Sega Saturn Region Free BIOS

I'm getting some odd behavior on a VA5 I re-chipped last night.

Booting the following with listed behavior:
MYST - licensing screen, then black
MegaMan X4 - goes through Capcom logo FMV then resets to the dashboard willing to restart the game.
ClockWork Knight (I believe, I failed to label it's CD-R) - wanted me to format 100% of the onboard memory before it would play.
Virtua Racing - same as MYST

All discs play in a second chipped Saturn just fine. I've even swapped laser assemblies, modchips, and power supplies between the two to see if it was any particular part and they work fine in Saturn #2.

The only conclusion I have is that there might be a cold joint on the Macronix flash but I'm not sure why it would affect the ability of games to boot but nothing else. Oddly my heavily scratched copy of Resident Evil will boot but freeze while the zombie dog is staring at Barry's back - probably due to it being heavily scratched and me attempting a polish job that didn't help.

The modchip works fine in Saturn #2 and I put in a different, well tested chip into Saturn #1 (the aforementioned problematic model) with the same exact behaviors.

 

I have the same problem with a console here. I suspect its a cold joint that has gotten broken with all the messing about inside.

 

Just as I read that I noticed on the underside of the board that C23 had it's solder look a bit...bubbly. There is also some sort of yellow-orange crystalline substance on it's casing.

No idea what the rated value is but looks like a candidate for replacement.

Addendum:
I did notice something odd about this particular VA5, probably means nothing. When I clipped the pins off of the mask ROM there was nothing restricting the movement of the chip. I saw nothing I could attribute to glue or adhesive. Every sub-VA6 I've done this to has had enough adhesive to more than secure the mask ROM.

Poor QA on this board maybe?

 

Doesn't need glue. Boards usually do not have that, dunno why they did it with the Saturn. And some models don't seem to have it

 

Region free bios on Sega Saturn EPROM 27C4100

Region free bios on Sega Saturn Japanese Grey.
EPROM 27C4100
Made by me

 

I figured as much on all of it as I've seen wave soldering done.

Swapping the region free IC in now to a different Saturn, this VA5 also doesn't have any glue.

EDIT:

Works wonderfully in Saturn #2. Have a hunch about why the previous console didn't work but I don't know why it'd fix it.

 

I think nobody researched the side effects of using wrong combinations of hardware/bios revisions...

I said somewhere on this thread that I had some trouble after putting an HISATURN (H/W VA2) bios in VA0.5 motherboard... :shrug:

 

I have my saturn bios modded and modshipped working great.
I still would like to choose between 50 and 60 Hz.
I know I can do it by a switch on the back of the unit but I like switchless things.

I actually see this mod:
http://seb.riot.org/saturnmod/board.sml

I would like to make my saturn switchless only for the frequency, not for region.
I know I just have to not solder to region JP.
My question is about the led.
I already have the switchless board made by someone else, here it is:

It follow instruction here:


My question is:
How to put the Saturn original green led instead of the multicolor led on this schematics?

Is this way possible?


My goal is to have the led always active and not changing color, this way I will be able to change only frequency looking at this led flashing.

 

mmmonkey's site has a modified version of that hex, which only does 50/60hz switching.

You need to replace the LED tho, as the blinking only happens when you release the button and it changes mode.

If you have green for both modes, you will find it hard to change modes.

basically, when you hold down the reset button, the LED will change colour. you then release the button on the colour you want. the LED will then flash and change to that mode.

The rewrite of the code I am doing will do what you want (I wanted the same)

 

Just perfect! Let me know when you will finish it, I will be glad to have it.:thumbsup:
And if you can sell me two of those, I'll buy them from you. ^^

 

Guys, did anyone do a dual-bios mod? Like solder the new chip on top of existing, piggyback style, and have /CE of top or bottom chip pulled and connected alternatively to Vcc or GND?

I mean it's so easy to mess up with original masked rom chip removal... It's easier to just piggy back I guess

 

If you don't have the correct tools it might be easier. But replacement is much easier for me personally.

If you dont have hot air rework, I could see bending legs etc to be easier I guess.

 

I had vary bad experience with my attempts to desolder and then resolder memory chips on Xbox 1.0-1.4 to up the memory to 128MB for XBMC. I killed 3 perfectly working systems back when they where still 300$ a pop, so yeah, I prefer to piggy back

 

Just finished work on a VA10 with a Sanyo controller board and a VA07. Works great in both.

Of note the EMSIC modboards I received earlier work great with the Sanyo controller. Haven't tried any other boards in it but it wouldn't surprise if me if they all did.

 

Emperor Udan: Where did you find it?
http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/6558/accsa19.jpg

 

Its just a chip and a few resistors, cap and led.

I can sell you a "kit" if you really want one. Probably better to just have the 50/60hz version rather than the full version if you have the region free bios installed tho

 

A french guy sell it to me but a little bit expensive, I was lazy and pay for free irl time...
Take Bad_Ad84 offer, I already buy stuff from him, it's cheap and working same way.

 

I was more interested in the circuit board.

 

Here is a picture of the Bios installed on a VA13 board. Damn lucky that it isn't longer :O
http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e236/Konsolkongen/Various%20mods/Thisiscoolregionandhz.jpg

I also found that the chip was wider than the old one so I had to bend all the legs inwards to make it fit nicely. A lot a liquid flux made the soldering a lot easier.

EDIT: No glue underneath the Bios on this MB revision.

 

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