Replacing save batteries or fitting battery-free FRAM save mods.
4 repair logs
+84 photosSuccessful repairSega — Wondermega
Someone else's Victor RG-M1 Wondermega, JVC's branding of the Sega Wondermega, sent in for refurbishment and described as fully functional. It arrived with a blown supercapacitor and a loose capacitor rattling around inside the shell, later traced to a pad beside the DC input jack where the machine had taken a hard knock. Carts played happily but it would not read a single CD. A full recap followed, roughly 70 capacitors across every board, with white vinegar and isopropyl baths, flux and fresh solder over dodgy vias and the regulators, and DeoxIT through the karaoke pots and microphone jacks. The cart side came back fine, the CD side did not. A detour along the way cured the vertical jailbars on the composite and S-video outputs with an Oleg Endo RGB kit, tapping the Sony CXA1145M encoder and swapping the stock S-video port for a Saturn-style DIN. The supercapacitor was replaced and later superseded by an F-RAM install. The CD fault survived a complete chassis swap, a clean bill of health on every board and a working spindle motor, which left the laser. The owner sourced new old stock, and once it was fitted and its board recapped in turn, the machine read both originals and backups. Finished with UV protectant and packed up.
+7 photosNEC — PC Engine IFU-30
Capacitors, voltage regulator and the supercapacitor that keeps the save data alive on this NEC PC Engine IFU-30 interface unit. Validated with Street Fighter II and Bomberman '94.
+9 photosSuccessful repairF-RAM upgrade across a couple of N64 Controller Paks, no more batteries quietly erasing your saves. Revisited years later and redone properly, following nosIndulgences' research: the quick version can corrupt data in the long run, so this one adds a pull-up on the write-enable line.
+16 photosSuccessful repairSNK — Neo Geo CD
A cheap Neo Geo CD from 2021, recapped board by board: the AV and power board, the optical drive PCB, the mainboard and the original PSU. Later fitted with a NEO SD Loader to take the load off the drive, and an F-RAM save mod after it stopped holding saves even with a fresh battery.
