Boot or Original : Post original/bootleg PCB photos here.

[mastercello]

Bootleg - and for this reason I would say video ground is not connected to "normal" ground.
You should add a wire from pin 14 (comp side) to pin 1 or 2 - this should work afterwards.

[Stompp]

Bootleg - and for this reason I would say video ground is not connected to "normal" ground.
You should add a wire from pin 14 (comp side) to pin 1 or 2 - this should work afterwards.

As I suspected. Also, thanks for the tip about the video ground

[rkrenicki]

I have owned this F3 cart for almost 12 years now, but I never thought to open it up until a few weeks ago. I was having issues with my F3 motherboard (which turned out to be the capacitors) and I decided to check the cartridge for issues. I never expected to see that it was an obvious boot! It works perfectly fine, but whoever booted it, couldnt even find matching flash adapters or even EPROMs..

[geotrig]

ive never even though of checking mine

[muddymusic]

Mine is exactly the same! I only found out when I was opening carts up to dump PAL chips. Was not amused as it cost me a fair whack.

[Asayuki]

I have read the entire thread in two or three days, when time allowed. I treated it like a quiz to test my bootleg spotting skills and I must admit I did not manage to score the maximum, but I have certainly learned a couple new things along the way. For example, I didn't imagine that not having the key hole in the Jamma connector would have made the board cheaper for the bootleggers; or that Seibu didn't use to brand the board on the silkscreen. Thanks to all those who posted until now!

[chriscast]

Help please .

Is this original or bootleg???









Looks like previous owner repaired this area (back of blue dip switch)



thank you.

[copados33]

100% Bootleg, the pirates also went through all the hassle of copying the 8ing logo....amazing .

[mastercello]

Que niño malo...te pasas!

[copados33]

Que niño malo...te pasas!

Hola masto

[JandyKael]

As per my knowledge MVS cart case type not being legitimate I.E a clear Waku Waku 7.
Also the Label looking dodgy
PCB board(s) are full of eeproms
This is not always an indicator, as some games were officially patched later on using eeproms, Fatal Fury 2 is one example, however it should only be a couple of eeproms and not the whole board.
Dodgy hand soldering (this is the main indicator)

multi-layer pcb

[Asayuki]

For those who are unsure, check the spoiler:

DisplayCollapse view

Bootleg, but a really nice-looking one. The original has M52-SOUND-C on the audio board (M52 is the Irem model for this platform), while this one says MP-712A instead (William's order code number probably, as seen on the original board). Put a couple of original looking stickers on top of it in strategic places and it becomes hardly distiguishable from the original.
Neat eh?

The original for reference:

[system11]

There are loads of bootlegs of Moon Patrol, none of them have the correct amp heatsink.

Most of the originals are green by the way, the blue ones are rare - seems like it sold so well in the US that Williams actually had some manufactured, the green ones are all from the factory Irem used.

[Tsar]

1943
jamma

[system11]

Bootleg.

[Tsar]

Bootleg.

dumped rom#4

Hamster's Online Rom says:

1943b 1943: Battle of Midway (bootleg, hack of Japan set) 4.5h gfx1 0 32768

its the finest bootleg I have seen..in pcb quality etc...

thanks.

[system11]

1943 bootlegs are easy to spot as the MCU is missing, that's the empty 40 pin socket, sometimes the socket isn't even there just the space on the PCB.

[GIF]

Hey,
I just got a MVS of Strikers 1945 Plus and... It's not 100% original but seems more like a repaired game, not a boot.
The guy who sold it is selling on Yahoo Auction, seems to be arcade games taken from game centrers as he's got a big amount of copies of the same games.
He's a serious guy, I got many games from him, some were 100% original, others repaired.

Let me know, as I couldn't get information for this Strikers 1945 Plus.

Here are the pictures

PCB front :


PCB back :


detail 0 : PCB is melted, turned to brown on the components around the chip


detail 1 :
soldering is nice, but brown at all the points (comparing to the 1st top line)


detail 2 :
seems to be an original chip but brown on the soldering points, as if it was replaced


here are 2 links of pictures full size of the entire PCB, front and back :
http://superloin.free.fr/forums/MVS_str ... NT_big.JPG
http://superloin.free.fr/forums/MVS_str ... CK_big.JPG

Let Me Know
Thank you

[system11]

Original, be interesting to dump that chip with the blue sticker though in case it's a revision/region thing.

[GIF]

How would I know if it's a regional/revision thing ?

And about the other chip (number 2), original ? Because brownish on the soldering areas like if it has been replaced.
Same around the big chip (number 0).