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Graphics not fully loading on Sega Saturn

dblanchart - Aug 28, 2022

		dblanchart		Aug 28, 2022
			hi, i´m new to the forum, i have a sega saturn and it has a problem with a few images in the games, but it´s not on every game. I´ve searched a lot but cant find anyone with the same problem. One thing that happens too is when the images start to glitches the sound start failing too. Does anyone knows what could be causing this problems? in the video you can notice that sometimes it loads the image correctly and sometimes not.

		dibz		Aug 29, 2022
			There are other people here way more technically minded then me, but to me it looks like your saturn hardware is starting to fail. Is this a stock saturn with a retail game, modded, using a "cart" for loading games, or? To me it looks like something on your physical saturn is starting to fail though.

		dblanchart		Aug 29, 2022
			it´s a stock saturn but i have a pseudo saturn cartridge too. In both ways the game behaves the same, using original discs or a burned one.

		ChronoLe		Aug 29, 2022
			I'm no expert, but was able to solve 1 graphical glitch situation with the following remedy. 1. Some graphics display, but others do not. likely something with vram or vdp1/vdp2. If your system can boot to the cd player screen and display the spaceship correctly, then this may not be the same issue that you are encountering. 1.A Reflow memory chips under both VDP chips If reflowing doesn't work, there are a number of things other users have tried without proper scoping equipment to track down the exact issues. These include, but are not limited to: 1. Recapping the whole system 2. Recap/Swap out power supply 3. Reflowing VDP1 or VDP2 chips

		fafling		Aug 29, 2022
			I've had these kind of texture corruptions on ennemies in house of the dead due to a failing laser lens. The game streams them from the cd during gameplay. The music is also streamed simultaneously, which explains that both textures and music have issues in case the console has trouble reading the cd. Do you have the same issue with the psk cartridge removed from the console ?

		dblanchart		Aug 31, 2022
			ChronoLe said: I can boot to the cd player and the spaceship displays correctly, the first menu when i start the saturn where i choose the date also works normally (shows where i highlight). fafling said: Yes, using the original CD of the game without the cartridge happens the same. Some updates: Now the saturn wont read any discs, and dont spin the CD. I´ve bought a new laser lens online and i´m waiting it to arrive( should be by Friday) I will also replace the caps on the CD drive board. The caps of the motherboard are SMD ones so i cant replace by my own because i dont have the proper tools to do it. but if after i change the lens and caps from the disc board and texture problem persists i will replace all the caps on the motherboard. regarding to reflow the vdp1 and vdp2 chips, i hope to not get to this point.

		dibz		Aug 31, 2022
			dblanchart said: I ran into the same SMD problem with my fenrir'd va0 jpn saturn very recently. I decided I didn't want to deal with the SMD caps and just bought a new fenrir duo to put in my NA not-va0 saturn. For me it was just the "black screen of death" issue.

		fafling		Aug 31, 2022
			dblanchart said: Very unlikely that it would be a vdp issue, you would have much more graphical troubles.

		OhPoorPup		Aug 31, 2022
			Hi there, I'm a repair tech... that is working on building out documentation for servicing failing Saturn hardware. In my experience these issues tend to come from video RAM under the board, attached to the VDP chips, which is mostly connected but one of the address or data lines has come loose over the years. Here's a demonstration of a similar failure..., though I think your issue might be on the other VDP's VRAM. More specifically it looks as if (at least one of) your issues might have to do with the address/data lines that carry texture information. If you're having CD drive issues, I might also reflow the attendant RAM near the CD CPU. A reflow of that video RAM under the board should remedy the texture issue, unless there's something more drastic going on. If you're not comfortable doing that reflow, I'd be happy to offer my services, it'd be a great help to the repair documentation I'm building out as well.

		fafling		Aug 31, 2022
			Again, House of the dead streams those textures from the CD, and that corruption means they aren't read in time when the VDP needs them. And the OP console now stopped recognizing CD games at all. These are symptoms of failing laser lens or drive, with laser lens being the first thing to try to replace.

		fafling		Aug 31, 2022
			@dblanchart... Did you try to adjust the pot of the laser lens ? https://youtube.com/jLogV-dlGh4

		ChronoLe		Sep 1, 2022
			fafling said: Good call. Start with the most simple remedy. Given that the op stated other games seems to run fine graphically, and you exhibited similar issues, this is hopefully the case.

		dblanchart		Sep 14, 2022
			Sorry for the long time without any news but a lot happened. OhPoorPup said: If i live closer probably i would send it to you, but i live in Brazil, so the shipping cost alone probably will cost more than buy a used one working here but thanks anyway. fafling said: I never seen this method before. i tried and helped to solve the problem. So, like i said before, o bought a new laser lens, installed it and adjusted accordingly to the video above and using the multimeter on the potentiometer (orange thing of the lens). after all that the CD still didn't spinned so i started to check the power supply and everything was working as it should. When i was about to give up i decided to test the CD spindle motor and for my surprise it was dead. After that i have to buy a complete CD drive since i was unable to find only the spindle motor. It took some time to arrive that's why i took so many time to post something. Anyway, the new drive came complete including the lens. i installed and worked perfectly i played for a few minutes and turned off the saturn because it was late night. The next day i went to play to test one more time but i made a poor decision to test it on a non original disc with the pseudo saturn, the game didn't worked, i put the original game and still wont read, at this point i stopped and keep staring at the screen ( the one where you see the spaceship) for a few minutes. I took a deep breath and decided to put the new laser that i bought first. it worked but the graphical glitch persisted, then i began to adjust the laser again. after a few tries everything worked great and now i have no glitches anymore. ( a piece of information, when i was adjusting the laser i noticed that every time a made a new tweak to the potentiometer more and more textures started to appear normally) sorry for the long story but i wanted to share with you the same feeling i had while fixing the saturn. Thanks everyone for the help.

		charla753		Nov 4, 2022
			interesting information