Question about MVS carts

I was looking at one of the MVS carts I recently purchased on ebay and I noticed that several of the EPROMs were in IC sockets instead of directly soldered to the board. I would assume SNK would not use IC sockets. I'm guessing this means that these carts have been altered by someone.

What do you guys think? Have you ever heard of original carts with IC sockets?

I assume it would easy for people to download ROM images from a EMU page and burn an EPROM. This way they could create games they don't have using more common "sac" carts. Does SNK use generic EPROMs or do they use propriatory chips?

SNK have used eproms in the past, but primarily on "Special" games, like Fatal Fury Special, or when they update code or something. I've never seen one with sockets though. Also, I've never seen one use eproms for the C or V roms, usually M1 or P1 or EP1.

But that doesn't mean anything.. We're talking about SNK.

If it's ALL eproms, then most likely it's a bootleg.

Jeff



[This message has been edited by JMKurtz (edited September 19, 2000).]

Thanks for the info