rom dumping

[luke9511]

hey everyone, I have a sega genesis game that I am trying to repair and have been told by different people that the company that manufactured this game is known to have used pcbs that tend to go bad, however the only way to know for sure is to dump the rom which is where I am stuck,

I have a tl866ii plus programmer but cannot for the life of me find any info any where on how to use it to dump this rom to see if the issue with the game is the chip itself or the pcb, does anyone have any advice or links I can use to try and dump this game?

[Gameguy]

Is this a Tengen game? You could also use a multimeter to check for continuity between the pins of the chip(s) and the edge connector. You really just need to know if the traces are bad on the PCB.

[luke9511]

Is this a Tengen game? You could also use a multimeter to check for continuity between the pins of the chip(s) and the edge connector. You really just need to know if the traces are bad on the PCB.

checked all the pins before i desoldered it and they all checked out fine, no it is not a tengen game, its ariel the little mermaid

[gbpxl]

Yeah I have some Genesis carts that stopped working altogether

[luke9511]

Yeah I have some Genesis carts that stopped working altogether

if i cant figure out how to dump the rom i am going to buy a repro board and just transfer everything over

[Greg2600]

What game is it? There's very, very few Genesis games that are worth this type of effort.

[luke9511]

What game is it? There's very, very few Genesis games that are worth this type of effort.

ariel the little mermaid, i am mostly using it to learn how to do this in the future

[luke9511]

someone on another forum linked me to this https://www.tindie.com/products/GGLABS/e2r16-27c400-adapter-for-tl866-amiga-kickstart/ i have bought it and the parts needed to put it together, though i did get a zif socket rather than a regular socket to make putting the chip in and taking it out easier

[Gameguy]

checked all the pins before i desoldered it and they all checked out fine, no it is not a tengen game, its ariel the little mermaid
If all the traces on the board are working then the problem isn't with the board. I'm assuming you cleaned the connectors on the board already. If it's just dirty or your console is dirty then that could be a cause too.


if i cant figure out how to dump the rom i am going to buy a repro board and just transfer everything over
If it's an original game then it's usually better to use a cheap sports game as a donor so everything is original OEM.

[luke9511]

If all the traces on the board are working then the problem isn't with the board. I'm assuming you cleaned the connectors on the board already. If it's just dirty or your console is dirty then that could be a cause too.


If it's an original game then it's usually better to use a cheap sports game as a donor so everything is original OEM.

cleaned it a few times and tried different games and the other games worked, but we shall see when my parts come in and i try to dump it, like i said i have been told by a few people now that the company who manufactured the game cart used pcbs that tend to go bad, so i dont know only time will tell, i will of course update if i have anything

[Gameguy]

I thought this game was manufactured by Sega itself? Years ago I remember there being threads that listed games with a high failure rate and I don't remember The Little Mermaid being mentioned, I can't find them again to check. If there is a list you've found I would appreciate a link so I could read up on it. I remember the Tengen games being mentioned a lot like Grind Stormer, for whatever reason they were manufactured differently than other games.

Technically replacing a Tengen board with a standard Sega board isn't really correct as it's not original, but it's generally acceptable as the replacement is reliable and still 1st party. A modern aftermarket board would actually work as a repair but I personally avoid games with aftermarket parts like that, same with replacement labels. Using parts like that might devalue your games, so it's worth keeping in mind if you're repairing anything valuable later on. I just wanted to clarify that it could be repaired with an aftermarket board if you really wanted to.

[luke9511]

I thought this game was manufactured by Sega itself? Years ago I remember there being threads that listed games with a high failure rate and I don't remember The Little Mermaid being mentioned, I can't find them again to check. If there is a list you've found I would appreciate a link so I could read up on it. I remember the Tengen games being mentioned a lot like Grind Stormer, for whatever reason they were manufactured differently than other games.

Technically replacing a Tengen board with a standard Sega board isn't really correct as it's not original, but it's generally acceptable as the replacement is reliable and still 1st party. A modern aftermarket board would actually work as a repair but I personally avoid games with aftermarket parts like that, same with replacement labels. Using parts like that might devalue your games, so it's worth keeping in mind if you're repairing anything valuable later on. I just wanted to clarify that it could be repaired with an aftermarket board if you really wanted to.

well if i am able to dump it and it turns out to be fine then that will be my next step with a repro board

[luke9511]

new update on the little mermaid sega genesis cart
so while i was going through a box of stuff from my child hood i found a bunch of old genesis games which i posted a picture in a different discord and i also found a bare game with no shell, so i cleaned the pins and put it in my retron3 and it started right up and it is aaaahhhhh real monsters
when i turned it off and took it out i was looking at the pcb and noticed it was the same as the little mermaid minus a couple of extra pins that on the little mermaid that are blocked off with solder blobs
so i desoldered the chip put blobs on the two holes and soldered in the little mermaid and put it in and same thing, black screen, so the chip is bad but the board itself is good as i put aaaaahhhh real monsters in the little mermaid pcb and it worked fine, so i guess i will try to find the correct eprom for this and just make a new little mermaid

[Gameguy]

If you're using a Retron 3, are there any compatibility issues with The Little Mermaid? Some games might not be fully compatible for whatever reason so it actually might not be dead.

If you're going to use an eprom you could solder in a socket so the eprom would be easily removable, then you could reprogram it to play different homebrews or fan translations in the future. I would personally just keep the board to repair a different game with an actual faulty board, like if you bought a faulty Tengen game for cheap. I really can't remember hearing The Little Mermaid having reliability issues, I'll have to search this to find more info.

Personally I don't like the idea of just using an eprom to make a working Little Mermaid as you're essentially making a counterfeit game that's not easy to detect as everything else is legitimate, it just bothers me when counterfeit games are so easily floating around. Obviously you can still do it though it's a lot of work over The Little Mermaid. I assume you have a complete copy with a nice label. It may be cheaper to buy a working loose cart with a bad label than a correct eprom, then just swap the boards to have a nice complete working copy. It's been awhile since I looked at pricing but I thought The Little Mermaid was a cheap common game.

[luke9511]

If you're using a Retron 3, are there any compatibility issues with The Little Mermaid? Some games might not be fully compatible for whatever reason so it actually might not be dead.

If you're going to use an eprom you could solder in a socket so the eprom would be easily removable, then you could reprogram it to play different homebrews or fan translations in the future. I would personally just keep the board to repair a different game with an actual faulty board, like if you bought a faulty Tengen game for cheap. I really can't remember hearing The Little Mermaid having reliability issues, I'll have to search this to find more info.

Personally I don't like the idea of just using an eprom to make a working Little Mermaid as you're essentially making a counterfeit game that's not easy to detect as everything else is legitimate, it just bothers me when counterfeit games are so easily floating around. Obviously you can still do it though it's a lot of work over The Little Mermaid. I assume you have a complete copy with a nice label. It may be cheaper to buy a working loose cart with a bad label than a correct eprom, then just swap the boards to have a nice complete working copy. It's been awhile since I looked at pricing but I thought The Little Mermaid was a cheap common game.

i did try both a model 1 and model 2 genesis and got the samething, as for the label no its trash

[Gameguy]

If the label is bad, you might as well make a "reproduction" if you're getting an eprom. There's lots of various prototype, homebrew, and fan translated games available.

I've never played The Little Mermaid on the Genesis so I'm not sure how good it is. I kind of regret passing on copies years ago when they were cheap but I didn't exactly hear great reviews of it either so I assumed it was an average kids game. Making a repro of it seems a bit weird, like making a repro of Sonic 2 which is dirt common.

[luke9511]

If the label is bad, you might as well make a "reproduction" if you're getting an eprom. There's lots of various prototype, homebrew, and fan translated games available.

I've never played The Little Mermaid on the Genesis so I'm not sure how good it is. I kind of regret passing on copies years ago when they were cheap but I didn't exactly hear great reviews of it either so I assumed it was an average kids game. Making a repro of it seems a bit weird, like making a repro of Sonic 2 which is dirt common.

well like i said i am using this more to learn than anything else, i also have a copy of megaman 2 with a bad prg and a copy of excitebike with a bad chr, so i am using this to learn more about the process

[Gameguy]

It's up to you. You can always reprogram the chip later if you wanted to. It's the same process to program a chip with whatever you want on it.

I probably have some dead games too somewhere. Every so often I came across some in bundles back when I bought them that way.

[luke9511]

okay so i have some AT29C256 eproms and have programmed the excitebike chr and have soldered it in but cant figure out what if any wires need to be soldered in to make it work

[luke9511]

quick update, i got it working, the prg and the chr are bad, this has been a great and fun learning experience! thanks for all the help