This is why you should phoenix your cps 2 boards

Interesting story here. Most of my cps 2 collection run on battery power still but there are 3 that I have actually purchased the phoenix fix for but have not installed it. I went this week to play my aliens vs predator board and when I picked it up there was something shaking around inside so I opened it and found this.






The reason you see no roms by the way is because this picture was taken after I removed the roms but apparently the battery had exploded and taken out everything in its path which unfortunately included the large custom chip right next to the battery. How this happened I do not know. Fortunately I had purchased the phoenix rom from raz some months earlier but as you guessed never got around to installing them. It was impposible to salvage the PCB but I quickly thought of something. i had a dead darkstalker b board that had been setting around waiting to be phoenix so I thought what if I SAC the darkstalkers board and salvage the roms from the AVP board to bring it back. Fortunately the Mask roms and the pal chips from the AVP survived destruction so I just switch the rom from one board to the other and installed the phoenix roms for AVP. The hardest part about this operation is knowing the jumper settings because each cps 2 game has its own unique settings. Fortune was still on my side because AVP is one of the few games I have a second board too, so I just opened the working AVP got the jumper setting and applied them to the SAC version. I booted the board and it actually worked perfectly. You can't call this a boot leg because outside the phoenix fix it all original factory parts and there is no difference between my SAC version and my non SAC version. But wait there is more carnage, that damn lithium acid ate all the way through the b board into the a board and took out the A board too. I still working on reparing that it appear that only a D latch was destroyed which is easily purchased so I get back around to that later. I plan on phoenixing all my boards gradually because of this one incident. Has this ever happened to you?

Holy moly...that's one screwed up looking board.
Too bad you didn't phoenix your board.

This is the kind of thing that makes me nervous about buying any CPS2/3 games.

lachlan said:

Holy moly...that's one screwed up looking board.
Too bad you didn't phoenix your board.

This is the kind of thing that makes me nervous about buying any CPS2/3 games.

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I lost the pcb but saved the game, sacrificing a darkstalkers for a AVP is a good trade off. Well you shouldn't be scared of cps 2 because most of the time the battery just dies and thats it. This is a abnormal occurance. But to be safe just phoenix at least the most valueable cps 2 boards in your collection and come back to the rest later.

Have you at least tried to wash the board with hot water and vinegar to remove the acid residue?

Ive had a similar thing happen to a board of mine... after cleaning it up real good (vinegar bath then dishwasher) it worked nicely again.

Orlando Ortiz said:

Have you at least tried to wash the board with hot water and vinegar to remove the acid residue?

Ive had a similar thing happen to a board of mine... after cleaning it up real good (vinegar bath then dishwasher) it worked nicely again.

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That would not have helped, the acid physically dissolved about twenty of pins of the custom IC that is directly next to the battery, it ate the metal leg of the pins completely. The acid also took out countless pins of the neigboring IC, destroyed other components and also dissolved numerous traces.

are there pheonix roms for each region or how do they work, i heard they were universal?

there are noticeable differences between many games region and id hate to have english roms in my jap progear for example...

sven666 said:

are there pheonix roms for each region or how do they work, i heard they were universal?

there are noticeable differences between many games region and id hate to have english roms in my jap progear for example...

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Yeap the phoenix roms are universal, you can change the region to which ever you wish. What wrong with having your progear in englih.

mainman said:

Yeap the phoenix roms are universal, you can change the region to which ever you wish. What wrong with having your progear in englih.

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so does the region switching affect in-game details aswell? (such as titlescreens etc).

its only wrong from a collectors wievpoint.

sven666 said:

so does the region switching affect in-game details aswell? (such as titlescreens etc).

its only wrong from a collectors wievpoint.

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it affects the language, since I can't read kanji I rather have the board in english mode. As far as in game play feature well nothing is censored or left out, with marvel super heroes and marvel superheroes vs street fighter being the exception. If your a collector with a green board just change the region to jap.

I own a few CPS2 boards:

Street Fighter Alpha 2

Vampire Savior 2

Xmen CotA

and one CPS1 board:

Street Fighter 2 Turbo

How do I Pheonix my PCBs so that I don't break or ruin any of my PCBs? Does this prevent batteries from blowing up, or remove them completely? Is it hard to "pheonix" a board??? It would really suck to put one of those boards in my cab only to find it broken, especially if it was SF2A or VS2.

Tung Fu ru said:

I own a few CPS2 boards:

Street Fighter Alpha 2

Vampire Savior 2

Xmen CotA

and one CPS1 board:

Street Fighter 2 Turbo

How do I Pheonix my PCBs so that I don't break or ruin any of my PCBs? Does this prevent batteries from blowing up, or remove them completely? Is it hard to "pheonix" a board??? It would really suck to put one of those boards in my cab only to find it broken, especially if it was SF2A or VS2.

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Oh crap I seemed to have scared a few of you which I didn't intend to do. I think what has happened to me is a extremely rare occurance, don't be scared of cps 2. To phoenix your board you just need to buy the roms from their creator which is neo member raz. Yes phoenixing your make it immortal and removes the battery from the equation, it a simple procedure of removing the battery and switching a couple of eproms on the board with eproms that have been burned with the phoenix hack.

How long was that AVP board sitting on your shelf doing nothing?

(that's some fucked up shit, BTW)

English Progear censors the JP voices.

But how old was that battery ? Did you ever change it yourself?

Now that's some crazy shit! I'm glad that I've already phoenixed all my CPS-2 boards.

When I bought the board in question 1 year ago the previous owner had already changed the battery supposively only a few month before he sold it to me, it was not the standard red maxell battery capcom used. It had been three months since i last powered it up and like I said I have two copies so I would just play the one that was at a easier reach on my shelf which wasn't the one that exploded. So when I finally do decide to change the battery on the other one that was not at arms reach I found it had died violently when the battery exploded. Yeah that was meshed up but like I said I managed to save the AVP roms and I refurbished the AVP game by using another dead cps 2 board as a sac.

How much is this phoenix thingy?

mainman said:

Interesting story here. Most of my cps 2 collection run on battery power still but there are 3 that I have actually purchased the phoenix fix for but have not installed it. I went this week to play my aliens vs predator board and when I picked it up there was something shaking around inside so I opened it and found this.

The reason you see no roms by the way is because this picture was taken after I removed the roms but apparently the battery had exploded and taken out everything in its path which unfortunately included the large custom chip right next to the battery. How this happened I do not know. Fortunately I had purchased the phoenix rom from raz some months earlier but as you guessed never got around to installing them. It was impposible to salvage the PCB but I quickly thought of something. i had a dead darkstalker b board that had been setting around waiting to be phoenix so I thought what if I SAC the darkstalkers board and salvage the roms from the AVP board to bring it back. Fortunately the Mask roms and the pal chips from the AVP survived destruction so I just switch the rom from one board to the other and installed the phoenix roms for AVP. The hardest part about this operation is knowing the jumper settings because each cps 2 game has its own unique settings. Fortune was still on my side because AVP is one of the few games I have a second board too, so I just opened the working AVP got the jumper setting and applied them to the SAC version. I booted the board and it actually worked perfectly. You can't call this a boot leg because outside the phoenix fix it all original factory parts and there is no difference between my SAC version and my non SAC version. But wait there is more carnage, that damn lithium acid ate all the way through the b board into the a board and took out the A board too. I still working on reparing that it appear that only a D latch was destroyed which is easily purchased so I get back around to that later. I plan on phoenixing all my boards gradually because of this one incident. Has this ever happened to you?

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Holy smokes..lol..I didn't think that a lithium could explode that well!
Any ideas why it blew up?heat maybe?

Yeah i just changed the batt on the 5 x cps2 pcb's i own.First time and all succesful so was happy with that..not to scary.Took us 10 mins each.

However got these 3 dead board's(xmen v streety,19xx and cyberbots) i want to send to be phoenixed and was wondering how to remove the program rom's?
Do you need a special tool to remove them or desolder them or something?

cheers

Squid said:

However got these 3 dead board's(xmen v streety,19xx and cyberbots) i want to send to be phoenixed and was wondering how to remove the program rom's?
Do you need a special tool to remove them or desolder them or something?

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The program roms are socketed, so a flat-headed screwdriver will suffice to remove them. Be careful though not to break off their legs! Just email Raz which games you wanna get phoenixed and he's gonna tell you which roms you need to remove.

Looks like your board threw up all over its self.

It goes to show you that when it comes to collecting games, expecially expensive arcade equipment, you need to take care of your stuff. I'm sure you and everyone who has read this thred will never make the mistake you did. Thanks for the heads up.

Spike said:

How much is this phoenix thingy?

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I think Raz charges €30 per game iirc. Better contact him personally.

Squid said:

Holy smokes..lol..I didn't think that a lithium could explode that well!
Any ideas why it blew up?heat maybe?

Yeah i just changed the batt on the 5 x cps2 pcb's i own.First time and all succesful so was happy with that..not to scary.Took us 10 mins each.

However got these 3 dead board's(xmen v streety,19xx and cyberbots) i want to send to be phoenixed and was wondering how to remove the program rom's?
Do you need a special tool to remove them or desolder them or something?

cheers

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Just ran some test on the dead PCB and dicovered the diode on the battery was actually operating bidirectionally, so when the board was powered voltage was some how being feed back into the battery which caused it to eventually explode. Just use a flat head screw driver to carefully remove the chips.

greedostick said:

Looks like your board threw up all over its self.

It goes to show you that when it comes to collecting games, expecially expensive arcade equipment, you need to take care of your stuff. I'm sure you and everyone who has read this thred will never make the mistake you did. Thanks for the heads up.

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I do indeed take care of my stuff, I just don't throw it anywhere & anyhow. I got thousands of dollars invested in this hobby. My stuff is carefully stored in a special cabinent that is not hazardous to my gear or causes harsh environmental stresses either. Is more like if you own expensive arcade equipment you need to know how to fix it yourself. In the end it was a faulty 20 cent diode that was a undetectable problem that caused this.

Greywolf said:

The program roms are socketed, so a flat-headed screwdriver will suffice to remove them. Be careful though not to break off their legs! Just email Raz which games you wanna get phoenixed and he's gonna tell you which roms you need to remove.

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Ahh,thanks! that's great to know..
I just removed a chip from the 19xx board chipnumber(19XE03B) with a small flathead and the legs seem's to be intact.
Yeah ,sound's like i better contact the man himself to get a better idea on what to do and maybe send ect as i have no idea..
Just know where the program roms are located ,and now can remove em. cheers

Mainman,thats interesting to know.I figured later on it must have been something like that..Say there will be a few curve balls around the corner for myself with this hobby taking off now!

Just a nitpicky note here, but that's not acid that ate away the pins, but lithium metal. Lithium is very corrosive, and also very explosive under certain conditions. If you want to see a big explosion sometime just get some pure lithium metal and put it in some water (i've done it before )

So to clarify, wet cell batteries (in your car) use an acid solution along with metal plates to store electrons. Dry cells (NiCd, NiMh, alkaline, heavy duty, Li-ION) use a matrix of metals to store electrons.

Sorry, but I just wanted to make sure people know the difference. (I know, it's a stupid distinction )

cheers,
-DT

Not at all,glad you cleared that difference up anyway.

Jeez that lithium trick sound's nutz,you work for mythbuster's or something.How long you got to run? ..think i'll stik with my fireworks off the beach for now.

Hmm yeah i hope to never find a board like that!

Squid said:

Yeah i just changed the batt on the 5 x cps2 pcb's i own.First time and all succesful so was happy with that..not to scary.Took us 10 mins each.

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I also just changed the battery in 4 of my CPS2 boards, took about 20 mins per board (my first time doing this). I don't understand why people are rushing to get their boards Phoenixed, I thought this was only done AFTER they have died? Its much cheaper just to replace the battery and keep a sticker on the case to know when you should change it again.