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Re: Faulty Mega Drive games (original hardware) - black screen
08/02/15 06:50 PM
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> Recently I've had a problem with two Mega Drive games - they will not work at all on > any of my Mega Drive consoles, unless used with my Mega Key region converter. All > they do is give a very brief flash for a split second when you hit the power button, > then a black screen, just like when you power the console without a cartridge > inserted - no licensing text or anything. > > I have four Mega Drive IIs, all Australian PAL models, as well as a crappy AtGames > Mega Drive clone where both the FM and PSG (square wave/"Master System") sound is > lower pitched than normal and both are at different pitches, making everything sound > horribly out of tune. The Mega Key does not work at all with the AtGames console. I > don't have a Mega Drive 1 unfortunately. > > The games which refuse to work are Columns and Arnold Palmer Tournament Golf; the > contacts on the games are spotless (as with all of my games), as with the console > pins, and every other game works without any issues. Both games used to work until > Columns started going flaky and required me to insert the game at a slight angle > before it gave up working entirely; Arnold Palmer Tournament Golf on the other hand > simply decided not to work after being stored for a number of years, despite being in > very good condition (Columns is well used). If I use the Mega Key, both games work > perfectly without any issues whatsoever, so it's not like the ICs are fried or > anything like that. There are no bad solder joints or traces either. > > If I run these two games in the AtGames console, all I get is either a black screen, > a garbled mess of pixels, or simply the game menu itself. > > I also swapped out the original 47µF 16V cap (which read 1.2Ω on the ESR meter) > in Arnold Palmer Tournament Golf, didn't make any difference (replacement cap was > 0.5Ω, but it still didn't boot without the Mega Key. > > My main question is, has anyone else had any similar trouble with Mega Drive or > Genesis games?
Could these two games be games which don't do the TMSS 'Unlock', so they will only work on pre-VA5 (or pre-VA6 for some regions) Megadrive/genesis mainboards? I don't know the list of 'official' games which don't do the TMSS unlock (and hence won't work on newer consoles).
LN
"When life gives you zombies... *CHA-CHIK!* ...you make zombie-ade!"
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