Bought A New Neo Geo Or SNK Game? Tell Us About It Here
Mar 11, 2024 2:16:16 GMT
Riko, boogiepop, and 2 more like this
Post by donutman on Mar 11, 2024 2:16:16 GMT
Hey everyone. I mentioned that I would share the some more pics of the Neo Geo Big Red 4-Slot I restored in another thread so here they are
When I got the cabinet it wasn't in awful shape, but the monitor need some serious calibration, the original speakers were blown out. the 4-slot was filthy, and the control deck had some bad sticks and connections held together with electrical tape.
First, I read through the manual I found online for the Wells Gardner K7191 monitor to understand the calibration controls and got the colors looking good and the geometry sorted. I also had to repin the connector, at the monitor, coming from the MVS harness because the red color would come in and out of the picture. Second, I bought some new bat top sticks, some quick connectors, and some new microswitches and rebuilt the control deck. At this point the cabinet was functional but still needed some love.
Next I bought some Tang Band 4" 8omh speakers and a Kitner K2020A+ amp so I could hear the music and sounds again. These were easy enough to hook up because a broken memory card reader came with the cabinet. I tired fixing the memory card reader and had some success because I got the headphone jacks to work just not the memory card portion . I know there are headphone jacks on the 4-slot itself but the audio is very quiet on those and the volume slider doesn't help. Anyways, after the speakers I used a replacement LED kit to get the marquee looking new again.
The last thing I did was remove the MVS board to clean, remove the battery, and install a coin cell socket in its place. I will say I have never been as nervous as I was taking the 4-slot apart to service it. Everything from the prying the 2 boards apart to taking a soldering iron to the battery to remove it. But everything went well, all the dust removed, and the MVS saves again thanks to a new battery holder and rechargeable coin cell.
One tip, if you are ever restoring a Neo Geo (or probably any old arcade) and see some noise on the monitor, check all the grounds for the system. There was some annoying fuzzy waves going across the monitor on mine and after scouring the internet for a fix (which is insanely hard because who know if you are describing the issue as someone else has) I ran across a decade old forum post talking about how an incomplete ground circuit can mess with older arcades. So with that random tidbit I traced all the ground lines and sure enough one of the grounds near the power supply was not connected. Once I reconnected it problem was solved!
Well if you read this far I hope you either 1) enjoyed the read or 2) found an answer to a Neo Geo cabinet restoration question you may have had. Also here are a couple of bonus pics of the MVS games that came with the cabinet (about half came with the cabinet, including the 2 full kits!)