ToToTEK.COM

[F4yt]

Hello there,

first and foremost, sorry for my rather bad english. Got a bit rusty...

I've read through those other SF7 related threads; they're mostly about the conversion into thad GD3 format. Knowing that, I think my problem is more advanced than that.

But to start from the beginning:
As I heard how inaccurate the official english translation of Final Fantasy VI was, I thought about buying one of those Game Doctors I heard (and read) so much about. Thus I could also try some nice games never released over here (to name StarOcean).

Everything went just fine. It arrived and worked, I couldn't be happier.

But then, on, so far, two occasions, I noticed some glitches in the game. Once, the map was totally messed up (the scene where Terra (or Tina) remembers Cefca putting her the slave circlet on). Then, just a few days ago, the whole opera scene got outta control. Celes wasn't taking that last step down so we can see her entirely. Then, when she has to go upwards, she just went through the floor...

Starting the retranslation of Final Fantasy IV (which has a nice banner added to the beginning) also gives me a corrupt "block" on the lower right edge.

One may consider those things as minor flaws, but it made me think that something has to be wrong wit either the unit or my copies. Retransfering the game on new floppies helped with the map problem, but the "opera problem" is still there. The bad "block" on the FFIV-banner is also still there (and changes sometimes after power cycling the SNES)

To make sure it's not those hacked ROMs which cause those things, I dumped Mario a few times to have a look at the checksum using uCON64. It's changing with every dump and it's always not correct...

Also copying a ROM to disk, then doing a binary comparison (which was OK), copying this to the GD7 and back onto the floppy and doing a binary comparison again also resulted in some "fallen over" bits.

And now I'm stuck. I think there are a few possibilities what could be wrong:

1. The units RAM (although the Self Test states OK on both banks)
2. The GD7 floppy drive
3. The PC floppy drive
4. The games (though they've been altered)

Is there a way to check these things thoroughly? Or could there be another thing I missed in this whole situation?

I hope it's not the RAM, although I know it's quite old and it has it's limited lifetime. But I think new (really new) RAM modules may be next to impossible to find.

Thanks in advance for any ideas you guys might have.

[Data33]

Hi!

Maybe you should try transfering some ROM using the parallel port instead of floppies, that way you can rule out floppies. Otherwise, I don't know what could be wrong =/

I had almost the same issue with an old Pro Fighter Q+ and it turned out the floppy drive was bad. Changed the floppy drive and it solved.

I hope it helps you!

[F4yt]

Hi, Data

yes, that crossed my mind, too. All I need is a straight through parallel cable and a suitable PC, right? I'll certainly try that, thanks.

It's a pity that there are no error detection/correction mechanisms (it just reads the disks to fast for there to be any).

I also thought about getting the CD-Drive (the PCBs are sold somewhere and I have one the fitting drives (made by Panasonic, labeled by Creative).

[Data33]

Hi!

Yeah, you need a male-male parallel cable (Like this http://www.smcelectronics.com/CMPCAB12.JPG ), and a PC with an LPT port (the parallel port). From there, you can use a program called uCON64 to transfer the ROMs.

It would be really cool if you managed to build the CD drive, but I'd want to make sure your unit is working properly before that.

If you cannot get the parallel port method to work for some reason, maybe try replacing the floppy drive and get some brand new floppies. If it's still failing, there's probably something wrong with your unit =/

Regards,
Data33

[F4yt]

Just ordered one of those cables a few hours ago. I have some old machines around. Those "legacy" ports seem to be rarity nowadays...

Would be nice if I could use my old Amiga to do the job^^

I think exactly the same. First ensure that the unit is OK, then build the drive. The only thing I'd still need is some kind of power supply for the drive. Maybe one of the Dreamcast PSUs flyin' around will do.

I really hope that it isn't the unit itself... *sendsprayers*

[MottZilla]

The problem is most likely related to the Floppy Disks you are using, the Floppy Drives you are using, or both. One thing to try to help is to format the disks to 1.44MB, NOT 1.6MB. They are less reliable that way. Also use the GDSF7 to format, not your PC.

Other than that you could try replacing either your PC floppy drive or the GDSF7 floppy drive. It's possible they are out of alignment, or dirty.

Parallel transfer is nice and a bit faster but you need to set it up just right or else you can get the same issue you have with floppy disks where it appears to have loaded but it really hasn't and it might crash or do any number of wrong things.

One last note, after having the Console and GDSF7 powered up for awhile heat can build up and may affect the ability of the floppy drive to read. It should still read but it may be harder for it to read lower quality disks.

[F4yt]

I certainly hope that's the case. I wonder how it can format floppies to 1.6M. Maybe more bytes per sector as it doesn't do more tracks.

So I reformatted them to 1.44M but no change (tested FFIV so far, the "bad block" on the banner remains). Used the same drive for both transfers and formatting and the disks were new. I bought them a while ago but never used them.

Yesterday I noticed two other oddities:
Doing the selftest like mad, two times I got ERR at RAM1 and RAM2. Almost everytime after a fresh bootup (after powering down the unit thus erasing it's RAM) I get ERR at BRAM. After loading the BRAM from cart or disk, it states OK. But every time a cart is inserted it states ERR at BRAM again. Sometimes it also boots right into the menu, without pressing 'R'...

Finally I also did a backup of my F-ZERO cart (as you can play through the game in a relativly short period of time) and noticed no glitches so far.

So I'm more confused than before. Games backed up from carts seem to work well, everything that comes from disks (using the exact same drive for formatting, copying and reading them in the SF7) seems to be faulty. But one game seems to run fine from disk too: Gundam Wing: Endless Duel. I noticed no glitches the entire game. Maybe the "fallen over" bits are on non relevant positions, but that's quite unlikely, isn't it?

Today I'll try Mario World, as Final Fantasy is just too big for testing purposes...

[MottZilla]

Well you can replace the Floppy Disk drive as well as replace the RAM if needed. Tototek sells new RAM boards for 34$. http://www.tototek.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1_8_11&products_id=18

Now the thing should NOT fail self-test. Are you using the appropriate power adapter and always used it? Make sure its DC not AC. Make sure it's between 9 and 12 volts. 9 volts is preferable. I'm not sure what could have happened for your RAM to get damaged. It is possible maybe they got loose or something. If you are getting an error on RAM2 (the external expansion board) you can make sure it's plugged in all the way or take it out and put it back to see if that helps it. If it does then maybe the internal RAM needs to be as well.

[F4yt]

Got some time to relax and do a bit of research and testing last weekend.

It seems that my problem was a mixture of:

• Defective SF7 floppy drive
• The altered game
• The power supply voltage, MottZilla mentioned

Here's the story:
As I reformatted the disks (using the SF7 to format) I wanted to keep my BRAM saves of FFVI. I already had some, which seemed to be corrupted, as the saves where incomplete, showing either just one save or none; but instead of starting the intro, it jumped to an empty "Load" menu. At first I thought, SF7s BRAM files are incompatible with the emulators SRAMs.

To make sure I have an up to date BRAM backup I just copied it again (giving me 2 or 3 backups). As I copied the BRAM file back on disk, I obviously picked the wrong one: I got the same strange behavior on the real machine as I had before when using an emulator. So something went right, what went wrong before.

I stripped the last 24,576K off the previously saved BRAM backup and fired up my emulator. Tada~ it worked! I started just before the opera scene, and guess what: This bug is in the retranslation! What a relief!

As I have an universal power supply, I also switched that to 9V; the voltage regulator runs much cooler that way. Since then, the selftest stated OK at all points every time. What I can't understand is: If it says "9~12V, 850~1500mA" on the bottom of the unit, why doesn't it work right when using 12V?. The manual also has nothing to say about that. You're not even told what kind of parallel cable you need to connect to your PC. Thankfully the one I ordered last week was right.

For the time being, I'll integrate the data transfer into my HTPC. I don't wanna boot up my desktop just to play a few games. Maybe I'll assemble the CD-Drive sometime.

What remains is the "bad block" on the FFIV banner. I copied the game to every available location on the SF7 but it's always the same result. So maybe it's another alteration related bug. It's unlikely that the same error exists in all available memory locations.

So tu sum this up: Many of the SF7 related problems come from the poor documentation. The site mentioned on the product page is not available anymore. Maybe I should take the information you shared so kindly with me and make a little info site myself.

Thank you for your help, you two

[MottZilla]

I don't know why they say to 12V, but everyone has always told me doing higher than 9v will make it run hotter and heat is bad for it so you don't want that obviously.

What do you mean "bad block"? Do you mean the Title in the menu has some garbage characters in it? If so that's not unusual as some titles use non-standard characters or translators change the title and cause that.

If all tests pass now it sounds like you are in good shape. =)