X'eye issues

[substantial_snake]

When I boot up my x'eye using an urban strike cartridge the game fails to start.

I get a single screen which says "produced or distributed by sega etc.etc." but no game.

Any ideas?

[shadowkn55]

Try cleaning the cartridge. Sometimes you'll still get the license screen but no game if the connectors are dirty.

[Dreamstate]

Second that advice. I was getting that on all of my 32x games until I cleaned it up.

[substantial_snake]

Picked up another genesis game to test out on the X'eye, Garry Kitchen's Super Battletank.

The game boots up but im getting no sound from it period.

This is strange because with no game inserted the X'eye version of the Sega CD boot screen displays fine and plays it own music track, and if I have a music CD inserted it will play that just fine as well. (still have yet to pick up a sega CD game)

Ill be picking up a few more games this weekend but until then any thoughts?

The only things I could see is messed up is either something is wrong with the genesis portion of the X'eye or the genesis portion doesn't output audio over the built in VGA output. Either that or its a compatibilities issue with the system, I have no idea weather that is the case but I know that some of these combo systems did have issues with certain games.

Edit: I failed to note that I had tried cleaning both cartridges and I didn't notice a change. Urban strike still fails to boot and super tank still has no sound.

[substantial_snake]

(sorry double post)

I've acquired a few more games and ive noticed a pattern.

Everytime I use a game that wont load past the start screen I get a momentary white flash when I turn the system on. Im not sure if that helps or not but there it is.

The Sega CD portion seems to have stopped functioning now, the system fails to boot to it whenever I don't use a cartridge.

After testing a few games none of them have sound except for Sonic 1 and I have no idea why. That being said Sonic 1 freezes shortly into the game, similar to anything else that actually loads onto the system.

I really have no clue what the problem is, anyone have any ideas?

Edit: Sega CD now functioning...again.

[shadowkn55]

What kind of power supply are you using? The official x'eye or cdx perhaps?

[substantial_snake]

My mind was on the same track.

I was using an adjustable voltage after market charger which should of worked running 9V 2.5A so just in case that was causing problems I picked up another running 9V 1.5A which to my knowledge is closer to factory spec. I had also picked up another universal plug as well just to be sure that the one I originally picked up wasn't out of spec. With the new power supply and new plug there is no change in functionality so this seems to be a dead end.

The thing I find strangest is what errors im getting really fall into 3 categories so far.

-Games that don't load past the startup corporate screen.

-Games that run with no sound and freeze a few minutes into the game.

-Games that run a full speed with sound but soon freeze, Sonic 1 is the only game to do this that ive tested.

[InsaneDavid]

Let's try a quick and dirty cartridge slot cleaning method to see if you get any changes.

Take a cotton swab and dip it in isopropyl alcohol, shake it off a little, then run it along the top of the cartridge slot. Then take a clean game cartridge and insert and remove it a few times. Repeat the above maybe three times, then let it sit for awhile so any remnant alcohol will evaporate.

Also try not pressing the cartridge down all the way into the slot. Since the X'Eye slot is wider than normal, sometimes the connectors can get bent up from earlier misuse over the years. Sometimes a better connection can be found further up.

[substantial_snake]

I tried this and it seemed to do the trick for Sonic 1.

Outside of a few sound errors the game was running perfectly while I was playing it.

Then I tried another game which failed to load, then Sonic 1 again which failed to load this time. Im going to give it a more through cleaning an report back my findings. Thanks for the advice that really seemed to do the trick for a short while.

[substantial_snake]

Ive determined that whatever cleaning the cartridge did was either temporary or a fluke.

After testing Sonic 1 successfully I tried a couple of other games which all failed the same ways they had before, then I tried Sonic 1 again with the same freeze up issues it had had before. I then tried to clean the cartridge again more throughly but I still couldn't replicate Sonic 1 running correctly again.

Whats most baffling to me about this is the inconsistency of the problems. Ive tested every game I have on the working sega console I have and haven't had any of the issues ive found here so its definitely not the games themselves. The only thing it reminds me of is having some sort of bad RAM issue on a pc.

[InsaneDavid]

Ive determined that whatever cleaning the cartridge did was either temporary or a fluke.

After testing Sonic 1 successfully I tried a couple of other games which all failed the same ways they had before, then I tried Sonic 1 again with the same freeze up issues it had had before. I then tried to clean the cartridge again more throughly but I still couldn't replicate Sonic 1 running correctly again.

Whats most baffling to me about this is the inconsistency of the problems. Ive tested every game I have on the working sega console I have and haven't had any of the issues ive found here so its definitely not the games themselves. The only thing it reminds me of is having some sort of bad RAM issue on a pc.

I suppose it's possible that you have a bad solder joint somewhere, namely the cartridge slot or somewhere in power connection since the symptoms you are describing are usually resolved by cleaning. However diagnosis like that is beyond the scope of forum posts and responses unfortunately.

If you decide to get rid of the system, shoot me a PM because I'd like to poke around inside it, reflow some connections, maybe replace some parts, etc. I'd offer repair services but since it's not something that I can tell you outright I can fix, a bad switch or something for example, I wouldn't want to deal with back and forth diagnosis.