======================== The Sega/Gremlin X-Y FAQ version 1.17 written by: Mark Jenison ======================== 1. Introduction 2. The X-Y Convert-a-Game system a. The System 1. CPU boards 2. X-Y timing and control boards 3. Sound boards 4. EPROM boards b. Monitor: Electrohome G08 X-Y c. Power supply 3. Games a. Space Fury b. Star Trek c. Eliminator 1. Upright 2. Cocktail 3. 4-player d. Tac/Scan e. Zektor 4. Repair tips a. CPU b. EPROM c. X-Y boards d. Audio Issues 1. Space Fury Sound Boards 2. Eliminator/Zektor Sound Boards 3. Universal Sound Board 4. Speech Board 5. Misc Audio Issues e. Controls f. General Tips g. Power supply h. Monitor 5. Conversions a. Game-to-Game b. Related documents 6. Contributors 7. Document History *************** 1. Introduction *************** This document discusses the Sega/Gremlin X-Y Convert-a-Games system. These games were color X-Y games released in the early 1980's. The Convert-a-Game system was designed so an operator could convert from one game to another by simply changing artwork, control panels, game cages (and possibly the orientation of the monitor) without having to re-wire the cabinet. All of this could be done from the front of the cabinet. The following were included in the series of Sega color X-Y Convert-a-Games (listed in order of release): - Eliminator - Space Fury - Zektor - Tac/Scan - Star Trek ******************************************* 2. The Sega color X-Y Convert-a-Game System ******************************************* ========== The System ========== This is just a brief overview. The system is explained in much more detail in the Star Trek manual. Each Sega color X-Y Convert-a-Game system consisted of what is known as the G-80 system. It contains the following elements: * CPU board * Sound board(s) * X-Y timing and control boards * 48K EPROM board These boards are about the size of a piece of paper (approximately 8 1/2"x11") with one narrow end having a 86 (2x43) edge pins. All these boards fit into a card cage, with the individual boards plugging into a interconnect board at the bottom of the cage. The interconnect board allows the boards to be plugged into the slots in any order or position. This board is supplied with voltage from the power supply, and is how all boards are powered. It also acts as a bus to get information between cards. ---------- CPU boards ---------- The CPU board itself is generic between the X-Y games. However, each game had a special chip (protection chip/slapstick) at U21 and an EPROM at U25 that was specific for that game (the only exception here may be Space Fury and Eliminator). Some games have the same special chip as other games. These are a list of which special chips go with which games: Special chip (U21) EPROM (U25) Game --------------------------------------------------------------------- 315-0076 1390 Eliminator 4-player 1711 Tac/Scan 315-0064 969 Space Fury 1873 Star Trek 315-0063 959 Space Odyssey (version 1 & 2) (non X-Y) 315-0070 969 Eliminator 969 Eliminator cocktail 1346 005 (non X-Y) 315-0062 829 Astro Blaster (non X-Y) 315-0082 1778 Monster Bash (non X-Y) 1611 Zektor See the MAME source code for more information. ----------------------------- X-Y timing and control boards ----------------------------- These boards, often referred to as the X-Y pair, are the boards that control the monitor. They are generic between all X-Y games. These boards are hooked together via a ribbon cable. ------------ Sound boards ------------ There is some compatibility of sound boards between games. There may or may not be necessary EPROM swaps on some of these boards. Sound board Games used with --------------------------------------- Speech board Space Fury Star Trek Zektor Battle Star/Space Fury Space Fury Meatball/Eliminator Eliminator Eliminator 4-player Zektor Universal Tac/Scan Star Trek Meatball and Eliminator sound boards are apparently the same. Sega changed the name of this sound board during production of the game for some reason. Zektor`s sound board (800-3249) is the same as Eliminators (800-3174) except for these minor differences: Ref Des ELIMINATOR ZEKTOR R5 10K 4.7K R9 33K 12K R71 270K 100K R79 2 MEG unused R122 220K 390K R132 220K 100K C9 0.01uF 0.0047uF C46 0.022uF 0.047uF Also, there is a large socket on the Eliminator sound board which is supposed to be populated with an AY-3-8912 chip. This chip must be present to hear all of the sounds for Zektor. Without it, Zektor will be missing these four sounds: ping, rotating rings, city flyby, and zizzers. Eliminator, however, does not make use of this chip, so Eliminator will sound just fine without this socket populated. The Battlestar sound board doesn't need this chip either in order to play all of the Space Fury sounds. Speech boards have very little circuitry on them, so don't get worried if you pickup a set and see that the speech board is barely populated. I have seen several speech board sets whose EPROM numbers are not continuous. For example, Space Fury's speech board has EPROMs 970-972, and 808. The 808 is a 2716, while the others are 2732s. I would speculate that the 808's were from Astro Blaster. However, these leftover EPROMS ARE NECESSARY for the speech boards to run correctly. Star Trek uses a Zektor EPROM for its speech board. Speech boards can be strapped to use 2716 EPROMS vs 2732 eproms. There are jumpers on the board that to change the EPROM configuration. So if you take a speech board from a raster G-80 game, you may need to change the configuration to work with your vector game. ------------ EPROM boards ------------ The EPROM boards are common across all G-80 games; only the EPROMS themselves are unique to each game. ============================ Monitor: Electrohome G08 X-Y ============================ The Sega X-Y Convert-a-Games came with the infamous Electrohome G08 X-Y monitor. This monitor is infamous for its unreliability, and are probably the main reason why these games were junked by operators so quickly. It is commonly joked about on the net that if you operate one of these monitors, you should also be the owner of a fire extinguisher (and keep it handy). There were several versions of the GO8, but the version most commonly found in Sega XY games is the G08-003. See the G08 FAQ for more detail about this monitor. ============ Power supply ============ The power supply that came with the Sega X-Y games provided an audio amp and the following necessary voltages: +5VDC, -5VDC, +12VDC (for sound), -12VDC (for video), and 3VAC. According to John Robertson, "the original use of the 3VAC was a valid power detect reset. If the power switch was quickly cycled on/off/on this would force a reset. [This] Was a way around the fast cycle reset free credits that some games gave." ******** 3. Games ******** The following list of games are known produced Sega Gremlin X-Y games. I have a flyer which promotes Sega X-Y Convert-a-Games that shows another X-Y game called "Battle Star". It appears from the screen shots on the flyer that it is NOT a prototype game for Eliminator or Space Fury (the flyer shows a Space Fury being converted to a Battle Star). Even though Space Fury has a Battle Star sound board, it is possible Battle Star itself was never released. The Battle Star game that appears in the flyer is playing an unfinished game called "Space Disc Launcher", according to Tom Haagen. Most games came in the common Sega Convert-a-game cabinet, which was used as the cabinet for many of Sega's games (Congo Bongo, Zaxxon, etc). ========== Space Fury ========== Space Fury came in both the Converta-a-game cabinet and dedicated cocktail, which is the same as the cocktail described below for Eliminator. Space Fury is somewhat similar in game play to Asteroids or Space Duel. Enemies objects fly onto the screen, "assembling" themselves into floating objects. The characteristic of the objects depend on how many of the pieces are allowed to assemble. Between waves, you are allowed to add an "attachment" on your ship, giving you additional fire power, possibly in additional directions. This game is probably most famous for it's one-eyed alien which taunts you throughout the game. "So, a creature for my amusement. Prepare for battle!" 1 - Speech board (EPROM 970-972, 808) 2 - CPU board (EPROM 969, special chip 315-0064) 3 - X-Y timing board 4 - X-Y control board 5 - Sound board "Battle Star" or "Space Fury" 6 - EPROM board (EPROM numbers 960-968) Controls consisted of 6 buttons: left, right, thrust, fire, 1P, 2P. There were three EPROM versions of Space Fury: Version A: this version did not have the copyright year on the screen Version B: has copyright year Version C: has copyright year Not sure what the difference is between B and C, but I believe the speech data may be different between the two. ========= Star Trek ========= Star Trek came in a Convert-a-game cabinet, a dedicated cockpit version, a dedicated upright, and was also available as a Sega X-Y Convert-a-Game kit, which was popular for Asteroids cabinets. There is a switch setting for two sets of controls, so it may be possible to play out of a cocktail, but I've heard of one. Plus, the control panel, assuming a standard Sega/Gremlin cocktail would have been used, would have to be crazy. If you have a Star Trek board cage that has an edge connector on the metal cover, that means you have a Star Trek Kit cage. A mapping finger board was supplied for game conversion. Star Trek was a popular Asteroids conversion. Replace the vector monitor and insert a finger board and re-wire the control panel, and most of the existing Asteroids harness could be re-used. However, the edge card connection pinouts for Star Trek kits doesn't match any game (as far as I can tell), so a mapping finger board was required for the Star Trek conversion kits. If you have a Star Trek cage where the harness goes right to female mate-n-lok connectors mounted on a metal panel, which is mounted on the cage itself, then you've got one out of a Star Trek cockpit. The screen consists of three sections: 1) a display for score, available shields, photons, and warp time, 2) a radar view of your ship, surrounding enemies and star bases, and 3) a cockpit view from your ship; sort of like Battlezone in outer space. The object of the game is to defeat the enemies in the sector. There are star bases which you can dock with to get more shields, photons, and warp time. There are bonus rounds which you must survive where NOMAD places mines, and you must successfully navigate through the mine field them and attempt to destroy NOMAD. Of all games manuals, Star Trek's manual is the most helpful when it comes to explaining the Sega X-Y G-80 system. It also has a good deal of monitor information, and explains the theory of the G-80 system in detail. Of all the Sega X-Y manuals, try to get a copy of this one. 1 - CPU board (EPROM 1873, chip 315-0064) 2 - X-Y timing board 3 - X-Y control board 4 - Sound board "Universal" 5 - Speech board (EPROM 1871-1872, 1607) 6 - EPROM board (EPROM numbers 1848-1870) Controls consisted of an encoder wheel, thrust, fire, photon, warp, 1P, and 2P (the cockpit does not have a 2P button). ========== Eliminator ========== There are many different forms of Eliminator, but the premise is the same: There is a large spherical rock known as the Eliminator. It floats around the screen and sends out ships to destroy you. You attempt to destroy enemy ships by forcing them into the Eliminator with your energy bolts. The Eliminator can only be destroyed by firing a shot down a narrow tunnel to its core. I believe the Eliminator was coined as "The Death Bagel" by John Grigsby. Although the games between the three different types are the same, different versions, thus different EPROMs, were necessary to handle the displaying of scores for each of the different cabinets. The attract modes for each game stayed the same as the upright version, which is kind of odd for the 4-player version since the attract mode implies only two players. ------- Upright ------- The 2-player upright of Eliminator came in the standard Convert-a-Game cabinet. There are two ROM versions of this game. The first version of the game had small, fast, and accurate firing drones, and there was a "counter" for each player that counted down from 30. The counter would decrement went certain things happened, but there seems to be no rhyme or reason to it. The second versions is the most commonly found version. In this version, the drones are more colorful, larger, and dumb. There are no counters, just a score for each player. There are two different versions of the artwork also. I suspect one was released with each version of the software. The Eliminator upright board configuration is described here. It consists of: 1 - CPU board (EPROM 969, chip 315-0070) 2 - X-Y timing board 3 - X-Y control board 4 - Sound board "Meatball" or "Eliminator" 5 - EPROM board (v1 EPROM numbers 1158-1170; v2 EPROM numbers 1333-1345) Controls consisted of 10 buttons: left1, right1, thrust1, fire1, left2, right2, thrust2, fire2, 1P, 2P -------- Cocktail -------- The Eliminator cocktail is very different in hardware than its upright or 4-player counterpart. For starters, the game has a different power supply configuration. It has what appears to be a basic switching power supply for the +5VDC, a transformer, and a small board which looks to rectify some of the other voltages, and also a small audio amplification board. Also, the monitor in the cocktail has a different chassis than the ones used in the uprights and 4-player model. The chassis is more compact, even though all the parts appears to be the same (they are just mounted more closely to the tube neck.) The Eliminator cocktail board configuration is described here. It consists of: 1 - CPU board (EPROM 969, chip 315-0070) 2 - X-Y timing board 3 - X-Y control board 4 - Sound board "Meatball" or "Eliminator" 5 - EPROM board (EPROM numbers 1200-1212) Two control panels containing left, right, thrust, fire, with the 1P, 2P buttons on the cabinet. -------- 4-player -------- The four-player version of Eliminator is a tall table top game where you stand at each side of the monitor at a player control panel. It was not really a Convert-a-Game per se, since no other games could be played out of its cabinet and the game couldn't be played out of any other Sega/Gremlin cabinet (without some serious hacking). The four-player consists of basically the same set up of the regular upright except that it has an external I/O board to handle all the additional coin and control inputs. The I/O board is mounted to the side of the game cage. 1 - CPU board (EPROM 1390, chip 315-0076) 2 - X-Y timing board 3 - X-Y control board 4 - Sound board "Meatball" or "Eliminator" 5 - EPROM board (EPROM numbers 1347-1360) Controls consisted of 4 control panels, each with: left, right, thrust, fire No player start buttons were needed. There was a coin door for each side of the cabinet under each player's controls. The coin mechs have lockout coils, so as soon as a player put a coin in, the coin door would lock out attempts to coin up that side again, and the player would use that side. A countdown from 10 would begin, and other players could coin in before it reached 0. Once it reached zero, players could not join, and any remaining attempts to coin in would be locked out. The players then try to "eliminate" each other. The last remaining player must then face the Eliminator (and its drones) alone. There are two versions of the Eliminator 4-player flyers. One shows a cabinet where the control panel color indicates which color ship the player controls. There is also a typo in the description of play text. This flyer also shows a "high impact promotional canopy" (which is optional) on the back. I've only seen this version of the cabinet. There is also another version of the flyer which shows each of the control panels being black, with only the color of the buttons and a number to indicate which control panel controls which color ship. It also lacks the promotional canopy on the back of the flyer, and the game description text does not have the typo on it. This one was likely the first flyer produced, and when the picture of the canopy was added, the text was not formatted correctly around it. As with the two player version of this game, there are two different ROM versions for this game as well! One is the common version that came with the regular version of the game. The other that was found was labeled "prototype" and in this version, the Eliminator is *very* aggressive. Also, the game can be started by simply pressing any of the player buttons on the control panels. ======== Tac/Scan ======== Tac/Scan was a kit for the Convert-a-Game cabinet. It is possible it may have come from the factory as a "factory conversion". According to the flyer, it was also offered in cocktail form. However, if you look closely at the flyer, you can see that the spinner is off-center, and the buttons on the left are the same color, but the buttons on the right are two different colors, matching what you'd see on an Eliminator or Space Fury cocktail. It appears to be a mockup. You pilot a fleet of seven ships that all move and fire in unison. First scenario: Shoot down enemies while you pilot your fleet through waves of descending enemies. The game play for this scenario is unique; your ships are at the bottom of the screen, firing up, but you can "tac" the ships to fire left and right, and pilot your fleet past enemies. The formation of your ships also changes. Additional ships appear occasionally which you can catch and add to your fleet. Second scenario: Basically the same thing, except in a 3-D perspective from behind your fleet. Additional ships are also awarded here. Third scenario: Pilot your fleet down a warp tunnel. Avoid hitting the sides or you will lose ships. 1 - CPU board (EPROM 1711, chip 315-0076) 2 - X-Y timing board 3 - X-Y control board 4 - Sound board "Universal" 5 - EPROM board (EPROM numbers 1670-1688, 1709-1710) Controls consisted of: encoder wheel, fire, add ship, 1P, 2P. ====== Zektor ====== This is the rarest of the Sega XY games. The game was basically "lost" until April of 1997, when Paul Frazee discovered a partial boardset and posted it for sale (not knowing the attention that this one boardset would draw). He then held an auction for the partial boardset, and it was purchased by me (and a few other unnamed contributors - thanks guys) for $400! Turns out I had found the CPU EPROM chip in a warehouse raid about a year prior to the auction, which made the boardset complete. In early January of 1998, Lee Bender found a complete Zektor cabinet, and a few others have been found or assembled since then. "Dangerous Dann" Frank contributed this description of Zektor, taken from the manual, flyer, and his personal experience with the game. ------- Object: To "recapture Eight cosmic cities that have been seized by an evil cadre of alien Robots." Each city is named in an Alphabetical progression (and increasing difficulty) in this order... Ascella Baitos Centaurus Denebala Eridonus Faltar Graffas ...??? Each city's liberation begins with a different "Robot" image and voice confronting the player... The robot ruling "Faltar" was a male with a deep voice stating "I rule Faltar now, you will have to fight for it". There are also female robots such as the one who declares "I have conquered Eridonus. You will not take it from me" To liberate each city, the player must defeat three 'waves' of enemy FIGHTERS' and ROBOPROBES that are often 'shielded' (in red) and who fire lethal zig-zag shaped 'Zizzers' at the player's ship. Also there are three types of MOBOIDS, and their features are as follows... Green Moboids... 'Spin' player's ship on contact and 'bounce' enemy ships Blue Moboids... 'Bounce' all ships Red Moboids... Destroy all 'unshielded' ships (including Player's ship) After defeating the three waves of attack, the alien Robot holding the city appears within three concentric rings (a la "Star Castle") through which a 'Slot shot' can be scored 'neutralizing' the Robot and earning the player a Bonus ship. If you don't make the shot after a period of time, you still advance to the next level, but don't get a bonus ship. Enemies who are shielded must be hit several times to weaken the shields before they are destroyed. SPOILER ALERT! . . . . . . . The last boss is the alien from Space Fury. My own speculation says that they probably planned to have a planet per letter, with Zektor being the last. Must have ran out of program space. The game board consists of: 1 - CPU board (EPROM 1611, chip 315-0082) 2 - X-Y timing board 3 - X-Y control board 4 - Sound board - "Meatball" or "Eliminator" (modified as mentioned above) 5 - Speech board (EPROM numbers 1607-1610) 6 - EPROM board (EPROM numbers 1586-1606) Controls consisted of: encoder wheel, 1P, 2P, thrust, fire ************** 4. Repair Tips ************** So you have a set of what you believe to be a complete Sega/Gremlin X-Y game. You have your working monitor and a good power supply. You power up the game, hoping to see the game's attract mode come up on the screen, but instead you get a garbled mess of graphics, a still picture, or no picture at all. Welcome to the wonderful world of Sega/Gremlin X-Y games. Well, don't fret. These marvels of technology were designed to be modular so that they could be debugged easily. It helps to have a known *working* set to swap parts around to figure it where the problem lies, but if you aren't so fortunate, here's some debugging advice. ========== CPU boards ========== The led on a good CPU board will flash out information that can be used to debug other problems; check the manual for these codes. If the game isn't coming up, press the test plunger. If you get a steady halt light, try replacing the 2114 RAMs and the Z80 on the CPU board and see if that fixes it. If the halt light flashes repeatedly, the first 1k of EPROMs is either bad or making a bad connection. If you get nothing, many things could be the issue. The clock for the CPU board comes from the XY timing boards; sometimes however, you'll see a crystal on the CPU board. Since the G80 games all used the same CPU board, chances are they reused a CPU board from a raster G80 game. By the way, bad sound boards and speech boards can cause symptoms that might make you suspect the CPU or X-Y boards are bad. Do not test CPU and X-Y boards with untested sound and speech boards. You don't need these boards in the card cage for the game to run, so unplug them and set them aside until you've tested the rest of the boards. Here are the pinouts for the CPU board: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10- 11- 12- 13- 14- 15- 16- 17- 18- 19- 20- 21- 22- 23- 24- 25- 26- 27- 28- ============ EPROM boards ============ First things first; reseat each EPROM on the EPROM board and check all pins are getting a good connection. It doesn't help to try and debug a program that cannot run. I've seen many different versions of sockets used on these EPROM boards, and in most cases if the EPROM board doesn't seem to be working, it's because of the sockets. There are three or four devices on the board itself, so replacing them all wouldn't be a problem if it came down to that, but rarely are these the problem. In the last EPROM socket you should find a 74LS154. ========== X-Y boards ========== Listen carefully to your monitor when you are working with these boards. If you power up and you here the deflection circuitry working (what is known as "deflection chatter") but don't see a picture, then it's likely the control board is bad, and your timing board is probably ok. If you hear nothing, it could be either board. Press the test plunger on the CPU and it should flash out the location of any bad 2114 RAMs on the timing board. Keep doing this until all bad 2114 RAMs have been located and replaced. Sometimes the board will continue to complain about a RAM event if you've replaced it; I've seen that often they'll complain about U27 over and over. Something else is wrong with the board in this case. I get a lot of cases where people aren't sure if they have the video connectors on correctly. The "wiring diagram" on the boardset or in the cabinet can confuse the issues, so just ignore it and follow the guides below for hooking up the video. This guide assumes that the boardset is in its normal position, where the power plug is connected on the right and you are looking into the cage. XY-control board (controls RGB; "remember...COntrol means COlor"): This is the board of the XY pair which has the highest connector of the two. Numbered counting down from the top. This connector normally has 3 different color wires. 1 ----- Green output 2 Empty 3 ----- Red output 4 ----- Blue output XY-timing board (controls the XY position): This is the board of the XY pair which has the lowest connector of the two. Numbered counting down from the top. This connector normally has two wires of the same color, and a bare wire for the Shield wire. 1 ----- Y output 2 ----- Shield 3 Empty 4 ----- X output Hopefully this makes things more clear. Remember, for the top connector, pin 2 from the top should be empty, and for the bottom connector, pin 2 from the BOTTOM should be empty. There are two small screwdriver pots that control the width/height slightly. ============ Audio Issues ============ First, here are the associated audio connectors. Again, going from the top of the board set where the power connector is on the right and you are looking into the boardcage: Sound board: 1 - Audio Out 2 - NC 3 - NC 4 - Audio Ground (usually bare wire) Speech board: 1 - NC 2 - NC 3 - NC 4 - External Audio in 5 - Audio Ground (usually bare wire) 6 - Audio out On sound boards, the ground (shield) is the bottom pin, and the upper pin is the sound. When diagnosing sound boards, it is often a good idea to take the speech board out of the equation. To do so, take the connector that connects to the speech board and connect the bottom pin (pin 6) and jumper it to the third from the bottom pin (pin 4), routing external audio in directly to audio out. Be especially careful when hooking up the speech boards, as in some instances the top/first pin is cut off. If you put the connector on aligning the connector with the first pin you see in this case, it will cause you you to connect audio out directly to ground, which is not helpful. Each game has a sound test. This test can be deceiving. The loss of sound(s) does not necessarily mean the sound board is bad. A bad CPU board, bad speech board, bad amplifier, or screwing up the connectors will also cause a loss of sounds. Sound problems are the least simple to debug. A common problem with these boards is that most sounds will work, but some will be missing. ---------------------- Space Fury Sound Board ---------------------- The most common problem with this audio board is failing capacitors. The schematics show fairly clearly what capacitors are in what circuits. Try replacing those first. C7/C21 - Explosions C32 - Star Spin/Partial Warship C36 - Thrust C48 - Craft Joining C44/C50 - Fireball C57 - Docking Bang/Ship Firing TL082 are the common failing component on these boards as well. The large socket on the sound board should not be populated. ----------------------------- Eliminator/Zektor Sound Board ----------------------------- The schematics clearly show the sound circuits for each of the individual sounds for Eliminator. Typically the CD4011 or TL081 chips are at fault. Sometimes a failing electrolytic can cause problems, too. Zektor will need an AY-3-8912 populated in the large socket. --------------------- Universal Sound Board --------------------- Universal Sounds board are a major pain to debug. The Star Trek manual specifies what circuits control the specific sounds, so get a copy of that before you start. Static for all sounds: check the processor is running and the onboard RAMS. No sound: check the inputs/outputs of the TL082 chips on the board Whole sound block missing (SB0/SB1/SB2): This is the fun part, as one bad sound in the circuit can pull down all the sounds in the circuit. First start by checking the output of the large chip (there are three) that control the output for each sound block. Then move up or downstream appropriately. If output from the large sound block chips are fine, then move on to the three resistor network coming out of each sound block. Lift one leg of each resistor and retest, then reconnect the resistors one at a time. Lifting one may bring back the other two, so then you know to work backwards from the one resistor bringing down the rest of the circuit. ------------ Speech Board ------------ Fortunately, this board has a lot of socketed devices and is sparsely populated. David Shuman suggests: "...try replacing the socketed TL082 op-amp on the speech board. This swap brought back the speech on one of my Space Fury sets. The other problem chip is the 8035 CPU-- this is another part that, when it dies, knocks out the speech.". Speech boards can be nasty, as bad ones can create symptoms like multiplier errors and no sound at all, which might make you think the sound board is bad. The speech chip on the board is the SPO-250 Orator, which is an uncommon and expensive chip. If your speech board and sound board have different audio levels (speech is lounder than sounds or vice versa), there is a small screw driver pot controller that can adjust the balance between the two. This speech board was common across the Sega G80 games, including the raster games. However, some of speech boards used by the raster games used a different strapping for the speech board. Assuming the "ears" of the pcb are up, and the edge is down, the second EPROM socket from the right should have four jumper locations above it. Starting at the top, they should be labeled E, F, G and H. The second strapping location is on the middle right, and should be labeled, from the top, 16, 32, 16, 32. To properly strap the board for use with the vector games, E should be cut, F should be jumpered, G should be unjumpered and H should be unjumpered, and the 16's should be cut, and the 32s should be jumpered. If you're having problems with Space Fury speech, make sure you have the correct speech eprom data for your version of the game EPROMs. Space Fury had different versions of the game and the speech data is not compatible across some versions. ----------------- Misc Audio Issues ----------------- Is your Sega XY game too loud, and you can't turn it down low enough? Check right behind the volume pot. There should be a resistor, maybe under some shrink wrap, that will be inline with one of the inputs to the pot. Changing the resistor to a lower value (or removing it altogether) will allow you to reduce the volume of your game to bearable levels. ======== Controls ======== The control that causes the most problems is the spinner. If your ship is spinning erratically in Star Trek, or the numbers are changing drastically during test mode, there is a problem. I'd say ninety percent of the time the problem is caused by loose connections somewhere along the line, typically in the Mat-n-lock connector. The female pins tend to lose tension and open up, so use a small flathead screwdriver and push them closed again so they make a tight connection. Also, wires can get pulled out of the connectors on the CPU board; try pushing them in with a small flathead screwdriver. ============ General Tips ============ Double check your connections; these games have a bunch of connectors that are not keyed, so it is easy to put one on backwards by mistake (making it especially easy to fry sound and video boards). The self test is useful, but not flawless, however. All self tests may pass, but you could STILL have a screwed up game. The only thing I could suggest is the EPROMs, since the self test only tests a certain portion of the EPROMs, not all EPROM data. I have an Eliminator 4-player that originally passed the EPROM test, but the player 2 and 4 ships were still screwed up. The problem turned out to be a corroded socket where an EPROM was not making a good connection. ============ Power supply ============ Sega/Gremlin power supplies are not the most reliable. If you have a dead one, you have a few choices: you can repair it, or replace it. In most cases repairing these power supplies is straight forward. If you open it up, you'll see there's really not much to it. The voltage regulators are all mounted to the heat sink and can be easily replaced. If you are missing a voltage, the schematics for the power supply are very straight forward, and it usually means simply replacing the voltage regulator in that circuit. I also recommend replacing the connector and connector pins for any burnt connectors, and resoldering the header pins on the power supply PCB. If you decide to modernize your game and put in a switching power supply, there are a few things to consider: 1) The Sega/Gremlin power supply has a built in audio amplifier. You'll need to provide your own if you replace it. I've had good luck with using the Bally Midway Dual audio amps as a replacement, but any audio amp should do. 2) You'll need a 3VAC supply for the power-on reset. I've heard that using +5VDC as a substitution may work, but your milliage may vary. 3) You'll need +5VDC, -5VDC, +12VDC, and -12VDC. John Robertson says you may be able to get by with substituting -5VDC for the -12VDC for the video, but you'll need to adjust your picture. Or if you wish, you can use a switching power to supply the more common voltages and keep the old power supply in there and use it for the things that may still work (audio amp, 3VAC, -12VDC). Just make sure if you do this to make the grounds common between the two power supplies. ======= Monitor ======= Reference the G08 FAQ for more detailed information about the monitor. Let me just say this; in general, the entire system set up (monitor, power supply, board sets) is flakey. The monitor has been redesigned several times, the power supply has surface wire hacks and cut traces, and the board sets aren't very reliable. If you get a working set up and running, hold onto it like gold, but prepare parts in advance for any problems that may come up. Good luck! ************** 5. Conversions ************** ============ Game-to-Game ============ So you have a Sega/Gremlin X-Y game, and have been looking to add to your collection of Sega/Gremlin X-Y games. However, these games in general are hard to come by, and if you *do* find another, it is likely it won't be working. Well, if you can gather just a FEW pieces, you may be able to convert your game "X" to game "Y". In order to convert game "X" to game "Y", the *minimum* you would need would be: 1) Game "X"; a working game "X" would be best, but it's possible that the parts you swap in for "Y" will get you a working set. 2) The audio board for the game. Space Fury, Star Trek and Zektor would need the additional speech board as well. 3) A copy of game "Y"'s EPROMs. This includes the CPU EPROM U25 for game "Y", and maybe speech board EPROMS as well. 4) The special protection chip at location U21 for game "Y". This will be the hardest to come by. If you are lucky, your game "X" will already have this. 5) Controls. Star Trek control panel could run Tac/Scan, Eliminator (2 player) can run Space Fury, etc. For example: To add Space Fury to your Star Trek (assuming it's in a Sega Convert-a-cabinet), you'd need the EPROM data, Battle Star sound board, and a spare control panel; a control panel from just about any Convert-a-Game (Zaxxon, Congo Bongo, Eliminator) will do. Swap EPROMs on the EPROM board, speech board and CPU board, swap in the sound board and swap control panels (assuming you've modified it for Space Fury) and your done! David Fish figured out the security scheme used by Sega. He broke the code and rewrote all the EPROM data to be non-security chip specific. Clay Cowgill took this one step further and made a kit for Sega XY games so that all the data for all five games fit on ONE EPROM, and made a daughter board kit so that all five games could be played without switch special chips or EPROM data (only sound boards need to be swapped). Vectorlabs came out with a multi-game board that replaces the CPU board, EPROM board, and speechboard. Since it frees up two slots, that leaves room enough to install all the sound boards in the cage, and you can play the kit with the original sound boards. ================= Related Documents ================= This section has been obsoleted and replaced with "Search the internet". *************** 6. Contributors *************** Mark Jenison David Shuman Rick Schieve Kevin Klopp John Grigsby Dangerous Dann Kerry Stillinger Dwaine Hurta Zonn Moore William La Covara John Robertson Ian Boffin Paul Tonizzo Al Kossow Clay Cowgill Tom Haagen ******************* 7. Document History ******************* Version 1.0: Initial Release Version 1.1: Added information about Zektor Version 1.2: Added more to Sound board section Added information about Battlestar Version 1.3: Added more speech board information Version 1.4: Added Eliminator cocktail information Version 1.5: More added to repair section Version 1.6: Zektor section updated Version 1.7: Updated sound board section - Zektor sounds figured out Version 1.8: Zektor section updated Conversion section updated Added new Eliminator 4-player flyer information Version 1.9: Corrected information about cocktails and monitors Updated some links and some e-mail addresses Version 1.10: Add more power supply tips Version 1.11: Added Sound board and Controls repair tips sections Version 1.12: Added guide for putting on connectors for XY-pair Version 1.13: Added info about Eliminator ROM versions Removed monitor info and provided reference to FAQ Removed e-mail addresses altogether Version 1.14: Added 2nd Eliminator 4-player EPROM info. Misc updates. Version 1.15: Added additional audio board information Version 1.16: Added strapping information for speech board. Misc updates. Version 1.17: Misc fixes and updates