free PC Engine, not working!

[blackevilweredragon]

OR turbographix, whatever you want to call it..

I was working on my car, and I saw it sitting at the garbage a couple houses down..  so i waited for it to get dark, to snatch it (to not get caught, LOL)..

i plug it in, and you can hear the game start (Space Harrier), it sounds like it responds to the controllers too, but the screen, well, it's like it has no horizontal hold!  It's all washed out..  my HDTV just repeats:  "NO SIGNAL", but any old TV shows a picture with no horizontal hold...

what can be it's issue?

[kendrick]

Dragon, you check the solder joints? The American Turbo hardware is notorious for bad contacts, particularly in the video connector. Usually, all it takes is some fresh solder on the five-pin connector to bring it back to life. It's not that there's no horizontal hold, so much as there's bad contact or a short in there screwing up the composite signal.

BTW, Lawrence broke many 2x4 lumber segments educating me as to the distinction between PC Engine and TurboGrafx hardware. The American Turbo consoles could play import games with just the adapter, whereas the Japanese PCE consoles needed an internal mod. There's also a bit of an expectation regarding aesthetics and expandability with the PCE as opposed to the TG-16. Whereas other game consoles are functionally identical among the regions, with the NEC stuff it pays off to be specific.

-KKC, who thinks that would make a good game concept. "Lawrence whacks you over the head with wood so you understand what is what!" :)

[ken_cinder]

And here I was thinking this was a post about you giving away a free PC Engine. Shucks!

And I just learned that too, US Hu-Card's don't work in JP PC Engines without modification, but the reverse is not true.
US Hu-Card's check the region of the console, and I'm pretty sure the same can be said for Turbo CD games.

[blackevilweredragon]

ok, i just took a look at it, and all seems good on the solder..  just in case, i re-soldered everything on the connectors (reflow, and add fresh solder)..  still no go..

i don't know how the system/console works, but is it normal for it to take 40 seconds before it starts playing the game music?  (as i can't see what's on-screem)

[kendrick]

Any other game you can test with? It sounds like Space Harrier is spinning up into demo mode while it waits there for you to hit the 'Run' button, and that's why you don't hear music for a half a minute. The fact that there's silence for so long might also be an indicator that the controller port isn't working like you think it should.

What's the expansion port look like in the back? I haven't fixed quite as many TG-16 units as I have other consoles, but I've seen enough botched RGB jobs to want to think of that as a possible failure point too.

-KKC, who should really trade in his spare TG-16. For, like, a pizza or something.

[blackevilweredragon]

took me a while to find a picture..  im not home at the moment (am gonna be out all day tonight and tomorrow)..

this is exactly what it looks like:  http://www.destructoid.com/wp-content/uplo...9/PCE_CDROM.jpg

(so hopefully you'll know what im dealing with)

EDIT:  there wasn't any other game..  if there was any more out there in the trash, the garbage truck got it...

[kendrick]

Whoa hey, that is a PC Engine. Is it just the core unit on the right, or did you score a CD drive too? Either way, make sure you've got a game from the right region to test with. If you do have the CD drive, note that no game inserted will give you the static boot screen prompt, which is pretty clear and unmoving for test purposes.

-KKC, who needs to live in a neighborhood where people throw out game consoles...

[blackevilweredragon]

Whoa hey, that is a PC Engine. Is it just the core unit on the right, or did you score a CD drive too? Either way, make sure you've got a game from the right region to test with. If you do have the CD drive, note that no game inserted will give you the static boot screen prompt, which is pretty clear and unmoving for test purposes.

-KKC, who needs to live in a neighborhood where people throw out game consoles...

it does have the CD-ROM drive..  if I turn it on with no cartridge (or whatever you call those little things), the TV does do "something", but you can't hear anything...

I noticed though, there's a slight "buzz" in the audio too...  (i have the unit with me at school)

[Joe Redifer]

If you turn on a PCE or TurboGrafx-16 without a card in the slot, you'll get a random solid color.  No sound.  You'll need a System Card to enable CD-ROM games, and unfortunately that's probably gone with the trash as well.  And by the way, US and Japanese CD games are 100% cross-compatible with each other (but not the System Cards).

Your problem might be in the expansion module (the suitcase part that the CD-ROM and the PCE hook to).  Or it may have been a PCE that was modded for PAL as that happened quite a bit in Europe-land since they never got an official PCE, but they eventually got a PAL TurboGrafx that did not sell well at all.  I am betting that is a PAL modded system you have.  Go ring your neighbor's doorbell, wait for them to answer and see if they have British accents.  Then without saying a word, run away quickly, screaming the whole time for no reason.

[blackevilweredragon]

If you turn on a PCE or TurboGrafx-16 without a card in the slot, you'll get a random solid color.  No sound.  You'll need a System Card to enable CD-ROM games, and unfortunately that's probably gone with the trash as well.  And by the way, US and Japanese CD games are 100% cross-compatible with each other (but not the System Cards).

Your problem might be in the expansion module (the suitcase part that the CD-ROM and the PCE hook to).  Or it may have been a PCE that was modded for PAL as that happened quite a bit in Europe-land since they never got an official PCE, but they eventually got a PAL TurboGrafx that did not sell well at all.  I am betting that is a PAL modded system you have.  Go ring your neighbor's doorbell, wait for them to answer and see if they have British accents.  Then without saying a word, run away quickly, screaming the whole time for no reason.

all my TVs are multi-systems

actually, the guy who threw it away is a local police officer, one who is hispanic...  (i think)

[blackevilweredragon]

eureka!  it's working!  I used a different power supply on it (i was using the official one), and now it's working..

the real PS must have been failing or something...

the music sounds so "SID" like, and the graphics look, well, kinda like my Genesis, but a tad more colorful (it seems)..

BUT, the controls are lagging slightly..  Don't know if this is normal for a system this old..

[NFG]

Go ring your neighbor's doorbell, wait for them to answer and see if they have British accents. Then without saying a word, run away quickly, screaming the whole time for no reason.

Hahaha, brilliant.  Good idea!

The IFU units are VERY flaky, it's becoming unusual to find one that WORKS, so it wouldn't surprise me to find this part of your system is not working right.

[blackevilweredragon]

what does IFU stand for?  (i tried Googling it, but can't find it)

[NFG]

It's marked right on the hardware.  Interface unit, the bridge between the PCE and CD.  IFU-30 IIRC.  

And controls don't lag.  Ever.  Even on the very first consoles they don't lag.  How could they and still be playable?  You're imagining things.

[blackevilweredragon]

You abbreviated, i don't put abbreviations and things like that together..  (the unit says the full name, thus i don't know they are the same)..

I may be imaging the controller lagging, but the buttons seems stiff..  there might be something sticky in it (causing the appearance of lag)