels work, or are they all out?

I'll try and poke around the schematics this weekend, see if anything stands out... but, obviously, not having the board in front of me, I'm reduced to "maybe" guesses. Do you own an oscilloscope or, at least, a logic probe, and know roughly how to use it? Or are you planning on just shotgunning this thing until you get lucky?

BTW: Somehow I missed that you mentioned the SSIO interface error in the original post, which was why I asked about the DIP switch. But, that is something to remember for any MCR game... SW1 at D14 will give that message even though everything else works fine.

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Permalink Reply by paul dianno on February 5, 2010 at 2:41pm

i have learned you cant expect anything out of theses old games,its amazing they are still around

Pascal. said:

Hey! I have the same problem with mine... Tryed to change lots of parts and nothing work! I put all new chip where I can change them on the SSIO, brand new ribbon cables and still nothing! Next step, put new chip sockets everywhere!
Hope someone find a solution, a lot of Spy Hunter owner has this sound trouble!

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Permalink Reply by Shane on February 5, 2010 at 10:35pm

paul dianno said:

i have learned you cant expect anything out of theses old games,its amazing they are still around

Pascal. said:

Hey! I have the same problem with mine... Tryed to change lots of parts and nothing work! I put all new chip where I can change them on the SSIO, brand new ribbon cables and still nothing! Next step, put new chip sockets everywhere!
Hope someone find a solution, a lot of Spy Hunter owner has this sound trouble!

It will be interesting to know what the fix is once you have found out what the problem is : ) Im sure there are other inquireing minds wanting to know.

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Permalink Reply by paladin-ng on February 5, 2010 at 11:38pm

This seems to be a common problem, I had this exact problem. it's somwhere on the SSIO board.
I had this problem with 2 different SSIO boards. I've swaped all the removable chips and replaced the MC3403 (which I tought was the problem was) to no avail.

I was able to fix mine by finally finding an SSIO board that works. (this was a couple years ago)
someone else on RGVAC also had this problem this week. sadly enough now that I have schematics I was trying to re-investigate this problem by pulling out one of my "BAD" SSIO boars and trying to fix... only to somehow screwed up my CPU board. (still works but video is not all mungy... I know it's the CPU board not the video generator...

anyway I"d suggest you just try getting new SSIO boards till you find one that works.
If anyone has an old CPU board (working) and wants to sell, let me know as know I have to find a new CPU boards so I can get my game back up and running.

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Permalink Reply by paul dianno on February 6, 2010 at 10:54am

i wish it was that easy to find a diff ssio board,i have a spy hunter cockpit which uses a panning board which makes it that much tougher to find one..

paladin-ng said:

This seems to be a common problem, I had this exact problem. it's somwhere on the SSIO board.
I had this problem with 2 different SSIO boards. I've swaped all the removable chips and replaced the MC3403 (which I tought was the problem was) to no avail.

I was able to fix mine by finally finding an SSIO board that works. (this was a couple years ago)
someone else on RGVAC also had this problem this week. sadly enough now that I have schematics I was trying to re-investigate this problem by pulling out one of my "BAD" SSIO boars and trying to fix... only to somehow screwed up my CPU board. (still works but video is not all mungy... I know it's the CPU board not the video generator...

anyway I"d suggest you just try getting new SSIO boards till you find one that works.
If anyone has an old CPU board (working) and wants to sell, let me know as know I have to find a new CPU boards so I can get my game back up and running.

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Permalink Reply by Pascal. on February 6, 2010 at 12:00pm

Good luck to find an other good SSIO board... Have you seen the prices on Ebay or anyother places? And almost time, they are sold untested! :-(
The only thing I found at this time on mine is that the "sound interface error" was the defect switch on the dip switch bank.. When this switch turn bad, the yellow led on the SSIO stay lit but you still can play... I put a new one but still no sound... Only the Peter Gun them..
Please god (or someone else), help us! ;-) I hope to hear my Spy Hunter sound oneday.

paladin-ng said:

This seems to be a common problem, I had this exact problem. it's somwhere on the SSIO board.
I had this problem with 2 different SSIO boards. I've swaped all the removable chips and replaced the MC3403 (which I tought was the problem was) to no avail.

I was able to fix mine by finally finding an SSIO board that works. (this was a couple years ago)
someone else on RGVAC also had this problem this week. sadly enough now that I have schematics I was trying to re-investigate this problem by pulling out one of my "BAD" SSIO boars and trying to fix... only to somehow screwed up my CPU board. (still works but video is not all mungy... I know it's the CPU board not the video generator...

anyway I"d suggest you just try getting new SSIO boards till you find one that works.
If anyone has an old CPU board (working) and wants to sell, let me know as know I have to find a new CPU boards so I can get my game back up and running.

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Permalink Reply by Shane on February 6, 2010 at 5:09pm

If this is a common problem with the SH sound and the part in question is becoming rare, Someone with the technical experiance should come forward and make a new board if feasibly possible. The problem is not gona go away unless someone can come up with a simple fix or a new board for sound.

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Permalink Reply by paladin-ng on February 6, 2010 at 7:43pm

I am trying to find the fix. There is actually only like 4 chips between the 8910 and the sound output.
(3 op amps, a couple MC14016 and a one other LS74 logic chip (Forgot which one, and have my schematics downstairs)
unfortunately I somehow fried my CPU board while trying to test.. .must have been static electricity or something.

game still works and can test sound, but the graphics are all messed up so now I have to troubleshoot that too... thats what I get for trying to be a good guy and help find a fix using my working game ;-(

However you can use the SSIO board from ANY MCR series game for this.
my working SSIO board is from a KICK. you just have to swap the sound ROMS. Note some boards don't have the chips socketed for all the different type of input processing, (for example my KICK didn't have a one of the chips necessay to handle the steering input, it was a simple logic chip, and I just added it (the boards are the same generally, but some of them don't have the chips installed if it wasn't required for the original game.

if someone needs to know what chip was added I can let you know. though I have to check my notes to remember what chips it was, I do remember it was a common TTL logic chip, I think it was an input buffer, it was a couple years ago so I'd have to check though.

Shane said:

If this is a common problem with the SH sound and the part in question is becoming rare, Someone with the technical experiance should come forward and make a new board if feasibly possible. The problem is not gona go away unless someone can come up with a simple fix or a new board for sound.

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Permalink Reply by paladin-ng on February 6, 2010 at 7:46pm

by the way if anyone has a working MCR III series CPU board for sale. (or even an "unknown" one if cheap) please let me know. I'd like to get my game back and working, once I do I wil ldo my utmost to find the sound fix and share/post the fix.
I"m pretty sure I"m close as I mentioned there are only a few possible chips between the 8910 and the actual output.

paladin-ng said:

I am trying to find the fix. There is actually only like 4 chips between the 8910 and the sound output.
(3 op amps, a couple MC14016 and a one other LS74 logic chip (Forgot which one, and have my schematics downstairs) unfortunately I somehow fried my CPU board while trying to test.. .must have been static electricity or something.
game still works and can test sound, but the graphics are all messed up so now I have to troubleshoot that too... thats what I get for trying to be a good guy and help find a fix using my working game ;-(

However you can use the SSIO board from ANY MCR series game for this.
my working SSIO board is from a KICK. you just have to swap the sound ROMS. Note some boards don't have the chips socketed for all the different type of input processing, (for example my KICK didn't have a one of the chips necessay to handle the steering input, it was a simple logic chip, and I just added it (the boards are the same generally, but some of them don't have the chips installed if it wasn't required for the original game.

if someone needs to know what chip was added I can let you know. though I have to check my notes to remember what chips it was, I do remember it was a common TTL logic chip, I think it was an input buffer, it was a couple years ago so I'd have to check though.

Shane said:

If this is a common problem with the SH sound and the part in question is becoming rare, Someone with the technical experiance should come forward and make a new board if feasibly possible. The problem is not gona go away unless someone can come up with a simple fix or a new board for sound.

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Permalink Reply by Shane on February 6, 2010 at 8:28pm

paladin-ng said:

by the way if anyone has a working MCR III series CPU board for sale. (or even an "unknown" one if cheap) please let me know. I'd like to get my game back and working, once I do I wil ldo my utmost to find the sound fix and share/post the fix.
I"m pretty sure I"m close as I mentioned there are only a few possible chips between the 8910 and the actual output.

paladin-ng said:

I am trying to find the fix. There is actually only like 4 chips between the 8910 and the sound output.
(3 op amps, a couple MC14016 and a one other LS74 logic chip (Forgot which one, and have my schematics downstairs) unfortunately I somehow fried my CPU board while trying to test.. .must have been static electricity or something.
game still works and can test sound, but the graphics are all messed up so now I have to troubleshoot that too... thats what I get for trying to be a good guy and help find a fix using my working game ;-(

However you can use the SSIO board from ANY MCR series game for this.
my working SSIO board is from a KICK. you just have to swap the sound ROMS. Note some boards don't have the chips socketed for all the different type of input processing, (for example my KICK didn't have a one of the chips necessay to handle the steering input, it was a simple logic chip, and I just added it (the boards are the same generally, but some of them don't have the chips installed if it wasn't required for the original game.

if someone needs to know what chip was added I can let you know. though I have to check my notes to remember what chips it was, I do remember it was a common TTL logic chip, I think it was an input buffer, it was a couple years ago so I'd have to check though.

Shane said:

If this is a common problem with the SH sound and the part in question is becoming rare, Someone with the technical experiance should come forward and make a new board if feasibly possible. The problem is not gona go away unless someone can come up with a simple fix or a new board for sound.

Is this like what your looking for ?

http://cgi.ebay.com/mcr-3-dual-power-amp-board-PCB-Board-Arcade_W0Q...

or this ?

http://cgi.ebay.com/Midway-MCR-3-cpu-board-not-working_W0QQitemZ350...

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Permalink Reply by paladin-ng on February 7, 2010 at 12:24am

Yup, the second one is the one I'm looking for thanks.

By the way, the guy I was originally working with on RGVAC to help solve the problem just said that replacing the LM3900 on his fixed the problem, so I'd suggest anyone with a bad SSIO board try that fix. Unfortunately I cannot test mine yet since I don't have any LM3900s on hand :(

but his symptoms where EXACTLY the same as mine and the other symtoms everyone else was mentioning.

they can still be bought but I think they are backordered at both Digikey and Mouser.

By the way he also said he had a couple SSIO boards and the LM3900Ns were bad on both of them, I also have 3 SSIO boars and mine has the exact same problem on 2 of them, so I"m betting this is the fix.
maybe someone should write this up in the Spy hunter game section

by the way the LM3900N is at position D3 on the SSIO board, Id suggest puttint in a 14 pin socket to make future replacements easier.

-brian

Shane said:

paladin-ng said:

by the way if anyone has a working MCR III series CPU board for sale. (or even an "unknown" one if cheap) please let me know. I'd like to get my game back and working, once I do I wil ldo my utmost to find the sound fix and share/post the fix.
I"m pretty sure I"m close as I mentioned there are only a few possible chips between the 8910 and the actual output.

paladin-ng said:

I am trying to find the fix. There is actually only like 4 chips between the 8910 and the sound output.
(3 op amps, a couple MC14016 and a one other LS74 logic chip (Forgot which one, and have my schematics downstairs) unfortunately I somehow fried my CPU board while trying to test.. .must have been static electricity or something.
game still works and can test sound, but the graphics are all messed up so now I have to troubleshoot that too... thats what I get for trying to be a good guy and help find a fix using my working game ;-(

However you can use the SSIO board from ANY MCR series game for this.
my working SSIO board is from a KICK. you just have to swap the sound ROMS. Note some boards don't have the chips socketed for all the different type of input processing, (for example my KICK didn't have a one of the chips necessay to handle the steering input, it was a simple logic chip, and I just added it (the boards are the same generally, but some of them don't have the chips installed if it wasn't required for the original game.

if someone needs to know what chip was added I can let you know. though I have to check my notes to remember what chips it was, I do remember it was a common TTL logic chip, I think it was an input buffer, it was a couple years ago so I'd have to check though.

Shane said:

If this is a common problem with the SH sound and the part in question is becoming rare, Someone with the technical experiance should come forward and make a new board if feasibly possible. The problem is not gona go away unless someone can come up with a simple fix or a new board for sound.

Is this like what your looking for ?

http://cgi.ebay.com/mcr-3-dual-power-amp-board-PCB-Board-Arcade_W0Q...

or this ?

http://cgi.ebay.com/Midway-MCR-3-cpu-board-not-working_W0QQitemZ350...

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Permalink Reply by Pascal. on February 7, 2010 at 12:44am

Check here:

http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-LM3900-Quad-Op-Amp-Semiconductor-Set-of-3_W...

I will try that for sure, it would be wonderful if this can fix the problem!

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