Installing Unibios on AES

[PigInTheMud]

Hey I wanted to install my unibios onto my aes without piggybacking. I didn't read to much into it so I had assumed the unibios and original bios chip were 1-1 in their pinouts but looks like I was wrong.

Long story short I desoldered the original bios, soldered on a socket, and I was expecting to just plug in whichever bios I want, but the Unibios displays a Hardware test error: bios message on boot. Any can describe the difference in pinout and what I'd need to do to get the unibios working properly in the slot?

See current board pics below

 

[GohanX]

There is no rewiring necessary, the Unibios should be plug and play. Check to see if you messed up any traces, then check to see if the Unibios was burned properly if you didn't buy it from Raz.

*edit*

Does the original bios rom work when you plug it into the socket like your first pic? That'll tell you if your socket install went OK, the original chip should still work if you didn't destroy the legs on removal.

 

[PigInTheMud]

There is no rewiring necessary, the Unibios should be plug and play. Check to see if you messed up any traces, then check to see if the Unibios was burned properly if you didn't buy it from Raz.

*edit*

Does the original bios rom work when you plug it into the socket like your first pic? That'll tell you if your socket install went OK, the original chip should still work if you didn't destroy the legs on removal.

The original bios in the socket is working properly. No issues during game play. I did purchase the unibios from Raz but this was purchased for an MVS console that I am also working on. Not sure if there AES/MVS unibios makes a difference.

Here is a what displays on boot. Sorry for the low quality. I'm testing on my bad tv

 

[GohanX]

Paging Razoola, you are needed in Tech Support.

 

[ShootTheCore]

EDIT: Never mind and disregard-I'm an idiot. I didn't realize that Raz releases an identical file for both AES and MVS.

Spoiler:

The original bios in the socket is working properly. No issues during game play. I did purchase the unibios from Raz but this was purchased for an MVS console that I am also working on. Not sure if there AES/MVS unibios makes a difference.

Pretty sure you can't use an MVS BIOS on an AES-there's hardware differences between the two platforms substantial enough to cause the crash that you're seeing. If it was "one BIOS suitable for all" then Raz wouldn't offer them seperately right?

 

[pulstar]

Is the self-test on startup enabled? If so, disable it. I would double check the soldering on the socket and maybe reflow the joints. Also, did you just continue with the A button or press the B button to force to AES? Does that get through to the game or an infinite loop of tests and fails?

Pretty sure you can't use an MVS BIOS on an AES-there's hardware differences between the two platforms substantial enough to cause the crash that you're seeing. If it was "one BIOS suitable for all" then Raz wouldn't offer them seperately right?

The Unibios is the same for the AES or the MVS so that shouldn't be an issue...or at least the free version works fine in both my MVSes and AES.

 

[PigInTheMud]

I have gone over the joints as many times as I can and they are solidly connected with solder now. Pressing the A or B button on startup goes to the Neo Geo UniBios v3.3 screen which then gets to the game. Both have the same effect. There is no disable hardware test in the aes bios

 

[Neo Alec]

Since it's a revision 3-5 board, you may need to bridge pins 38, 39 and 40. If that makes it worse, undo it.

 

[pulstar]

Since it's a revision 3-5 board, you may need to bridge pins 38, 39 and 40. If that makes it worse, undo it.

Surely that would only be of help if it was burned to a higher capacity eprom (something like a 27c4096)? I assume if it's come direct from Raz it would be a 27c1024? I suppose it wouldn't hurt to try.

I would check all the traces are good from the bios. This thread might be of help:

http://www.neo-geo.com/forums/showthread.php?218824-BIOS-error-message-in-modded-AES&p=3099255&viewfull=1#post3099255

 

[PigInTheMud]

I talked with Raz this morning in chat. He mentioned the traces to me too. Sure enough two of the traces were broken when removing the original bios. I redid the socket, connected the traces, and now it works great!

 

[GohanX]

Sweet. The first time I tried to do that I had to send it to Jeff to fix it for me

 

[Neo Alec]

Nice. Yeah, it's really difficult to desolder this without doing at least a little damage; even for the best of us. I think you have to do many of them before you can do it with 100% confidence. If this was your first one then I think you did a damn good job. I just would have soldered the bios pins from the back of the board to help maintain the integrity of the socket and keep it flat. Good thing Jamma Nation X has the bios pinout online.

I'm surprised the stock bios worked at all like this.