Did JPAC fry my videocard?

Let's see if somebody can help me:

I just bought a JPAC in order to try to install a PC with AdvanceMAME in a friend's cab. I first wanted to try it in my scart RGB TV through a supergun and my Windows XP PC. The graphic card is a regular ATI Radeon 9200, I don't have an ArcadeVGA, as that one is supposed to work too.

Well, I didn't manage to get a viewable image in my TV, and after finishing messing with it some windows icons image got "corrupted" in my PC screen. Other than that everything looked fine. I decided to restart in order to get rid of the problem. Well, after rebooting, I couldn't get any image in my PC screen at all, no matter how hard I tried. Then I removed the graphic card and connected the monitor cable directly to the motherboard, and I could get an image. I had to reinstall the mobo video drivers in order to have it working well, as I had been using the graphic card ones. Notice that the same windows icons are still "graphically corrupted". Anyway, I put the graphic card again and again I didn't get any image.

Looks like tomorrow I'm going to buy a new graphics card, I hope it works OK and I didn't destroy anything else.

Any hint?

Did you disconnect all power to the jamma connection before attaching the jpac?

Yes, there was no power in the JAMMA connection at all, the psu was disconnected, which reminds me that because of that the JAMMA connector was not grounded, could that be a part of the problem?

I guess the jpacs video buffering between the arcade monitors rgb input drives and the video cards vga outputs would needed some ground reference - so that may well have had something to do with it.

There is no harm in leaving the psu connected, the supplies go to blank pins, I dont remember seeing mention of the grounding requirements between the PC and arcade monitor in the docs ? Will have to check the board layout.

I've just been carefully reading the pdf manual and looks like the lack of ground in the JAMMA harness was my fatal error. Since I was using my regular TV, which already has all its own connections, I didn't think about that.

The manual says:

Double check the monitor frame and the control panel are directly connected to ground. If the ground is poor, a voltage could build up on the cabinet connections which is not only dangerous but will destroy the J-PAC. Be especially careful if you have removed the power supply as this may result in breaking the grounding of the monitor which could have been routed through the
power supply.

Click to expand...

Well, I hope I haven't destroyed the JPAC, I'll try it in the cab (this time I'll make sure it is grounded) on Sunday most likely. I've lost hope on saving my video card, but oh well.

The jpac may be OK, but vid card RIP