New Project: WPC MPU well on the way

[MartyJ]

I thought the T2 was WPC89. I suspect more of a bug on the RD board for that game

[Homepin]

I thought the T2 was WPC89. I suspect more of a bug on the RD board for that game

OK - thanks, I'm not surprised.......

[vidme]

the t2 problem happened to me, i purchased a replacement driver board and the buttons in video mode work in reverse... nothing that can be done im told..

[pinball god]

  sorry I didnt read mpu. Yes the driver board is the problem.
 Talking about the CPU will your board still have a resistor setup for choosing countries or possibly a dip switch setup. I hope I'm not mixing up the boards again as I just woke up  

Also will the new wpc allow for rechargeable batteries or to be mounted away from the board?

[beaky]

i can see the pads for the country jumpers on the layout.

i assume u will be making provisions for a lithium cell button battery?

[Homepin]

Talking about the CPU will your board still have a resistor setup for choosing countries or possibly a dip switch setup.

Also will the new wpc allow for rechargeable batteries or to be mounted away from the board?

We intend to have only the holes that will take either jumpers or the buyer can fit a DIP sw if they like as leaving all jumpers OUT defaults to English

We will be including all battery options, remote batt pack, onboard CR2032 and probably Supercap

[pinball god]

Talking about the CPU will your board still have a resistor setup for choosing countries or possibly a dip switch setup.

Also will the new wpc allow for rechargeable batteries or to be mounted away from the board?

We intend to have only the holes that will take either jumpers or the buyer can fit a DIP sw if they like as leaving all jumpers OUT defaults to English

We will be including all battery options, remote batt pack, onboard CR2032 and probably Supercap

Thanks for that

[johnwartjr]

Awesome stuff Mike  

looking good.
it will be nice to be able to offer my customers a proper replacement if their board is to far gone

+1, will be great to be able to source a replacement locally. I bought an aftermarket WPC MPU (a Rotten Dog one, from MAD Amusements) about 6 months ago for a clients game.. after nearly having a heart attack at seeing the prices some of the local pin part suppliers were selling them for   hence why i started looking overseas.

Please note for T2 owners these boards don't work. For some reason the left flipper is recognized as the right and so on. So the dot matrix mini game works in reverse.

I believe that's a side effect of the Rottendog WPC *driver* board, not the CPU? I think there are a couple pins swapped on the RD driver board that are only used on pre-fliptronics games.. so maybe the inputs to the 4n25s are reversed or something.

Having another aftermarket CPU board isn't a bad thing. I look forward to seeing your board!

[Homepin]

Some major progress with this board - closing in on the smaller things now like back up battery options and part legends.

[ktm450]

awesome work again mate

[Homepin]

We now have the artwork practically finished for this board. A few final things needed attention. One is the backup battery. This board has a real time clock that runs all the time and so it places much higher demands on the backup battery. We have opted to use a much larger CR type battery than is usually used for Bally MPUs for example.

This also meant I had to source a holder for the new battery and then design up the footprint to add to the PCB artwork.

This is now all done so a bit of final checking and the art can go off to the PCB factory. I am also investigating FRAM to eliminate the need for the battery completely. It will all come down to the cost. It is my intention (at this stage) to offer the board complete BUT less the *micro, ROM, RAM & PLCC* as these can all come from the original board and are rarely damaged by corrosion. This will keep the cost of this board as low as possible.

This pic shows the larger batteries and holder along with the only SIP (Single Inline Pin) resistor network used on this board:

[johnwartjr]

Please note for T2 owners these boards don't work. For some reason the left flipper is recognized as the right and so on. So the dot matrix mini game works in reverse.

Can you elaborate a little more please - does T2 use a different version of WPC or what makes it different?

I believe Rottendog flipped a couple pins on a connector erroneously. I believe it's the one that feeds the 4n25 optocouplers on the driver board - in such a way that the right flipper button triggers the left optocoupler and vice versa

[Homepin]

I believe Rottendog flipped a couple pins on a connector erroneously. I believe it's the one that feeds the 4n25 optocouplers on the driver board - in such a way that the right flipper button triggers the left optocoupler and vice versa

That should be pretty easy to sort out with a couple of cuts and jumpers surely?

[Homepin]

Mike, what about using NVRAM instead of batteries?
Might add to the cost but it would be a great thing to not need a battery at all and it would be the only replacement board on the market like it, which you would think would make it a big selling point.

OK - I give in....I found a rail of FRAM today - now I just have to find the breakout boards to convert them to DIP as this chip is not made in a DIP package. I don't want to have a board made up if I can avoid it..........




OK - so I couldn't find breakout boards anywhere......designed some up and ordered them a couple of days ago - they should nearly be ready.

A breakout board basically converts a surface mount part to its DIP equivalent:

[Homepin]

I negotiated with the board house to be able to get 10 boards made if I pay the setup fee AND, as long as there are no changes (in other words no cockups on my part that require fixing) they will not charge a setup fee if I order more within 30 days.

That should give enought time to assemble up a few test boards and trial them to ensure there are no problems.