SOS!! Sega Saturn Picture Roll / Sync Issues

Well we've just about reached the end of the line now as far as non invasive tests are concerned.

I received the SCART cable today and I was indeed filled with disappointment to find that the same fucking thing happens. The BIOS is fine but the picture is still scrambled in games.

This scart cable has all pins in place on both the circular end and the SCART end.

I have got my RGB signal back though.

It's ether that small IC which needs corrective surgery or worst case something else we haven't identified on the video lines on the board.

Given the fact that on one of my LCDs the picture seems to be split in a pattern, the top half of the screen and bottom half flashing and intertwined coupled with the wierd high pitch noise both my CRTs make when playing it would lead me to believe that the clock timing is off on one of the chips (VDPs) possibly.

This as far as my limited knowledge goes would lead me to the smallest chip on the board where the 50/60hz switching and clock timings are governed. This is also the place where there are blatantly 2 pins grounded where there should only be one.

That (unless you have any suggestions) will be where I start a careful re-constructive solder job.

If the Saturn manages to survive the surgery, and this still hasn't fixed the problem I'm just going to have to consider buying another and cutting my losses.

I really can't believe my luck is so bad that when I finally get a machine I've wanted for years the fucking solder job on it has ruined it's ability to play on all TVs. What the fuck!? Not even sure when I'll pick up another as this whole fiasco has left me pissed off and out of pocket.

I may just see about purchasing another model one and taking the time to fit the chip out of this one into that one.

In the mean time I'll be making a trip to Maplin this weekend I think to pick up a fine tip soldering kit + solder remover syringe.

Damn

 

x

 

Practice with the solder sucker on a junk PCB before doing it on the real thing. There's a bit of a knack to it and you don't want to burn out that chip as you learn it.

 

You absolute legend!!! :clap::clap::clap:

Thanks for confirming for me, especially for risking potential damage to yours to diagnose mine, thanks.

Many thanks to everyone who has thrown their 2 cents in to help and a special thanks to you mate for helping me finally nail the problem!

As for the serial number, it's in the pics from the first page:

Good advice, will be practising on whatever I can find again and again with small amounts to try to emulate the situation before going into 'surgery'.

Like I said before, the last time I picked up a soldering iron a fire alarm went off. Mind you that was about 10 years ago and I was a lot less patient then.

I'll be putting an entire day aside to take this slowly and do it properly.

I may very well remove that green wire and replace it with smaller kaynar wire, not sure yet. As the size of that wire is a little overkill.

If I can do it by clearing up the pin 1/2 grounding joint and re-soldering it to pin 1 only then I'll opt for that as it's less risky.

If anyone has ANY links to soldering/de-soldering tips/info I'd be grateful as I'll need all the help I can get, also the life of a Saturn now hangs in the balance with my soldering skills or lack thereof.

Nice 1 anyway fellas :thumbsup: I can go to bed with a smile on my face tonight knowing the solution needed to get my baby working properly once more.

Much, much appreciated! ray:

I knew I wasn't going crazy!

 

x

 

Well hopefully it's not a hideous mess under that blob and thick wire.

Well when I say thick wire, the repair point is absolutely TINY (as you know) which is what makes this repair job tricky.

I'm heading down to Maplin today to pick up a soldering iron, ESD wrist strap with mains ground, de-solder pump + solder. Here's the iron FYI:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/30w-soldering-iron-45545

By the sounds of it your method sounds easy and sufficient. I'm just worried about tinning the wire again without spilling solder all over the chip and really cocking it up...

In kind of a mixed mood, it's great we've identified the problem, but nerve racking it's me who has to fix it! lol

Also:-----------------------------------------------------

The new SCART cable seems to be more temperamental than the older official one I've noticed, as I saw last night there was an ever so slight rain-bowing around the edges of objects on the screen last night.

Basically I had to force the lead further into the back of the console and upwards towards the power supply for the picture to centre properly and the colours to become solid.

That's the kind of quirkiness I was expecting when buying this console! lol

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Wish me luck...



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Lifted pin 1 and seperated the two properly from all solder ect (method I'll describe later)

IT'S WORKING!!!

Interestingly I haven't yet grounded pin 1 and it 'seems' to be switching from 576i to 480i on demand, not sure if it's going between 50/60hz modes though when using the reset switch method...

UPDATE:

No it isn't, just got to re-attach the ground line to pin 1 now. The dangerous bit is over anyway.

UPDATE 2:

I have now soldered pin 1 to ground, the console now plays on all TVs and switches region/hz/resolution flawlessly.

Time to hammer the CD burner me thinks.

Once again, thanks Druid mate!

Will be back later...

 

x

 

It's odd, but true. You can definitely tell it isn't switching between 50/60hz. You can still see it flickering in 480i mode whereas now the picture becomes more solid.

 

I too bought a third party RGB scart for my MD 1 and find I constantly have to wiggle the hell out of it to get the picture to stay solid in colour and sound.

 

It's not too bad, now that it works on my Sony TV I'm using the noise cancelling features on the picture menu. It sacrifices some picture sharpness, but it isn't a problem since it's an SD signal anyway and isn't really noticeable.