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Char corruption, gets worse with time/heat

vthyng

New Member
Joined
Feb 22, 2024
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6
I had this c64 working for a few days. 250425 board. Now the chars get corrupted quickly after starting from a cold system. My first thoughts were char rom and RAM. I checked ALL ICs can can't find any change in behavior when swapping out.
The data and address line signals look terrible. Could this be a capacitor? None seem bulging, leaking or exploded. timing signals look clean.

I appreciate any ideas on what to check next.

Vince

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If you are convinced/think it is temperature related, a can of electronic freezer spray is inevitably required. Spray each chip in turn as accurately as you can.

Actually, those signals don't look bad...

However, as always, check all of the power rails for their DC levels (and check they are within tolerance), then check for the AC component of each power rail looking for ripple (between 50 Hz and 120 Hz) and noise (much higher frequencies) to see if that is within tolerance.

Dave
 
"RAM TEST BAD" should eliminate the character ROM. My first thought went straight to a bad solder joint or a cracked trace at/near the RAM. Freeze spray should get you close...
 
When you say the data and address lines look terrible, all I see in the recording is the typical sampling defects of digital scopes.

If you had a wide bandwidth analog scope, say in the range of 100 to 400MHz, the waveforms would look more normal. If you look at the steps in the sample waveform, it becomes easy to see that your scope is not resolving what the real waveform might actually look like.

To avoid these types of sample rate issues, I use analog scopes, the Tek 2465B rated to 400MHz, but it can easily view a 700MHz waveform, or the Tek 465/464/466 which is good to over 100MHz. One trouble with digital scopes, is that the marketing rhetoric tries to impress people with sample rates, but they derive no equivalence to the capability of an analog scope to display a wave, which in theory will have a sample rate equal to the inverse of the Planck interval. There are no discontinuities and interpolations between them, to confuse the displayed picture.

Also as noted, if it is a thermal problem, freeze spray is your friend. Though sometimes the effects can be too diffuse. If you want to cool a specific part, one way is to put IPA on a cue tip and apply it to a specific part, and keep applying it. The latent heat of evaporation drags heat from just that one part and it can be easier to locate it.
 

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Thanks for all the info. I have replaced every chip from another board, same issue. I recapped all of the electrolytic, and all .1uf. When the problem happens, I can see address lines 0 through 15 change in their pattern. 16+ do not seem to change (or maybe they don't get accessed). So it has me thinking about what can impact all of those address lines that isn't one of the chips. I have been focusing on the ram area and found that if I pull out U26 (74343), Dead test image 781229 can get all the way through sound test, where normally it freezes up at either screen ram or other memory tests. However I have tried 2 other 74343 and have the same issue. Dead test image 781229 requires U26 to be out to get through sound test.
Diag STID 1.2.0 with U26 in flashes for different RAM chips depending on the attempt.
Diag 586220++ will run through sound test without U26 in and gives random bad ram chips each time.

So what does this tell me. With U26 out I can reliably run a diag on repeat even though the screen is messed up. I think it says what is being read from video addresses is either not correct or getting corrupted in transit to the screen. Having U26 installed leads to the system locking up after a few seconds.
Is the problem coming from the expansion port with the diag cart as it accesses all address lines? I don't think so, because I have this problem without it in.

Still hacking away at it. Appreciate any more ideas. Thanks,

Vince
 
Ugh... I noticed some bad solder joints on ram and U13/25. Seems to be working well now.... Massive face palm.
 
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