VOGONS


First post, by Leon53_de

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My apologies for the crosspost: I did not see earlier, that there is a subforum for sound specifically!

I hope somebody will be able to point me into the correct direction here.

Some months ago I purchased a Roland SC-88, but at that time I could not find the time to test the device.

Now some days ago, I finally got the time to check it out and it turned out to be partially faulty: It was not booting always reliably (sometimes started OK, sometimes not at all) and sometimes it just stopped working after some minutes, so would not react anymore on a button press and the display was stuck also. For the small times it was working I could press the preview button, which made the respective bar in the display indicating, that a sound should have been played and the same was showing, when connected to a midi keyboard, but no sound came out of the SC-88.

Reviewing this board for information turned out, that faulty/leaking SMD caps on the mainboard were a possible reason for that behaviour. So I decided to remove these and the funny smell while desoldering these, which was described in some posts over here, was somewhat proving that I was doing something right.
After replacing these caps with 'regular' (not SMD) ones, partially with a higher voltage, the device is now booting up fine always, it produces sound, when the preview button is pressed.
BUT no midi input is being detected by the device at all; meaning if I connect it to my midi keyboard, I cannot play the sound in that way. I tried multiple midi input devices and also mutiple cables.
On the internet I found the Service Manual, which also comes with the schematics: the midi/battery test goes until that point where Midi In A is blinking, but not any further. I also checked voltage and reset signals on IC11 (I do not own an oscilloscope unfortunately, so just testing things with a regular multimeter).
As mentioned in the other post, I re-soldered the connections from the Midi DIN connectors already. So these are apparently not causing my issue. Also since all MIDI inputs do not work, (In A, In B back and In B Front) that is likely not the culprit...

So at this point I am somewhat stuck now, not knowing what I could do to fix it completely... any help/hint is highly appreciated!

Reply 1 of 6, by Tiido

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There's a likelyhood that some trace got damaged from the leaking capacitors where those caps were.

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Reply 2 of 6, by Shponglefan

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If you haven't done so already, I would do general continuity testing. You want to make sure electricity is getting to where it's supposed to go (e.g. no broken traces or damaged components), and that there are no short circuits.

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Reply 3 of 6, by Leon53_de

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Thank you Tiido and Shponglefan; this is the advice I was looking for, though was hoping to get something more specific.

Regarding the MIDI test from the Service Manual there should be IC's 1, 2, 9, 10, 11 involved. From what I can see, only IC11 is close enough on the mainboard to one of the caps (C12)
I tested continuity for IC11 and all traces seem to work fine. Attached is a photo of that section; maybe you can see more?

Can you suggest another area I should be looking for?

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Reply 4 of 6, by Tiido

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Pin 57 and 59 have traces that look suspicious. 57 has some soldermask removed but looks like it can be fine but 59 has that dark spot right at the chip pad and it likely has nothing but corrosion in it. You'll want to see if there's any other such things seen around the other capacitors that got replaced.

T-04YBSC, a new YMF71x based sound card & Official VOGONS thread about it
Newly made 4MB 60ns 30pin SIMMs ~
mida sa loed ? nagunii aru ei saa 😜

Reply 5 of 6, by Leon53_de

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Hello Tiido, thanks again!

I agree, that some traces look rather suspicious and would require some treatment, but testing continuity was showing that these are working OK. I also tried to review the areas around the other caps and tested continuity, but also here no faulty traces detected so far.

So this is really hitting the nail of my post: I cannot think of anything else then doing what you recommended (general continuity testing), but since I am not too familiar with electronics, and also having limited capabilities, I was hoping that somebody could help me isolating things.
Meaning I could try testing ALL areas of the mainboard (very time consuming if you do not know what exactly to look for except for broken/corroded traces) while knowing that only some parts of that board maybe relevant to the MIDI circuit.

As said, according to the service manual there are only a few ICs which seem to be part of that MIDI circuit, and only one of them (IC11) is close enough to one of the leaking caps I replaced while testing some suspicious traces still have continuity and others have been tested also. So far I wasn't able to detect where the problem sits...

So, it would be great, if somebody could again direct me to the right spot of the board, where I could continue my investigation?

Reply 6 of 6, by Leon53_de

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What I am looking for is something like "if you connect a midi keyboard via midi cable to one of the inputs, and you press a key on your midi keyboard, there should be a signal showing on pin XX on connector YY, and this should also show further on pin mm on IC nn" or similar.

OR as the service manual suggests "when connecting midi out/through of the mainboard with one of the inputs, what should I see in regards of signals/voltages and where? As said, the test fails, but I should be able to trace down what is expected by the test???