I am here to crush another one of those dreaded saturn modchip threads upon you all.
Here is the basic rundown of the whole deal:
- Racketboys saturn modchip.
- Model 1 PAL Saturn with 64pins IC cd-drive board with the twisted ribbon cable.
- 2 wires method. (5v and signal to 8th pin of 64IC - at first I tryed A+B single wire, more to that further down.)
- Modchip carefully filled down around the plug edges, for a better fit. Moves in as nice as the original ribbon cable now.
- Saturn jumpers set to JP region + 60hz permanently. (not that this really makes a difference.)
- Tests involved coldbooting/softbooting, trying to start from main menu screen, resetting from menu, etc blah.
- Backups used to test are confirmed working on the same saturn through the nasty swap trick.
- Evil fact (involving up comming situation B): Saturn still trys to go for the security ring.
Now to the full symptomes of our patient, because of some weirdness I split it into 2 versions. All involve having the chip connected.
Situation A:
Audio Tracks
At first, whenever I had the chip set up it (saturn) would behave as normal, except reading everything as audio cd's. This happend regardless of wiring method. First, I used A+B single wire installation. Since the saturn did not read anything, I assumed perhaps I have to go with the IC pin. So I changed that to the 2 wires method. I wired "Signal A" to pin "8" of the 64pin IC. I am not new to soldering, so that worked out fine and the disc drive was still spinning alright.
But, its exactly the same as A+B. Only reads as audio tracks. Let's move to Situation B...
Situation B:
Only Originals
I refused to give up and gave the whole thing a better view. At this point I worked more on the plug edges to get its current, nice fit. Then I reminded myself of a post I was reading, either over here or segaxtreme, i dont know. (I looked around a whole freaking lot before I even ordered the chip, so I knew already that its not a 100% chance.) Anyway, I was reading that one person had to involve some pressure towards the modchip and its pin allignment. (Chip to motherboard) It has quite a bit of movement at the top, but that might just be because its really flimsy and fragile. I tryed to get some pressure towards the back of the chip around the middle, bottom'ish. Pushing it away from the drive, "into" the pins of the socket. And heres where situation B kicks in.
I tryed around with the lid off, and while gaining a momentary pressure I booted up and put in a original japanese gundam demo disc at the main menu screen of the saturn. Then I went ahead and pushed the lid sensor back to see what happends. Well what'ya know, the saturn application button appeared and I was able to start my ORIGINAL game just fine. But I didnt push my hopes up too much.
Then I put in a copy, here's where it gets ugly. Since the lid was off I could get a better look at the saturn's drive mechanics. With the tests having the case on, I was already able to listen to the worst thing anyway.
The Saturn drive assembly was STILL desperatly trying to read the non existing security ring on the backup disc. Duh, one step forward, two steps back.
So, we have learned that my saturn chip needs a bit of pressure applied to even start passing some data through properly. But the security ring procedere is not circumvented. Nasty.. nasty.
At this point I am rather clueless. What does all that mean? I basically have a modchip that lets me play my original games but not my copys. Planet saturn is full of paradox. Any ideas OTHER then getting a Model 2 saturn? I am currently in the process of moving to a new place, and I cant rely on german ebayers as much as racketboys incredible shipments and their lightning fast speed. I was hoping to celebrate with hardcore saturn gaming, playing "new" titles I just couldnt afford.
At some point I sure would try to fumble around with other units, but giving up sucks! I love my model 1 unit and would have to try to move model 2 guts inside my model 1, rewire the access LED if possible in the particular model 2 I would find, as well as redo all the region modding. (Im not too sure if only the cd-drive can be swapped without issue? I basically was reading both yes and no, but not a clear answer around.) Obviously thats not as cool as using the unit you got and adore for so many years
Thank's a lot for reading and potential advise. I know this subject has been kicked to death by now, I was hesitant to even start asking, but our good old racketboy said I should rather post over at the forums. So if you gotta throw stones, at least at the both of us!
Ps. as attachments you get a crappy phone picture as a treat. Including the intense ghettoness of modding on moving boxes! (Yeah, that pink thing is a improvised reset switch. It works perfect with the lid on!)
Also, if anyone NEEDS to know my saturns motherboard and cd-board serials/nfo, I can take it apart down to its board to tell what it is. In any case its obviously one of the late Model 1's, with the model 2'ish stuff like the ribbon sockets and cd drives.
