Author Topic: Area51 Cabinet - help required? (Read 8406 times)

dmworking247 · « **on:** April 20, 2008, 09:17:59 am »

I bought a new cabinet today, its an Area 51 shooter.

Cabinet itself is in quite good condition, it has a monitor and chassis (that seems ok, but not fully tested yet... it might be a bit bright), and has a power supply and game board. There is one gun missing however

The trouble is with the game board. When I power it on, I'm getting a screen "Watch Dog Check", and a message "Three Taps And You're Out". A few mins later, another (colored) screen comes up saying "Disk Drive Not Connected or Not Responding".

I'm ashamed to say I'm still pretty new to original Jamma cabinets, so any tips people could give me about diagnosing this further, checking the HDD etc would be greatly appreciated. What are the worst case scenarios (replace hdd-how do I replace the software? game board suicided? no hope?).

Thanks!

cw · « **Reply #1 on:** April 20, 2008, 10:18:03 am »

I am thinking that the game needs the hard drive hooked up....

DJ_Izumi · « **Reply #2 on:** April 20, 2008, 10:30:11 am »

If the HDD is shot, would it be possible to replace it and make use of a MameCHD image to image onto the replacement HDD?

dmworking247 · « **Reply #3 on:** April 20, 2008, 10:34:55 am »

That was what I was thinking too (assuming its just a hdd fault), but how does one go about doing that?

Fozzy The Bear · « **Reply #4 on:** April 20, 2008, 10:37:51 am »

Quote from: dmworking247 on April 20, 2008, 10:34:55 am

That was what I was thinking too (assuming its just a hdd fault), but how does one go about doing that?

Yes it is possible to do that..... It more than likely is a dead hard drive. I've replaced a few in Area 51 cabs.... Give me a few mins and I'll find you a link for a tutorial on how to replace the hard drive with a compact flash card and flash it with the CHD from Mame. It's cheaper than replacing the drive with another one and more reliable after.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

Fozzy The Bear · « **Reply #5 on:** April 20, 2008, 11:13:56 am »

OK Here you go......

Two PDf Acrobat files describing the process...... I've done this a couple of times and it works fine. If you get stuck give me a yell.

I had to attach this as two files because of the forum file size limit.

Ignore the prices for parts in these instructions... they're from a while ago and Flash Drives are WAY WAY WAY cheaper now. Try Amazon for one and probably e-bay for the adapter to make it work on IDE.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

Fozzy The Bear · « **Reply #6 on:** April 20, 2008, 11:22:50 am »

OK... I'm also attaching here a link for how to use the Dolly sector copier that you'll need... http://www.vendoramusements.com/hard_drives.htm

And a zip file containing the Dolly Software.

For Area 51 make sure that you only buy a compact flash card no larger than 2Gb Area 51 is fussy about drives larger than that. Also it may be the only way to go now, as you're going to have trouble even finding a 2Gb Hard Drive.

Also... Make sure you have a good working CHD image before you start by running it in Mame. If it runs OK in Mame, then you know the image is good.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

dmworking247 · « **Reply #7 on:** April 20, 2008, 06:15:53 pm »

Thanks so much for this, its a shame I pulled apart a stack of 2gb hdd's looking for spinner parts!

I'll look out for the CHD files, and grab a CF converter and a 2gb CF card. Any advice about whether I should deliberately seek the older CF cards or whether the faster (66x, 133x) cards would be ok too?

Malenko · « **Reply #8 on:** April 20, 2008, 06:22:59 pm »

I believe the speed of the older cards isnt an issue, they are still much faster then the IDE drive.

Fozzy The Bear · « **Reply #9 on:** April 20, 2008, 07:35:05 pm »

Quote from: Malenko on April 20, 2008, 06:22:59 pm

I believe the speed of the older cards isnt an issue, they are still much faster then the IDE drive.

Not correct.... Older CF cards can actually be slower than a hard drive. The cards are cheap enough to try a few if the first one doesn't work well. The problem with the newer ones is that they are probably too fast and may show as "drive ready" and send the drive ready signal before the boards OS has had time to boot. So yes I would go for the older and slower cards. The data speed is not that important with Area 51 as it only loads the software and graphics from it and isn't actually doing anything like buffering live video from it.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

dmworking247 · « **Reply #10 on:** April 24, 2008, 10:13:40 am »

Ok I'm going to give this a try tonight...

A few problems:
There seem to be 4 variations of CHD files for Area 51 on the 'net... how do I know which one I should try? At the moment I'm downloading the plain vanilla Area51.chd which is around 500mb

Also, I'll have to mail order a CF converter/CF card... instead I thought I'd first try using a 10gb hdd I have laying around, and fdisk'ing it to 'large disk support =n' which limits it to a maximum partition space of 2048. Reckon that'd work?

dmworking247 · « **Reply #11 on:** May 05, 2008, 07:02:20 am »

I searched ebay specifically for a 2gb quantum ide hdd which would replace the (very defective) hdd that I pulled out of this machine.

I followed a tutorial I found online that basically said you could use CHDMAN to image the hdd
(Note that you can also use chdman to re-create a real HDD from a backup CHD image in much the same way:
chdman -extract image.chd \\.\PHYSICALDRIVE3)

And I plugged it in....

Failure. Damnit... same screens. I suspect I have more than just a hdd problem (ie a problem with the board). Can anybody help me source a service manual, or otherwise explain what a 'watchdog reset' is, and how to fix it?

dmworking247 · « **Reply #12 on:** May 05, 2008, 09:18:19 am »

I've done some more reading and a watchdog reset seems to be an automatic reset if the 'watchdog' does not get a 'all is good' response, including during the startup sequence.

So theoretically, it could still be the hdd (although I worry its more). The hdd seemed to image ok (as in the chdman command completed successfully after about 5 mins of writing the image), but how can I tell that it wrote for sure? Did the hdd need to be formatted (I assume note as it wouldn't be a fat/ntfs partition). How can I tell if its the write CHD for the game board?

SirPeale · « **Reply #13 on:** May 05, 2008, 09:31:09 am »

I seem to remember this on an Area 51 I repaired once.

Double check your voltages *ON*THE*BOARD*.

Make sure all connections are *SECURE*

Make sure your security key is firmly in place. Which is what it was on the machine I worked on.

SirPeale · « **Reply #14 on:** May 05, 2008, 09:47:15 am »

Quote from: dmworking247 on May 05, 2008, 09:39:31 am

Hi Peale,

Thanks for the tip on the Area 51.

Please excuse my ignorance as I'm new to proper Jamma machines.

What does the security key look like, is it literally a key or a chip/dongle that is meant to be somewhere on the board? Chances are it might have been taken

When you say measure the voltages on the board, do you mean measure the voltages on the harness plugged into the board (I'm assuming Area 51 is Jamma), according to the voltages on the pinout here: http://www.jammaboards.com/jcenter_jamma_pinout.html

Thanks again!

Measure the voltages either on an empty chip socket (you measure from opposite corners) or on the edge connector itself. If you measure from the JAMMA harness it won't be a "true" reading because you can lose some current from a poor connection. You should probably clean the edge connector while you're at it. The voltage should be ~+5.1V

As for the security chip, it doesn't look like anything else on the board, it should stand out. IIRC it has four pins, but it's been a couple years since I worked on an A51.

dmworking247 · « **Reply #15 on:** May 07, 2008, 01:46:19 am »

Success!

I re-did the chdman process on a 680mb hdd instead of the 2gb, and it worked! I don't know what the problem was with the other one (I did check the jumpers).

So now I can confirm that chdman (using a chd from MAME) does help rebuild dead arcade hdd's!

Now with that out of the way, on to the next problem:
The gun doesn't work. In player 1 position, the gun does nothing. If I change the plug to the player 2 position on the board, I can press the trigger and it 'reloads' but nothing shoots on the screen. Is this calibration or possibly the gun being faulty?

Thing is, I have a feeling that the wiring is bodgy from the gun to the board.
Does anybody have any guides, diagrams, or tips on how I can confirm that the gun is functional, that it is wired correctly, and that it calibrated properly?

On that subject, does anybody have a suitable red or blue gun they want to sell? This game is already missing one (the player 2 gun).

Again appologies for my newbieness to original arcade cabinets/boards.

Fozzy The Bear · « **Reply #16 on:** May 07, 2008, 02:15:56 am »

Quote from: dmworking247 on May 07, 2008, 01:46:19 am

Success!

I re-did the chdman process on a 680mb hdd instead of the 2gb, and it worked! I don't know what the problem was with the other one (I did check the jumpers).

Told you that it was fussy about hard drives....... Some work some don't.

On to your gun problem..... There's a lot that can go wrong with guns. That said, have you entered the calibration routine from the test menu?? Try it... what happens??

It sounds like a dodgy gun input board. It's possible, given the condition of the machine when you got it. We'll look at that next.

But first... Take the gun to pieces.. disconnect the cable inside the gun, disconnect the cable from the other end as well and buzz through it with the meter. Check each line and check for any shorts. Gun cables are prone to a lot of wear. They regularly fail in the arcade. If you find any faults in the cable then either buy a new cable or make a new cable. The second of those is the cheapest option.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

dmworking247 · « **Reply #17 on:** May 07, 2008, 07:49:33 am »

Well, I stripped down the gun and reseated everything inside... I've taken off the scratched perspex in the front of the cabinet (the screen) and wiped down the monitor (it also needed a brightness adjustment - man that pot is sensitive!).

Courtesy of the service manual Spacies provided, I found the test switch and calibrated the gun in the player 2 position. The gun 'tracks' in the player 1 position but the 'fire' button doesn't work.

Very strange since the same gun works in the P2 position but not the P1 position... hmm.. I might need to take the PCB out and take a look at the solder joints for the p1 pins.

I also need to get my hands on a second gun.

Oh, whilst I was cleaning up the cabinet I found a 'operation wolf' marquee in 9/10 condition... not bad. I'll be printing up a new 'Area 51' marquee because the original doesn't take up the full width of the cabinet.

Coin mech works with $1/$2 coins (good), fluro needs replacing in marquee (no big deal).

shardian · « **Reply #18 on:** May 07, 2008, 08:12:45 am »

Wade has a dead gun, wiring, and a good optic that he is wanting to get rid of from a Maximum Force. You could put it all back together to be a working gun I believe.
Give him a holler and make him an offer:
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?action=profile;u=1374

red_johnny · « **Reply #19 on:** July 15, 2008, 10:18:03 pm »

Quote from: Fozzy The Bear on April 20, 2008, 11:13:56 am

OK Here you go......

Two PDf Acrobat files describing the process...... I've done this a couple of times and it works fine. If you get stuck give me a yell.

I had to attach this as two files because of the forum file size limit.

Ignore the prices for parts in these instructions... they're from a while ago and Flash Drives are WAY WAY WAY cheaper now. Try Amazon for one and probably e-bay for the adapter to make it work on IDE.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

Very cool, I would love to do the flash drive upgrade. Is it the same process for the area 51 max force combo card?

Q*Bert_OP · « **Reply #20 on:** July 16, 2008, 01:54:55 am »

Quote from: red_johnny on July 15, 2008, 10:18:03 pm

Very cool, I would love to do the flash drive upgrade. Is it the same process for the area 51 max force combo card?

Yes.

red_johnny · « **Reply #21 on:** July 16, 2008, 08:52:04 pm »

Ok, just ordered the parts so I should have them in the next week. Now the CHDMAN.EXE I cant seem to find. Call me dumb but I looked over the net for it and cant find it. Do I need it? I also got area 51 max force zip files which are less then 300 kbs. I thought the game was 1.7 GIGs. Anyway, I hate to ask dumb questions like this but its how I learn. Thanks!

BASS! · « **Reply #22 on:** July 17, 2008, 03:19:01 am »

I have an untested gun and mounting I got as a extra when I bought a Sony PVM monitor . If you want it I'll trade it to ya for anything really.

Sam

SirPeale · « **Reply #23 on:** July 17, 2008, 06:24:08 am »

chdman.exe comes in the Mame ZIP archive.

The ZIP files are the gameboard ROM files. You still need area51.chd.

red_johnny · « **Reply #24 on:** July 17, 2008, 11:47:02 am »

Ok, I will look some more to see if I can find it.

red_johnny · « **Reply #25 on:** July 27, 2008, 02:01:54 pm »

I cant get dolly to work. I put in my info and everything dissapears. Also I dont see why I have to use chdman. What does this do? Cant I just put the flash card into my card reader and burn it that way? I really dont see why I could not do that. This process is alot more complicated than I originally thought.

Jdurg · « **Reply #26 on:** July 27, 2008, 09:12:03 pm »

chdman.exe takes the compressed data and uncompresses it into the exact format that the arcade board is expecting. If you were to just burn the CHD file to the disk and not go ahead and use chdman.exe to uncompress it, I guarantee you 100% that it won't work.

red_johnny · « **Reply #27 on:** July 28, 2008, 04:52:45 am »

Ok. I figured there was a reason I just did not know what it was. Now I just need to figure out how to use dolly and if I can use a card reader to do the burn.

SirPeale · « **Reply #28 on:** July 28, 2008, 07:25:47 am »

I did this exactly once with a Blitz 2000 Gold hard drive. Instead of using Dolly I used Linux's 'dd' command. I had a hard drive with an installation, but I don't see any reason you couldn't use a boot-off-the-cd version.

Wait...don't newer versions of chdman have the ability to write directly to drives?

Paladin · « **Reply #29 on:** July 28, 2008, 11:22:17 am »

Here's a page with a very short 'how to' on using chdman to extract the .chd to a hard drive:
http://aarongiles.com/?p=97

Using a compactflash to IDE adapter it should work the exact same way, as that's the whole point of the adapter - it makes the compactflash look like a normal hard drive to the PC.

I've had the parts to try this on my Gauntlet Legends for a while, but I only got the cabinet done a short time ago. I may be able to try this sometime this week, and I'll be using that how to. I'll post my results after I give it a shot.

red_johnny · « **Reply #30 on:** July 28, 2008, 12:13:10 pm »

Thanks guys, you have been a HUGE help to this project. I will give that a try tonight. Can someone PM me a good MAME site so I can download it? I tried a few MAME programs but they are either patches or ones that dont have chdman. Cant wait to get this done and see if it works!

SirPeale · « **Reply #31 on:** July 28, 2008, 12:56:31 pm »

The MameDev site should have it, I think.

http://www.mamedev.org

red_johnny · « **Reply #32 on:** July 28, 2008, 04:23:31 pm »

Alright, got it and got it unzipped but there is no EXE file in the whole mess. I dont see anything to even start mame? Boy I really missed something havent I?

SirPeale · « **Reply #33 on:** July 28, 2008, 06:45:23 pm »

Quote from: red_johnny on July 28, 2008, 04:23:31 pm

Alright, got it and got it unzipped but there is no EXE file in the whole mess. I dont see anything to even start mame? Boy I really missed something havent I?

Sounds like you got source instead of executable.

red_johnny · « **Reply #34 on:** July 28, 2008, 07:03:28 pm »

Ok, I will go back and get the right one. Thanks, I hope I aint sounding like this all the time

red_johnny · « **Reply #35 on:** July 28, 2008, 09:43:21 pm »

Got the EXE and working! Only problem was I had a corrupt sector in the area51mx.chd file. So I am off looking for another one. I think I came across a good find and if its ok to post it.... removed by moderator They have individual CHD files and I found the one I need in 3 segments. Too bad the site is down right now.

SirPeale · « **Reply #36 on:** July 28, 2008, 10:23:30 pm »

What...precisely...made you think it was okay to post a link to a ROM site here?

red_johnny · « **Reply #37 on:** July 29, 2008, 06:44:12 am »

Because there were links in the other posts you had? Sorry, not trying to go against the grain.

SirPeale · « **Reply #38 on:** July 29, 2008, 06:58:30 am »

Where did I link to a ROM site?

red_johnny · « **Reply #39 on:** July 29, 2008, 12:17:21 pm »

You did not but I dont see any differance. I was putting it out there to help other people so I dont understand the problem of why this was a big deal

Is this site not meant to help as you have helped me? I know there are some questionable copyright debuts but how does a link effect this site? Anyway, I am not trying to stir stuff up just trying to help.


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