X68000 Newbie

[Hubz]

Hi all,

I recently acquired a X68000 Ace HD that unfortunately received damage during shipment. And once powered on the power just clicks and the lights blink rapidly over and over so I quickly powered it off and left it off. But I really want to save it! I've read through some various tutorials on this site but I'm kinda slow so I'm not grasping everything

I see that PSU's pretty much need to be replaced so I was going to go ahead and give that a shot and it sounds like PicoPSU is the way to go but I wondered if anybody had any pictures of their pico psu installs? I am pretty good with soldering but I'm a visual guy so would love to see pictures of installs to boost my confidence that I'm not mis wiring something as I'm not the best at reading electrical diagrams.

Also is their a list for the Ace HD for all the caps I would need to replace on the motherboard? I might do the floppy too but I think I may just end up going with the CF route. Luckily this X68000 already had the RAM Expansion as well

Thanks for your help,

- Hubz

[eidis]

 Hi Hubz and welcome to the forum !

First thing to do, when acquiring an X68000 and doing further troubleshooting, is to replace capacitors on the whole system. There is a possibility that the original power supply could be saved as well.

X68000 ACE capacitor list
http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:x68000_ace_capacitor_list

Please let us know how it went.

Keep the scene alive!
Eidis

[X-Col]

Listen to eidis,

I ended up replacing all capacitors, and 'nearly' succeeded in saving the PSU (ended up with a Pico).
System still works great over a year later   
I agree with eidis that it's always better trying to save all original hardware before reverting to alternatives.

Good luck! 

[Hubz]

Thanks for the responses, but I had already followed the directions and cut the wires from the old PSU and removed it, and I cut them pretty damn close to the Power Supply PCB so I don't think I can get them soldered back on and likely be functional without a lot of luck. So I think I'll have to go the replacement route for that.

Thanks for the link on the caps for the ACE model though, don't know how I  missed that... 

So I jumped on Digi-Key to order caps, and wanted to make sure I get the right kind. I was going to go with Rubycon, and I assume Polarized caps. Do I need to worry about Ripple Current and Impedance?

Thanks,

- Hubz

[aarkay14]

Hi Hubz,

Great to see you here!

I was just reading the posts when I saw your post about polarized caps etc. I too really want to know what kind of caps to order etc. for replacing capacitors in a x68000 compact one. I dont know why I felt the need to learn some soldering and bought an old cord cut broken x68k compact.. to restore.. Today I disassembled it and there are so many caps..

Did you find this info? please let me know ..

-Rama

[kamiboy]

Yes, they have to be polarized, and no, do no worry about ripple current or ESR. Voltage has to be equal or higher, capacitance the same as the cap you are replacing. Rubycon and Nichicon are good brands. Try to get caps rated 105C rather than 85C.

[Hubz]

Awesome just got my caps ordered. Now to work on the PicoPSU.

Can anybody take pictures of the circuit you have to solder in order to get this to work? Pictures of how it's wired into the PicoPSU itself would be extremely helpful too. I follow the ones on the wiki about 75% and I think seeing a few good pictures could help me figure out the rest.

Thanks!

- Hubz