How to kill an Dreamcast.

I leave this as a piece of WARNING for anyone considering dismantling an retail Dreamcast console and wishing to keep it into an working state after putting it together again.

This disaster was not caused by me, but I found this poor Dreamcast motherboard while I was going through my Dreamcast scrape boards for finding one in good working order for an special purpose.

The screws that hold the GD-ROM drive assembly are shorter than the other screws on the console to prevent something like this from happening:

Several address lines that connect the SH4 processor to the Holly (Power VR GPU) chip were severed by the over-fastened screw...

Edit: If one are having trouble finding the damage, it's aligned with the JHG markings right below the white rectangle.


And this:

Not so shocking as the previous picture, because the damage was done to an grounding line, which has no impact on the console operation.

Edit: Damage is below the second ferrite bead on the line with five aligned ferrite beads.

So PAY VERY CLOSE ATTENTION that the screws on the console are not mixed or else you will regret dearly. :gravedigging:

 

Thanks for the pictures. Could you edit them and put a red arrow to point to the area that is damaged? I'm not exactly sure what the problem area is as I have never taken a Dreamcast apart.

 

This one is common knowledge amongst the older DC crowd and I make damn sure to do it right when I take them apart.

 

oowwwwwwwwwwwwww, a friend of mine did the same mistake...R.I.P.

 

OT:
You will shit brix when you see it:



B2T uhm...not that i want to complain but the pics are pretty blurry and I cant really see any damage on the Board....but maybe Im just blind, otherwise pls look if theres a makro function for your camera

 

Well that *is* the macro function of the shitty Polaroid m630 I am using to take the pictures. No better than an modern cellphone camera, you see... :lol:

About the damage, it's the rough circle in the white retangle on the first picture just above the SH4 chip.

Edit:

If one are still having trouble finding the damage, it's aligned with the JHG markings right below the white rectangle.


And brix were shit. :lol:
Sorry about the crappy camera. Troll you next time ! :thumbsup:

 

Way way back I once slipped while removing some tough screws from a CPU heatsink. Screwdriver went right into the motherboard damaging traces and all sorts. Computer is still working today without no faults.

Thanks for the pics and info though, I've taken apart a few DC's without thinking about this stuff, guess I've been lucky.

 

and by 12, you mean about 4 right?

 

Was that a penis joke?

 

No, I work in a photo lab and know Macro works effectively at between 2 and 8 inches on most standard off the shelf cameras, the average being 4 inches.

 

The camera sucks. Case closed. :lol:

 

Well of course it sucks, the man already said it's a Polaroid.

 

I've done macro shots on my Canon at about 2-3 inches from the device. The problem is having a steady hand so as not to jitter the shot and turn out blurry.

 

Every game collector I know has a shitty camera

 

Thought it came with the job?

 

Seems most don't want to pay mroe then $25 for a camera...

 

Sadly that piece of trash was quite expensive when it was new. No wonder Polaroid went bankrupt little after I bought that trash... :thumbsup:

 

I use my lg ku990 phone to take pictures.

 

This is why i always put the unscrewed screws back into the case's screw holes,especially on something which is virgin territory for me.It prevents them from going walkies aswell .