Other Arcade Sound boards and less confusion

My post yesterday discussed the often misunderstood Digital Sound Board 2 from Sega. In this post I will discuss two other Sega Sound Boards, The Digital Sound Board 1 and the Sega Model 1 Sound board.

The Digital Sound Board 1

First I will tell you about the Digital Sound Board 1. I do not have one of these of my own but in research for the DSB2, I learned a bit about its predecessor. The first thing to know is that DSB1 games are not compatible with DSB2 and vise versa. If a game uses one of these Digital Sound Boards you must be using the proper one since they both work very differently. The DSB1 unlike the DSB2 had an even lower compatibility only being used with 3 games total. The compatible DSB1 games are as follows:

Star Wars Arcade (Model 1)
Sega Touring Cars (Model 2C CRX)
Scud Race/Super GT (Model 3 Step 1.5)

So as you can see, this board actually spans 3 generations of Sega arcade hardware. From what I understand, it serves the same purpose as the DSB2 and generates the music for supported games. From what I have seen in pictures, it will need the proper roms on the board in order for it to work with your game. I will include more information about this board if I ever get one of my own.


Sega DSB1 Sound Board

The Sega Model 1 Sound Board

The Sega Model 1 Sound board is a bit of a different animal compared to Sega's Digital Sound board. In Sega Model 1 games that use this board, this board generates all sounds for the game. Without the sound board hooked up, the game will function just fine and play just fine but will lack all sound. The reason for this is that the Sega Model 1 board (or CG Board, as it was known before the Model 2 started development) does not include any sound hardware on board. It also does not contain I/O hardware so a separate I/O board is needed as well for controls. Unlike the sound board, caged Model 1 boards will have the I/O board inside the cage with the main board. This sound board is needed by the following games:

Virtua Fighter (Model 1)
Virtua Racing (Model 1)
Wing Wars (Model 1) Star Wars Arcade (Model 1)
Daytona USA (Model 2)
Desert Tank (Model 2)
Virtua Cop (Model 2)
Sega Rally Deluxe (Model 2a)
Manx TT Deluxe (Model 2a)

As you can see, this sound board was created for Sega's first 3d board, the Model 1. It was used in a few of the early Model 2 games as well as a couple of the Deluxe cabinets. I really do not know much at all about its Model 2 use, since most Model 2 games did not require a separate sound board and none of the games I own are on this list.


Sega Model 1 Sound Board

As you can see above, this is a two layered board. In Virtua Fighter, the top board generates sound effects and the bottom board generates the music. The board connects from its 6 pin CN2 connector to the 7 Pin CN connector on the right side of the Model 1 filter board. That connection allows for data transfer too and from the sound board. Like the DSB2 (on the board itself, not the filter board), The Model 1's power is fed into it in the black CN1 connector. On a normal Model 1 harness this plug will be included and is keyed so it can not be inserted backwards. Sound can be outputted from the Model 1 sound board in two different ways. Each of the board has a set of red and white composite audio jacks along with a 5 pin connector. You can input these into a composite audio mixer or combination mixer/Amp or you can input the 5 pin connectors from each board into your mixer or mixer/amp. My setup came with the 5 pin audio cables and the 839-0542 audio mixer board that would input the audio into CN1 and CN2, then output it from the center CN3 connector. This would come out as right and left composite audio jacks that I would input into amplified speakers. You could alternatively input it into an audio amp and then into unamplified speakers.


Small Sega Audio Mixer

Other than the DSB2, DSB1 and Model 1 Audio board, any arcade hardware I have seen, includes the audio hardware built into the board either coming out of a JAMMA harness or as right and left audio composite plugs making none of this extra wiring and extra boards necessary. I am sure there are other audio boards used in arcade games that I have just not scene. If you are like me and you either hook your arcade boards to computer speakers or your HDTV, the include audio amplifiers with arcade games are not needed as your TV speakers and computer speakers should already be amplified so plugging in the audio directly from your arcade board is perfectly fine. In the case of a Jamma board, which in most cases is already Amplified, you will need a a device that will unamplify the audio and bring it back to line level. If you have seen any of my arcade videos where I deal with amplified boards, you will see that I use something made for automotive to do just that.

The Digital Sound Board 2 Demystified (DSB2)

I get asked many questions about arcade hardware but nothing seams to be less understood then the Digital Sound Board 2. So in this post, I will explain a bit of what I know about the DSB2 boards.

First of all, this board is ONLY used in the following games:

Top Skater (Sega Model 2 game)
Sega Rally 2
Daytona 2
Star Wars Trilogy
Spikeout Digital Battle Online
Spikeout Final Edition (Slightly patched version of the above)
Lost World Special (Full scale attraction version of the game)

As you can see, other then Top Skater, all of the games that need this board are Sega Model 3 games. Keep in mind, if you try to run one of these games without a DSB2, it will work perfectly fine, it will just not have background music, only sound effects. Another thing to know is, a DSB2 board is 100% universal and will work with any listed game, the only thing you must have done is installed the proper sound roms for the game you are working it with. I have received many DSB2 boards, One had Sega Rally 2 roms in it and the other had Star Wars Trilogy roms in it. I got my trusted rom burner guy to make me some Spikeout Digital Battle Online sound roms that I needed.

The Next thing to talk about is the confusion about caged vs uncaged DSB2 boards. The pcb is a fairly small board (as seen below) with multiple sockets for sound roms and many headers for I/O. Some people tend to run the pcb as just a bare board mounted inside their arcade cabinet with pcb feet. While the boards often came from Sega in a small metal cage similar to many of Sega's boards at the time. These cages not only protected the DSB2 but also made it easier to mount or stack if the board was used outside a cabinet. The biggest problem with the filter board on the DSB2 cage is that it reverses the pin headers on most of the inputs. So if you have a 6 pin header where pin 1 on the board was +5, if you have this DSB2 is in a cage, that +5 is now on pin 6 of that input on the filter board.


A DSB2 without cage with wires


Caged DSB2 board

As I had mentioned above, the sound effects are generated by the arcade board itself, but the music is generated by the DSB2. This is achieved by connecting the Model 3 (I have no knowledge of Top Skater's pinout) to the DSB2 via the 7 pin CN9 connector on the far right side of the Model 3's filter board. If your model 3 lacks this connector, you will need to source a filter board with CN7, CN8 and CN9 with populated pins as this will not work without those connectors. From my understanding the sound effects come out of CN7 just like any normal Model 3. CN7 and CN8 will both be used for sound effects if surround sound mode is enabled. If you are using a normal 2 speaker setup, all you need to worry about is CN7. The cable from CN9 on the Model 3 will connect to the CN6 on the DSB2. This connects the 2 boards and lets them send data back and forth. If the boards are running, the lights on the DSB2 should be blinking indicating data transmission. CN8 on the DSB2 filter is for power. The ground, +12v and +5v will need power on this connector or your sound board will do nothing at all. CN9 and CN10 on the DSB2 filter are used for music Output. Both of these (like CN7 & CN8 from the Model 3) would be used if you were using surround sound, only CN9 is needed if you are only using 2 speakers. Basically from here you just need to feed CN7 from the Model 3 and CN9 from the DSB2 filter board into a Mixer and then from the mixer to amp and unamplified speakers or directly from the mixer if you are using amplified speakers. There are many types of mixer boards from ones mainly used in arcade setups to ones used in audio/visual setups. Basically any mixer should do the trick.

The hardest part of of this whole thing is getting the DSB2 and Model 3 boards working properly and talking to each other. Once the lights on the DSB2 are blinking, you can test your CN9 and see if music is playing, and worry about your mixer from there. Of course having proper roms on the DSB2 is needed as well as this whole thing will not work at all if either you have the wrong roms or the roms are burned improperly as the first roms I received for this were burned on the wrong size chips and did not work. If you have any more questions about this whole crazy setup, feel free to contact me and I will try to help you.

The Arcade Games Live On!!! Hikaru, Planet Harriers and More!!

Unfortunately due to changing jobs, I have been kind of neglecting this blog a bit, almost a year without a post.

Well in this post I will at least try to highlight the arcade games and things that have happened in the past many months.

The biggest arcade purchase was my Planet Harriers Sega Hikaru board. If you did not know, Planet Harriers is the Sequel/Spiritual Successor to Space Harrier. This board (like Naomi) is based on Sega Dreamcast but it has a custom graphics chip and quite a bit of extra ram. The power of the board falls somewhere in between Naomi and Naomi 2. From what I have read, in some aspects the Hikaru board is more powerful then Naomi 2. Since the board was originally created to run Brave Fire Fighters, it is able to do advanced fog and smoke graphics as well as a rendering tech called Phong shading.

Sega Hikaru Board (Outside of cage, with filter board)


The biggest problem with the board is it is a very delicate board. If the heat syncs on the processors come loose they can do terrible, sometimes unrepairable damage to the game board itself. The one method that is universally accepted by the arcade community is to hot glue the head syncs in an effort that they will not come loose and kill your rare arcade board.

Due to some very good luck, my board came fully working and was not damaged. The seller (from ebay) had placed the whole setup in a box and individually boxed each piece to protect them even more. It came with the board itself (in metal cage), along with the full control panel mounted to a wooden box with the JVS I/O Type 1 (same one I used for Initial D) mounted inside the box with everything wired up nicely. It also included the power supply which had the third plug modified into a 4 pin molex plug that you would more commonly see on a pc power supply or ide hard drive. There is a small power harness on the I/O that connects to that 4 pin. The biggest problem is all that came to connect the two was a Molex Y splitter which ended up only letting the power supply be a few inches from the control panel. Due to my quick thinking I purchased a 6 foot Molex extension cable making it more comfortable to have the control panel on your lap and not be tethered to the power supply.

Actual picture of the control panel from the auction


One Slight problem I had when I received this board was I had Initially received Error 3. On most message board posts it will tell you that something seriously was wrong with the board and it was costly or near impossible to fix. Luckily for me, it turns out that the rom board had just unseated itself during shipping. I just turned the unit off, pressed down on the rom board and the game came up without a problem. So if your Hikaru board throws an error 3 and you did not do anything wrong or it was not handled improperly, try reseating or lightly pressing down on the rom board. It may fix things just like it did for me.

The only other problem I had with this unit is it was Japan version so all the in game text was in Japanese. I posted on various message board and found out that no one really knew much about converting to USA Region except for the fact that it was not a bios chip swap but an operator code to change the region. I emailed a few people about this and one of them wanted to charge me way too much for just a code. Luckily I messaged Ken from Irepairsega.com and he supplied me the code so now the game is fully in English and I am able to fully read the "How to Play" section which of course is important since I had never played before.

I created a few videos of this game in action which can be seen below. One of them is the intros playing through a few times showing various demo modes. The other is my first full Playthrough with the character Cory. I had to recalibrate the joystick in the test mode to get it fully functional. The seller told me I should do that every time it is turned on.

Intro and Attract Mode Video:


Full Playthrough as Cory (On Real Hardware)


I also bought various other games for my various hardware but nothing spring to mind at the moment, perhaps I will post more later or tomorrow.

Sega Naomi Maintenance: GD-Rom Swaps (Error 24) and Arcademodbios

Naomi Error 24/GD-Rom Swaps

So a couple days ago I got a new Naomi game in the mail, popped it in and was greeted with a nice Error 24 (GD-ROM NOT FOUND). I figured something wasn't hooked up properly so I reseated all of the connections from the psu to the GD-Rom, as well as the SCSI cable going from the GD-Rom. Nothing worked? I reseated the Dimm board as well as cleaned the disc and laser lens. Error still persisted. I read online that this error is either the lid on the drive is not closed properly (which wasn't the case), the disc wasn't present, or the drive died. I was kind of mad now that I would have to spend another $75-$150 on a "new" Naomi GD-Rom drive.

Of course me being as I am and not giving up on anything until every repair option had been exhausted I did some research. I learned that the laser assembly from a Dreamcast could be swaped into the Naomi GD-Rom unit and it would usually work. So I threw both of them on the table and proceeded to take them apart. I removed the GD-Rom drive assembly from the Naomi unit, and repeated the process on the Dreamcast. I heard there are two different drives used in a Dreamcast, Mine was a Revision 1 so the drive was 100% the same as the Naomi Unit. The ribbon cable in the Naomi unit must be reused as the Dreamcast's ribbon is much to short. The power cables (2 small connectors) make the trip with the gd-rom assembly as they are the same on both systems. The hardest part was getting the ribbon cable from the Naomi into the Dreamcast's laser assembly. A trick that I figured out was to undo the screw holding the metal rail in place that the assembly glides on. You pull the rail out, slide the laser assembly off of it making it much easier to get that ribbon cable inserted into it. Once done I placed the assembly back on track (ensuring the small spring that was under the rail was put back in place), and reinstall the rail and screw.

I was figuring it had almost no chance of working as I do not consider myself an expert by any means. So I went back to my Naomi setup and hooked up the drive. Turned it on and sure enough, no Error 24. The system went right into checking memory, and started loading from the GD-Rom drive. In a minute or two I was seeing Lupin III The Typing on the screen again (figured I would use that game as I knew it worked). Just incase you were wondering, when the error would happen it would quickly say Naomi GD-Rom System and then go right to Error 24 without checking memory. So now, all I have to do is replace a $10-$30 Dreamcast, which is much more common then a Naomi GD-Rom unit. So if you ever have this problem, grab a Dreamcast and fix it yourself.

Naomi Arcade Mod Bios

Other then this problem, Which had just happened a couple days ago, I had another "problem" with Naomi. Some games that I own (such as: Virtua Fighter 4 Evolution Ver B, Guilty Gear XX # Reload, Melty Bloody Act Cadenza Rev A) needed to be run on Japanese Bios and some games (Such as the Initial D Games, since they are the English exports) Need to be run on USA bios. Also some games will change a bit depending on what Bios is installed (example Gunspike (Japan) becomes Cannon Spike (USA) and Moero! Justice Gakuen (Japan) becomes Project Justice (USA)). Plus most of the games that are compatible with the Dreamcast controller ports need Japanese bios. My solution I had in place was to buy a Japanese bios chip and swap them when needed. Only problem here is every time I pulled out one of these chips I bent the pins a little and had a feeling that after a while one of them would break or I would do damage to the Naomi 2 board in a botched attempt to remove the bios chip.

Enter ArcadeModBios. This is a bios chip for the Naomi or Naomi 2 which allows you to switch regions with a combination of dip switches 3 and 4 (which are unused otherwise). I had heard about this because someone on KLOV forums was selling a Naomi unit which hard these bios and briefly mentioned how it worked. I of course had no interest in getting his Naomi 1 unit but quickly found out that there was a version for Naomi 2 as well. The cost was about $30 for the chip shipped. Took a good month and a half to get here because unfortunately the first one he had sent got lost in the mail, but you know, those things happen. Finally got the bios chip on this past Saturday and all is well. I can easily switch from Japan Mode (3 and 4 off) to USA Mode (3 on 4 off) with just the flip of a switch without needing to completely disconnect the Naomi system or rip the bios chip out every time. So I highly recommend if you have a Naomi or Naomi 2 system at home and have games that require different bios, get yourself a Naomi Mod Bios chip.

Arcade Mod Bios dip switch settings (I received version 1.15)


Update: Many days later for the heck of it I plugged in the Dreamcast which now had the "bad" Naomi GD-Rom drive installed in it and to my surprise it works without problem. I tried about 5 Dreamcast games and all load and play without problem. I also tried Bleemcast Tekken 3 disc and even that worked without a problem. I can honestly say I can not understand why it works, perhaps there is something wrong with the GD-Rom drive that makes it not work in Naomi but does not prevent it from working on a Dreamcast console. Go Figure.

Sega Model 2A CRX and Model 3 Step 1.0 Differences and Similarities

At this point I own both Sega Model 2A CRX with Virtua Fighter 2 and Sega Model 3 Step 1.0 with Virtua Fighter 3. Both of these games were the marquee game for their original hardware revision and it only got better after that. Later steps and revisions had faster processors and more horse power. Having these to pieces for a few weeks now I have noticed a few things that are quite similar and some things that are very different between the two. So here they are:

Similarities:

• Made up of 3 Boards (Graphics, CPU, Rom)
• Both use Martin Marietta/Lockheed Martin Real 3d Chips
• Use the same 25 Pin input connector
• Display video in medium resolution (24kHz)
• One power connector matches (10 pin ground & +5v)
• Board stacks in metal cases fan cooled
• Use the same Video (5 pin) and Audio (4 pin) Connectors
• Output unamplified audio (Amplifier or Amplified Speakers needed)
• Socketed roms make for easily upgrades (VF2.1/VF3TB)
• Earlier games do not use security boards (Later games like DOA do)
• Neither game got an arcade perfect port (same goes with the first 4 games)
• A Model 2 will work in a Model 3 Cabinet as long as you connect the 24 Pin to the proper pins

Differences:

• Model 2 uses an Intel cpu (i960), Model 3 uses a PowerPC cpu (603e)
• Model 2 uses another 10 pin (+5v & ground), Model 3 uses a 24 pin for more power (+3.3v, Ground & +5v)
• Virtua Fighter 3 uses an additional button (pin 12 on model 2 harness)
• Model 2's fan connects externally, Model 3's fans (2) are internal and connect to the filter board
• Some Model 3 Boards (like mine) have a vga port right on the filter board
• A Model 3 will not work in a Model 2 Cabinet without a different power supply (one with +3.3v)

Sega Model 2a Board (with cage and filter board


Sega Model 3 Step 1.0 Board

Sega Naomi and Naomi 2 Hardware Information

The original Naomi is the arcade version of Sega Dreamcast. It has twice the graphics and system memory compared to the console and 4 times the audio memory. The reason for such a jump in audio memory is because the system does not stream cd audio off of a disc like the dreamcast but rather it runs the audio off of the rom chips or dimm board. Speaking of which, the Naomi games come in two forms. Some games will come as a rom cartridge and some games will come on GD-Rom disc which require a dimm board and gd-rom drive.

A Naomi System with Cartridge (Virtua Tennis)


The Rom cartridges are large rectangular cartridges with the name of the game on the top and 3 connectors on the bottom where the cartridge connects to the board. The benefit of this format is there is almost no load time since the game does not have to be read from an optical disc like its console brother.

A Naomi Cartridge (Dead or Alive 2):


The GD-Rom games do not work the way you would think. On the Sega Dreamcast the game would be read and loaded off of the GD-Rom disc in real time, however on Naomi to save on load times, when the system is loaded the entire game is loaded onto the dimm board. Think of the dimm board like a Naomi cartridge that instead of having permanent rom chips it has fully rewritable ram. Once the game is loaded into this dimm board the gd-rom drive shuts down and just like the cartridge games, there is almost no load time once in game. Loading a game from gd-rom to dimm board can take about 3-5 minutes depending on the size of the game. In order for the game to be loaded you must insert the proper security key chip into the dimm board, if the wrong chip or no chip is inserted the system will display an error code and not load. Dimm boards have a battery pack which makes them able to keep the game saved in the dimm board for 72 hours with the arcade machine off. Unfortunately these days the battery packs are either rare or expensive and most operators opt to just let the game load every time. As long as the cabinet/system is not turned off even with a dead battery the game will continue to run.

A Naomi GD-Rom Game (Guilty Gear XX)


A Naomi GD-Rom Drive


As far as input goes, like the 246, The Naomi uses JVS I/O boards plugged into the usb like connector. There are a few boards this system can use depending on the game you are running. For standard games that use just a joystick and 1-6 buttons a Sega JVS to Jamma I/O will work just fine. Some people prefer the more expensive Capcom I/O board but for 2 player games that just use standard joysticks and buttons (no excessive analog controls), the Sega board is inexpensive and works just fine.

Sega JVS to Jamma I/O Board


The board will connect directly to the 6 and 8 pin plugs of a JVS power supply which when used at home will either need an adapter or to be modified in order to connect it to the wall outlet. When using the GD-Rom drive you will need a splitter which either connects to the 8 pin as a pass through or connects to the smaller connector. Your GD-Rom drive will connect to the dimm board with a normal SCSI cable. The video can be connected directly to the vga plug on the front and will output to any vga compatible monitor as long as dip switch number 1 is set to the up position. The audio is connected into standard red & white composite audio plugs like most jvs systems and of course is unamplified so an audio amp in an arcade cabinet or amplified speakers will be needed to hear the audio properly. Unlike other JVS systems the Naomi only has one VGA port and one set of audio jacks (most jvs systems have 2 of each for vs play).

Front of the Naomi (showing filter board)


JVS Power Supply with the 3 Mentioned Plugs


The Naomi 2 is an upgraded version of the original Naomi. It has dual processors and dual graphics chips. It has the same amount of system memory as Naomi but double the graphics Memory, having 32Mbyte for each GPU. Each graphics processing unit renders one half of the screen. The best part about this system is it is fully compatible with all original Naomi cartridge and GD-Rom games along with having its own graphically enhanced games. Of course it goes without saying that a Naomi 2 game will not work in an original Naomi system. All interface and connections are exactly the same as the original Naomi so upgrading from a Naomi to Naomi 2 is very easy. The original Naomi cartridge games are the white/cream color that matches the system where as the Naomi 2 cartridges are the grayish beige that matches that system. The GD-Roms will be noted as working only on Naomi 2 on such games like Initial D, Beach Spikers, Virtua Fighter 4 and Virtua Striker 3.

A Naomi 2 System with Dimm Board


A Naomi 2 Cartridge (Club Kart European Session)


Some games such as Initial D need more analog inputs then a standard I/O can provide. Infact the game will not even boot unless a Sega JVS Type 1 I/O is present, the system will just reset without that board. Since Initial D uses a few more analog controls (Steering wheel and pedals) then the normal I/O could handle that is why it is locked out in such a way. I will have more on Initial D on its own page.

Sega JVS Type 1 I/O Board (type 1)


The one of the last Naomi topics (for now) that I would like to discuss is region protection. For the most part, most Naomi and Naomi 2 games will work just fine regardless of the bios that your system has installed. However, certain games will only run on certain Bios. For instance, Initial D english versions require either USA or Export Bios and will not run on Japan bios. Games such as Virtua Fighter 4 Evolution (Ver B), Capcom VS SNK Millennium Fight 2000 Pro, Melty Blood Act Cadebza, Guilty Gear XX #Reload and Street Fighter Alpha 3 Upper will only run on Japan bios. Other then the region restrictions there are some games that will not only fully translate themselves but also change their name depending on the bios. Moero! Justice Gakuen (Japan Bios) will change to Project Justice on USA or Export Bios just like Gunspike (Japan Bios) will become Canon Spike using USA or Export Bios. The best part is that the bios chip is socketed so no soldering or desoldering is required to switch it out.

One last thing that often gets people confused is that some Naomi games are able to use Dreamcast controllers. Not too many games support them and you must have a Japanese Bios installed. The only game that I have come across that will work in USA bios with the controller is Mobile Suit Gundam Federation vs Zeon (and the DX Version). Capcom was a company who supported this feature a good deal, infact many of their cabinets have a controller port right on the control panel. Games such as Moero! Justice Gakuen, Marvel Vs Capcom 2, Street Fighter Alpha 3 Upper, Gun Spike and Power Stone all support this feature in Japan bios. Games such as The Typing of the Dead, Lupin III The Typing and La Keyboard can use a Dreamcast keyboard using this same port. The filter board (that board on the front with all the ports) has pin headers marked CN6 and CN7. The first five pins of each of these are for the controller adapter. The official adapter that would come off of a control panel will be a full JST (Japanese Solderless Terminal) connector going across all pins even the unused ones. You however can get a 5 pin JST nh connector and splice it to a dreamcast extension cable eliminating the need to hack up any Dreamcast controllers and giving you the ability to swap in a Keyboard if you plan to play those games. Some games such as Moero! Justice Gakuen even have the ability to share data from the Dreamcast (Japanese of Course) to the Arcade Version. In this game your custom character made in the console version can be used in the arcade version if you bring your controller and memory card.

Dreamcast controller ports in a Japanese arcade:

Namco System 11 and Namco System 12 Arcade Information

Namco System 11 is a standard jamma board which is Namco's arcade version of the Sony Playstation. The board includes a standard jamma edge connector as well as a 48 pin edge connector which is used for additional buttons in some games such as kicks (hence the common "kick harness") or even block in Soul Edge. The additional connector is also responsible for the second channel for stereo sound (since the jamma harness is mono). This board is capable of only Standard resolution 15kHz video through the jamma edge. Notable games on this board are Tekken, Tekken 2, and Soul Edge (prequel to Soul Calibur)

The board is made up of three different board interconnected together. The base board, also known as the main board, contains the main program and sound roms that make up the game. The larger of the two sub boards, also known as the cpu board, As the name would make you think, houses the cpu and all of the system ram. It sits on top of the main board. The final and smallest board, also known as the rom board, contains all of the game's graphics roms. Since all of the roms are surface mounted it makes changing a board from one game to another nearly impossible. This however was not a problem due to the much lower cost per board compared to other hardware of the time such as Sega's Model 2.

The Namco System 12 (in the same vein as Namco System 256) is an upgraded version of the System 11. It features more memory and faster processors. Unfortunately the exact changes are not known at this time. This board made it possible to have much better graphics and more fluid animations in games such as Tekken 3, Tekken Tag Tournament and Soul Calibur. This new board also added full jvs compatibility. It however is still compatible with jamma and the 48 pin "kick harness" but it also gave the operator the option to connect vga video at 24kHz (dual vga for dual displaying like a normal jvs spec), as well as the 6 pin jvs power supply plug and the usb looking connector for a jvs i/o. When a Jvs i/o board is connected the 48 pin harness is not required anymore for your extra buttons as they connect directly through the i/o. The other thing that is added are two pairs of composite (red and white) audio plugs which are not amplified so you will either need a set of amplified speakers or a sound amp board.

As far as connecting these boards at home goes, all you will need is a standard Min Dong, Suzo Happ or other screw terminal power supply and matching jamma harness. Of course a 48 pin connector will be needed for the extra buttons used in most of the games (Kicks in Tekken and block in Soul Edge). When using a System 12 board as mentioned above it can be plugged directly into a JVS setup, but without need for the 8 pin power connector that many jvs power supplies have. Another interesting thing is that Namco System 12 board are fully compatible with Namco's Cyberlead cabinet and will display special messages on the led display while the game is playing. A special note, if you are connecting either Tekken Tag or Tekken 3 with a Sega JVS to Jamma I/O, Button 3 is used for Tag in Tekken Tag, however when connecting Tekken 3, Skip button 3 and connect the Button 4 and 5 for the Kicks.

Namco System 11 Board (Tekken 2)


Namco System 12 Board (Tekken Tag)



Tekken Tag Tournament running in a Cyber Lead Cabinet