How does Wily Wars do region protection?

[brandman]

I feel the same about those black buttons, I think nothing can be done about it since we both grew up with different "official" releases.

True, true. xD

Nah I will have to insist that not having the name of the console there is a good idea. Cause the emphasis is put on the SEGA logo. Classy if you ask me

OK, Sure. You keep your PAL Mega Drive 2 and I'll keep my Genesis 2 (and nab one of those sleek PAL Mega Drives...). Deal?

Stay classy ZeroAX, stay classy.

[AppleQueso]

I think both PAL versions look like cheapo knockoffs.

[ApolloBoy]

No other Genesis or Mega Drive comes close to this beauty.

[ZeroAX]

OK, Sure. You keep your PAL Mega Drive 2 and I'll keep my Genesis 2 (and nab one of those sleek PAL Mega Drives...). Deal?

Stay classy ZeroAX, stay classy.

deal. And once your become a gentleman who owns a Mega Drive 1, then perhaps we can go horse riding and drink some Sauvignon wine my dear sir.

No other Genesis or Mega Drive comes close to this beauty.

Truly nothing does

[ApolloBoy]

That was odd, I could see the original image just fine. In any case I switched it over to a better one.

[kamiboy]

Could you forward a link with a well documented illustration of how the mod is supposed to look like?

This guide works very well for me: http://www.mmmonkey.co.uk/console/sega/md1switches.htm

Well, despite that site having diagrams that apparently were specifically made for my model, no dice.

But at the very least it explained what the mod actually does is connect a 5V line to one of the two jumpers determining either NTSC or PAL mode.

So I soldered everything off and decided to use a multimeter to find out which was which as every other diagram was wrong about the locations.

Despite what all other the diagrams were showing I discovered that both the JP3 and JP4 points were putting out nearly 5 volts. One read 4.5V the other around 4V.

Unfortunately despite having scraped away at the spacing between all 4 points between JP3&4 I still measure continuity between the ~5V location and the other two which logic dictates are responsible for determining region.

Something is definitely off about the function of my jumpers. There should not be any continuity between them once the surface traces are scraped off. I suspect they are connected on the underside as well, but I didn't bother looking.

Putting the switch down between the 4.5V line and the two adjacent points gets me what I had before.

I connected the genesis to my XM29 monitor to confirm that throwing the switch did indeed toggle between the machine putting out a 50hz and 60hz signal and indeed it does.

But I think the continuity is screwing things up as far as a clean region switch. I put in some NTSC games that are supposed to be region locked like Bloodlines and Mega Turrican and when set to 50hz they still boot up despite expectations. So yeah, something is not right here.

I am also noticing some slight graphical glitches. The SEGA logo has these tiny white lines strutting out from its right side which were not there before. They are there with the switch soldered on or off, which is unfortunate.

While I still have a functioning system I give up on this modding project. It was not meant to be. Maybe I've got hold of a strange motherboard revision.

[brandman]

I think both PAL versions look like cheapo knockoffs.

LOL. I still like the model 1 though.

No other Genesis or Mega Drive comes close to this beauty.

-image snip-

deal. And once your become a gentleman who owns a Mega Drive 1, then perhaps we can go horse riding and drink some Sauvignon wine my dear sir.

Cheers. *clink*

[ApolloBoy]

While I still have a functioning system I give up on this modding project. It was not meant to be. Maybe I've got hold of a strange motherboard revision.

Can you put up a picture of your mod? The purpose of the switch is to ground or send 5V to a pin on the VDP, one that controls the 50/60 Hz mode.

[kamiboy]

No pictures I fear, I do not want to open up all those screws anymore. I feel they are starting to be worn a bit.

Here is going by memory:


Middle Left Right
| | |
| | |
| | |
JP3(4.5V) O |
JP4(4V) O------|
JP2 O
JP1--CAP-- O

Edit:

Well, well. It seems the forum is removing the spaces which made my ascii art intelligible.

If you quote it, it should look right in the edit window though.

Basically the point that has JP3 printed next to it goes to the middle leg of the switch because that is the one with 4.5 volts coming out of it and the two points on the other side of the ones with JP3 and JP4 printed next to them get connected to the leftmost and rightmost legs.

But none of that matters because there is, as I mentioned, contnuity between the 4.5v point and the other ones even without the switch. I mean if there is supposed to be another connection between the two then why would a mod require to cut the line going between the two?

It does not take much knowledge of electronics to realize with my strange setup all the switch does is ensure that both the PAL AND the NTSC legs of the region chip get 5 volts when thrown in one side and only the NTSC leg getting the 5V when in the other.

That must be why I can get 50hz output while the region remains NTSC.

[theclaw]

Is that good or bad? I understood video and language to be independent, nothing stopping the console from using the rarely seen 50hz+JPN mode.