Found a free Warlords "cocktail" today

[SkiDragon]

I had to push it on a cart a half mile to my apartment. This is my first arcade machine, so I am kind of excited, but I know already that it doesnt work. I think some of the parts were even removed. I know there are many links to arcade machine information, but is there a site that deals more specifically with my machine? I'd like to eventually get this game running.

[Darth Sensei]

That's bad ass. Where in Michigan are you?

[98PaceCar]

O_O

Ummm, you do know how much that game is worth, right?

Since it's an Atari, the first thing you should consider doing is re-socket the board. The sockets they used were garbage and can cause any number of problems. Past that, it's all just typical arcade fixes. Fortunately the cocktail version of Warlords uses a color monitor, so it's much easier to find a replacement if you need one.

Congrats on a bad ass find! I love my upright (rarer and much more striking to look at than the cocktail), but for pure fun the cocktail wins hands down.

BTW, feel free to ask me any questions you have. I've rebuilt 2 of these machines already so I'm pretty familiar with them.

[SkiDragon]

I dont know how much it is worth. I think some important parts are missing. I contacted the person I got it from, and got this answer. I may be able to get some of these parts back.

"If memory serves me right, the coin return, power supply,
switches, and ROM chips were removed. In addition, I broke off the sockets for the ROM chips while trying to remove them."

Obviously, the ROM chips would be my first priority. Right now I dont even have the key to open it, but I'm sure I can get that. It would help if there was a picture of the insides, so I could compare. I dont want to plug it in with missing parts, I dont want to damage anything.

I have this game for the 2600 so I know its a good one.

[SkiDragon]

That's bad ass. Where in Michigan are you?

Ann Arbor

[DogP]

Wow! That's awesome! I just sold one last month for $700, and it wasn't in THAT great condition. You'll have to get into it somehow and see what all is there, but if the control panels and art are there, even if it needs a monitor and PCB, that's not THAT expensive...

DogP

[SkiDragon]

I actually opened it once by accident, but it locked itself again. I saw a large pcb, and the monitor is definitely there, although it has some pretty bad burn-in. Is there any way to fix that?

[DogP]

Heheheh... yeah, that's good that it sounds complete... there's no way to fix the burn-in though, but a lot of times there's tinted glass over it, so it's not too noticible.

DogP

[tholly]

congrats on the find....and good luck getting it to work....i know all too well the joys of brining a broken machine back to life......

[SkiDragon]

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~adonald/warlords/

Here are some pictures of it if anyone cares.

[tholly]

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~adonald/warlords/

Here are some pictures of it if anyone cares.


looks to be in pretty nice shape...don't know about the insides obviously...

[kainemaxwell]

Congrats on the find and good luck fixing it up!

[SkiDragon]

I got the key to open it up.
In addition to the coin return, power supply, switches, action buttons, and ROM chips, it is also missing the "sound board". I have seen some of these parts and can probably retrieve them, although I havent yet. The people who tried to fix it before said that the ROM chips were fine, but they couldnt get the machine to work. I took some more pictures of the inside with my crappy camera, which I uploaded to the same link.
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~adonald/warlords/
Look at pictures 15 and up. If I had some pictures to compare this to, it would really help.
I took out the main PCB and looked at it. Two chips are obviously missing, E6 and F/H6, which are right next to each other. There are also several empty spaces where chips would fit, but it doesnt look like anything was removed. There is an odd blue wire connecting the pin of a chip to a solder point elsewhere on the board. I looked on the bottom of the PCB, and it looks like somebody burnt the solder around chip F5.
I have no idea what these chips are.

Perhaps somebody can help me here.
By the way, it is serial no. 586.

[DogP]

Heheheh... what you NEED is a new camera ;) . Anyway, if this helps, here's a pic of the PCB: http://arcadecollecting.xmission.com/pcbpics/p128.html . I can't really tell from those pics, but your board looks complete except the two ROMs in the middle... I'd just replace those two sockets, and if you can get the original ROMs back, pop them in, or depending what type of chip they are, I can probably burn them for you.

I don't have my WL CT anymore, so I'm only going by memory, but I don't remember there being a "sound board"... IIRC it was all on the A/RII board, which you're missing (should be easy to find a replacement). Good luck finding the start buttons though... finding one or two of them is pretty tough... ugh, finding 4 will be a pain! And they're pretty important since they're the the powerball buttons too :( .

DogP

[SkiDragon]

I recovered the "audio board" and the power supply today. I imagine the power supply rests on the bottom of the cabinet somewhere, but I dont know how to get it down there without removing the monitor. The supply is really big and heavy.

[DogP]

Oh... I assume you're talking about the power brick (with the transformer)... that's not usually called the power supply... I believe the board you're calling the audio board is actually the power supply. It should have a large heatsink in the middle, and probably say Audio/Regulator II. That board should slide right down the side by the coin slot, but I'm not exactly sure where the power brick goes (it'd probably be easiest just to remove the monitor... it only has 4 screws on the top).

DogP

[SkiDragon]

Ok, you are right. The people I got the machine from called it the sound board and power supply. Either way, I got those pieces back, and figured out where the board went. I still need the ROM chips, which I was unable to find, but still might. If I cannot find them, is it possible to burn new ones? I still need the buttons, but I could always use another kind if I cant get them back. I assume I dont really need the coin return, although I may try to get that for completeness sake. Im not sure if there are any more parts missing. When one says to re-socket the board, are they talking about the IC sockets? Where can I get those, and what quantities do I need? Or are you referring to the plastic cord sockets?

Once I have all the parts I need to figure out how to hook everything up.

[DogP]

If you can't find the other ROMs, I can probably burn you new ones... I'd just need to know what kind of chips they are (I have the ROM files from MAME)... if I have some spare chips and my burner can burn that type, I'd be glad to do that.

For resocketing, yeah... just remove the old chip socket parts and solder a new socket in it's place. You can probably get the sockets at Radio Shack, although they don't always have them. If you need the chips burned, just remind me and I'll throw some sockets in with the chips.

DogP

[SkiDragon]

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~adonald/warlords/Warlords2.JPG

I marked the type of sockets, and the missing chips. I am also curious what the switch banks are for, and how they should be set. I marked those as well. The people who already tried to fix this are pretty knowledgeable about electronics in general, but not about arcade repair. They mentioned that they tried to re-burn the ROMS, and eventually determined that they werent the problem. I see dirt on the connectors on the edge of the board, and I'll laugh if this ends up being an NES type repair.

There is what appears to be a damaged trace underneath the removed ROM chip, but I should be able to fix that.

Concerning the sockets, I may have a source of (used) replacements, from more old electronics being thrown out. Im thinking that I should not worry about the sockets until I try some easier fixes, because frankly Im not used to that much soldering, especially de-soldering.

The monitor kind of worries me, both because of the shock danger, and because the last time I tried to repair a TV I ended up damaging the picture tube board even more.

When I have everthing, I have to hook it up, and I am unsure how.

[SkiDragon]

I just realized that there was a door on the side that allowed me to insert the "power brick". However, Im not sure which way it goes in, and there are more connectors there than I expected, including several of the screw on kind.

[98PaceCar]

There should only be one way that each of the connectors can plug in on the transformer block. The wires with the 'eye' on the end (they should be green) are ground and should be placed on the studs that stick out of the top of the transformer block. There are small nuts that hold them in place.

As far as the actual board repair, the first place to start on any Atari board from that era is to replace the sockets with new ones. That will fix probably 80% of the problems you see on these boards. If you aren't comfortable doing the repair yourself, I'd find someone that can. Do the simple stuff first and hopefully save yourself some headaches!

[SkiDragon]

Ok, I probably wont get any more parts back at this point, so I have to look into getting new ROMs. Apparently they are/were EPROMS, 24 pins. I dont know anything more about them. Of course, I can get the ROM image, and I think I may be able to get some 24 pin EPROMS of some sort, but I have no idea how to burn them. I also wonder why there are TWO chips, and not just one.

Ill also have to get some buttons. I took a look at where they were, and they seem to have 5 wires going to them (which were cut off). What kind of button has 5 wires?

[SkiDragon]

On the power brick there are several color-coded loopy things. I have heard that these determine what voltage you get. I want to make sure that the correct color is plugged in. Does the main power cable plug into the side? Because, there is another very similar looking connector on the top, that is unoccupied. What does the coin return look like, how many plugs does it have? Since I wont be getting that back, how do I work without it?

[SkiDragon]

The missing Roms are labelled "Read Only Memory- Graphics" in the atari manual, assuming its the same as the stand up version.

[98PaceCar]

I would get a hold of the Warlords rom set from MAME. From that and the schematics, you should be able to figure out which images to burn. I *might* have a spare board laying around that I can look at if you will give me the labels off of the board for the chips that are missing. I'm not certain if I still have a spare, but I need to dig in my parts pile anyway so I'll look for it.

[SkiDragon]

I got the files. The first six:

037155.1d
037156.1e
037157.1h
037158.1j
037153.1k
037154.1m

correspond to chips that are still on the board. The last file:

037159.6e

should be what I am looking for, but that is only one file, not two. The instruction manual (for the stand-up machine) gives "037159-01" as the part number for both the chips (E6 and F/H6). There is also:

warlord.clr

but I have no idea what that is.

ROM files are:
Size: 2.00 KB (2,048 bytes)
Size on disk: 4.00 KB (4,096 bytes)

[SkiDragon]

Ok, I got the chips, plugged them in to the corresponding spaces, plugged everything else in, and plugged the machine in to the wall. All I got was a big green square that slowly appeared over the course of 30 seconds or so.

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~adonald/warlords/postchip/green.bmp

Also, the LED on the PCB lit up. What course of action is best to take now? Remember, I am missing the coin return and action buttons. There are a couple plugs inside that arent connedted to anything. I assume these would go to the coin return. Also, there is a jack on top of the power brick that is unused.

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~adonald/warlords/postchip/brick.bmp

What should I try to do now?

[Time]

http://cgi.ebay.com/Warlords-PCB-Working-UNCOMMON_W0QQitemZ6254233103QQcategoryZ13718QQrdZ1 QQcmdZViewItem

Here is a board for you. Might want to give it a try.

[SkiDragon]

I am reviving this after so long, because I recently pulled this out of storage and in fairly quickly found and repaired the main problem that seemed to prevent any video output (a few years ago I managed to test the monitor so I knew that wasn't the issue).
After that, I have probed around and checked things. I acquired an EPROM programmed, and verified that all the EPROMs were programmed correctly. I now get this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2I8F7rUcWps

Actually, it takes a while for that to appear, because upon power up the 6502 microprocessor seems to just sit there and do nothing (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-cRJkezfgrs), even though it is getting a clock signal. Then, seemingly at random it will decide to start up. But as you can see in the first video, the game is not playing, and the sound does not correspond to anything it should sound like. I am guessing bad video RAM, but that doesn't really explain the 6502 issues, and I also probed every RAM and ROM chip to verify at least that none are totally dead.

One thing I notice is although Warlords seems to always be quoted at running at a CPU frequency of 1.512MHz, the clock signal it receives is actually half of this, and this matches the schematic also, which seems to show the 12.096 clock divided by 16 though a 4 bit counter, to go to the 6502. At least if I'm remembering how clock dividers work correctly. Am I just confused about the nomenclature of CPU frequency, or is it quoted wrong online everywhere? I'm contemplating buying a replacement 6502.

I was going to ask on http://forums.arcade-museum.com/ but they apparently require approval of another member or a donation. Does anybody have an account over there that can "recommend" me?

Thanks.

[Niku-Sama]

just out of curiosity is the 6502 soldered to the board or is it socketed?
I imagine its a dip 40 pin version?

[Nz17]

You might want to try asking in the "Restoration" sub-forum here. Those guys there are friendly and have a lot of technical knowledge.

I'm rooting for you!

[SkiDragon]

Hey, thanks for the input. I managed to make an account over at http://forums.arcade-museum.com/showthread.php?t=338232
Feel free to check on my progress if you'd like!

EDIT: I acquired a new 6502 processor, and that seemed to resolve the remaining problems I was having! I still need to restore the controls in order to really test the game, but the game seems to be working fine otherwise!

[Niku-Sama]

cool, be sure to show us the final project when you are done