Re: Cinematronics BPROM alternatives

Interesting. So long as the original 82s123 chips are in one piece and still working, I could read them and then convert their data for the BX288. While I was working on the replacements, I created some hardware and software tools for doing that. If the original chips are soldered into your board, I'm sure that I could remove them safely so long as they don't have pin-rot. If you don't feel safe desoldering the chips or using your programming equipment, I wouldn't mind doing it.

As for the eproms, I have a couple of universal programmers and between the two of them, there's only a couple of eproms that they won't read without an adapter. Those would be the few with non-standard pin-out.

If you can produce the bin files using your own equipment, that would save shipping the board or chips to me and save you the shipping charges and eliminate any risk of damage or loss during shipping.

Feel free to pm me if you are interested in moving forward with this.

William Boucher
  ----- Original Message -----
  From: litterbox99@mchsi.com
  To: vectorlist@vectorlist.org
  Sent: Saturday, October 24, 2009 8:48 PM
  Subject: Re: VECTOR: Cinematronics BPROM alternatives

  This is good news but a bit OT...

  I recently got into early 80's Bally slots (started out helping a
  buddy fix his) and they use 82s123's. EPROM & bipolar prom bin
  files were not documented or available like they are with our games.
  In order to preserve what I have, I will soon backup my slots roms.

  My slot uses 6 or so of these 82s123's and no bin files are available.
  I guess I will have to dust off my Data i/o 29b and remember how to
  use it. I would rather replace them with a product like yours as opposed
  to finding the originals and burn new ones.

  My only worry is that I don't want to zoik one of these proms while
  trying to read them.

  -------------- Original message from "William Boucher" <boucher@mnsi.net>: --------------

> I finished building my little bprom replacement boards for the Cinematronics
> CCPU.
> See here: http://www.biltronix.com/CCPU_Custom_Chip_Replacements.html
> Pictures now shown. I have lots of the PCBs so you can consider these
> available.
>
> These small boards can replace bproms from other games as well. Bascially
> anything in a DIP-16.
>
> William Boucher
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "William Boucher"
> To:
> Sent: Thursday, October 01, 2009 11:56 PM
> Subject: VECTOR: Cinematronics BPROM alternatives
>
>
> >I dunno about anyone else, but I'm rather sick of problems related to
> >sourcing and programming the old bipolar PROM chips on game boards. Tons
> >of games use BPROMs but they can be very hard to source, they can be
> >expensive, and finding an old programmer box that supports them is even
> >tougher. I used to have an older programmer that could handle 82Sxxx parts
> >but that's it. I tried burning 6301, 74Sxxx, and such equivalents but they
> >failed. My present programmer, a Xeltek SuperPro/Z cost me only $100 and
> >it can program all sorts of EPROMs, flash SPLD, flash EEPROM, PAL, GAL, and
> >stuff like that.
> >
> > I repair several Cine CCPU boards each year for people and the dam BPROMs
> > are always what I fear the most will have to be replaced. Since there are
> > five 74S288 (32 x 8) type BPROMs on the CCPU, I decided to start with
> > that. I chose an Atmel SPLD that is really cheap ($1.50), available from
> > almost any electronics distributor, is available in a small SOIC package,
> > and is supported by my programmer (and almost every programmer on the
> > market today). I wrote separate programs for all five BPROMs (located at
> > E8, C14, D14, E14, J14) using Atmel WinCUPL which is free. It produced
> > the JEDEC (*.jed) files needed to program the chips. The new chips are
> > flash or EE-SPLD. They are as fast as the original BPROMs. I made a chip
> > adapter socket today and tried the new chip in all five locations on a
> > known good CCPU board and they all worked fine. I have designed a tiny
> > new PCB that will convert the new chip pin-order to plug directly into the
> > CCPU original locations.
> >
> > I have also designed a replacement for the larger BPROM (74S287 256 x 4)
> > located at F14. For a first effort, it is based on a Xilinx XC9536. I
> > couldn't get all of the data to fit into a cheaper SPLD but I'm open to
> > suggestions if someone has a smaller cheaper chip in mind for the job. I
> > still have to build a socket adapter to try it. For now, the design is
> > done and the code is written in VHDL but I haven't tried it in a running
> > board yet.
> >
> > Also, I don't care much for old windowed EPROMs either. They're okay and
> > they've proven their worth, and some guys out there still sell NOS parts
> > at good prices but it's not like you can just buy them anywhere you want
> > to anymore. For the Cine CCPU (or Vectorbeam Space War), I decided to try
> > something else just for fun. I know someone will say "seen it, old news"
> > but just in case someone else might find it interesting I'm going to say
> > it anyway. I purchased some new readily available flash parallel EEPROM
> > chips that my programmer supports. The OnSemi CAT28C16A is a 2k x 8 flash
> > memory with the same pinout as a standard UV 2716 except that on the new
> > chip, pin 21 is "/WE" and not "Vpp". If the CCPU had wired pin 21 as tied
> > high, the new chip would just plug in and work. As it is, pin 21 is tied
> > low and so that would hold the new chip in "write" mode and we don't want
> > that. The solution I used tonight just to try it out was to program the
> > chip, bend the pin outward just a little and plug the chip into the socket
> > with pin 21 hanging out over the side. The board ran fine.
> >
> > The advantages of the EEPROM are:
> > -more widely available than UV 2716 chips
> > -cost is very low
> > -no UV needed to erase it, programmer does it instantly
> > -has 100 year retention
> > -has no window so it can't be corrupted by external light sources
> > -can be instantly reprogrammed for other games
> >
> > There's no 4k x 8 equivalent to the 2732 chip that I am aware of, at least
> > not in current distributor stocks. If there was, you could do this same
> > type of replacement for games such as Armor Attack and Solar Quest.
> > However, there is a 64k x 8 device that is in a 28-pin package. The cool
> > thing about it is that it can be plugged into the original socket with 4
> > pins at one end hanging out and it has everything needed except power.
> > One tiny wire jumper fixes it. Or, you can install 28-pin sockets into
> > the original 24pin sockets and add the jumper to that. Also, there's a
> > couple of extra address pins to tie down but that's super simple. You can
> > even program up to 8 games into the new chips and add switches to operate
> > the extra address pins to create a multi-game CCPU. That doesn't address
> > the obvious control panel wiring differences or the audio issues, but
> > still. You can make a general CCPU that can be used on the bench to test
> > several different games at the flip of a DIP switch or two. This has been
> > done before and is in fact old news but to my knowledge the chips
> > suggested were older UV parts. I'm suggesting to use the newer flash
> > CAT28C64 type as a superior replacement device. Designing a CPLD to
> > reroute the control panel lines would also be easy but I like Zonn's more
> > practical approach of redefining the input lines within the game source
> > code such that all the inputs for all the games match and then you could
> > build a universal control panel.
> >
> > Working with the SPLD and CPLD parts to replace old custom logic gets me a
> > little pumped to dive in and start collecting whole sections into CPLDs.
> > There's been lots of talk about possible single-chip CCPU boards emerging
> > in the near future and that would be exciting. I'm very new to such
> > devices so I expect that a project that big is beyond me for the moment,
> > but I can see how more experienced designers can really get into this
> > stuff and pull it off. I might not be able to make a single-chip clone
> > board on my first try, but I bet I could get it under 15, maybe 10.
> >
> > My plan presently is to get a couple hundred of the little 32x8 BPROM
> > converter PCB's made so if anyone is interested in them, let me know. I
> > may work something out for the 256x8 some time soon after that.
> >
> >
> > William Boucher
> > ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
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> > ** Please direct other questions, comments, or problems to
> > chris@westnet.com
>
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Received on Sun Oct 25 11:13:01 2009