Tinkerers...Need Your Help! Is it possible to revive a 3D0 machine?

[randycat99]

I know, crazy topic, right?

I decided to take my beloved 3D0 out of mothballs for a particular project. To my great dismay, it seems like the cd-rom drive has gone dead. The machine boots from rom and runs a screensaver, but simply ignores that a disc is sitting there ready to be loaded. The first time I tried it, I did hear the read head moving around trying to acquire and the disc whirring at different speeds. Then it all stopped, after later attempts. Now it is just silent, except for the whirring fan and perpetually looped at the screensaver.

So is it plausible that something could be replaced to make it run again, or is it dead to the vagaries of time? Anybody here ever had a chance to tinker on a 3D0 machine with any degree of success? Could it be so simple as to swap in a generic working cd-rom drive, and the 3D0 might know what to do with it, or is that just an out to lunch proposition?

Please, 3D0 gurus out there! I need your help to make this thing run just one last time.

 

[lefizz]

if the thing had been stored for a long period of time it might be a number of things. Depending on the cd read head in the unit they are often moved on an archimedes screw thread. This is usually greased and this grease can solidify with age, if this is the case, clean the old grease off get some Lithium grease and put a small amount on the screw thread.

This is a common problem with older high end HIFI players and is easily fixed by cleaning and lubing.

Its worth a try, beyond this i would also clean the CD lense with a cotton bud with a drop of methelated spirits and if all this fails and the unit does use a standard IDE cd-rom drive a swap out would be possible.

Phil

 

[Rainbow Man]

It's probably some custom concoction considering the age of the 3DO system.

CDROMs weren't common on the PC at the tiem of its lauuch and I doubt the industry had settled on the ATAPI or whatsitscalled standard yet.

PC optical drives generally used SCSI or proprietary interfaces of their own (remember soundblaster CDROMs?) around this time and 3DO isn't high-end enough for SCSI I think.

Good tip that about the cleaning/lubing stuff btw.

Peace.

 

[AzBat]

It's probably some custom concoction considering the age of the 3DO system.

CDROMs weren't common on the PC at the tiem of its lauuch and I doubt the industry had settled on the ATAPI or whatsitscalled standard yet.

PC optical drives generally used SCSI or proprietary interfaces of their own (remember soundblaster CDROMs?) around this time and 3DO isn't high-end enough for SCSI I think.

Good tip that about the cleaning/lubing stuff btw.

Peace.

It used a Panasonic (Matsuhita) proprietary 2X drive. I used to provide tech support for Creative Labs at that time and that was the only drive the 3DO Blaster supported. BTW, there were also 2 other non-IDE/SCSI drives out at the time: Sony and Mitsumi.

Tommy McClain

 

[randycat99]

Thank you all for the replies and interesting background about the cd-rom drive. I would suspect the "proprietary-ness" and early age of the drive would be an obstacle, as well. As far as I can tell, the plugs in the back of the drive chassis "look" very IDE-like (the familiar wide plug suited for an IDE ribbon cable and a short plug suited for a typical power connection). As far as the pins matching up to a "modern" IDE cd-rom drive, that is anyone's guess, eh? Would this be enough temptation to try a generic drive, if you were in my shoes?

Good call on the screw threads! I do see exactly what you describe in there. I will examine it further to see if the grease has solidified.

Also, I'm targeting the disc motor for troubleshooting, as well. There is an orange wire and a yellow wire that lead directly to the power terminals. Any guess which one is positive and which one is negative (does this kind of stuff have color conventions)?

 

[Mize]

The motor may have simply frozen too. Does it spin at all if you gently assist it?

 

[randycat99]

Yes, it spins easily by manual actuation. Next step is to apply external power, but I want to get positive and negative right with the orange and yellow wires, if possible.

 

[AzBat]

Thank you all for the replies and interesting background about the cd-rom drive. I would suspect the "proprietary-ness" and early age of the drive would be an obstacle, as well. As far as I can tell, the plugs in the back of the drive chassis "look" very IDE-like (the familiar wide plug suited for an IDE ribbon cable and a short plug suited for a typical power connection). As far as the pins matching up to a "modern" IDE cd-rom drive, that is anyone's guess, eh? Would this be enough temptation to try a generic drive, if you were in my shoes?

I wouldn't. Not because I'm afraid to mess it up, but because the drive is not compatible with the IDE standard. Yes, the connector looks the same, but it's not the same.

Anyway, the drive is called a Panasonic or MKE(Matsushita Kotobuki Electronics) or SLCD CD-ROM interface. The best page I found dealing with the interface and pinouts is here...

http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~theom/electronics/panasoniccd.html

Might want to check out the Unofficial 3DO FAQ too...

http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/3do/file/918744/2608

Good luck with the repair. Just remember if all else fails you can always get parts on eBay or go the emulator route.

Tommy McClain

 

[Mize]

I meant does it spin under its own power with a little assist. I now understand that you've disconnected the internal power. Do you even know what voltage it wants? If it were me I'd use the 3DO to power it.

 

[randycat99]

I'm gonna guess 5 v! Approve or disapprove?

Point taken, AzBat. Thank you for the extra links!

 

[randycat99]

Here's the update:

grease...still feels slippery- no sign of caking

powering spindle motor directly...it spins!

I guess I am stalled as to what else I can troubleshoot...

 

[Mize]

so the drive isn't getting power...is the rest of the machine powered? sounds like a psu issue

 

[randycat99]

The rest of the machine does power-up (lights, screen output, fan). For lack of any obvious signs, the drive does not seem "powered".

 

[Rainbow Man]

Perhaps the drive electronics died then.. Otoh, what was there released for the 3DO that's worth playing these days?

Surely the AAA classics are extremely far ansd few on that platform. I can't think of a single one really.
Peace.

 

[randycat99]

Well, it's not really to play games on it. I thought it would be cool to dvr the fmv openers for some of the titles that were really cool (for the time). For instance, Shockwave had a cool opening video, imo. It starts out almost like the beginning of a STNG episode, but then shifts to a sinister Earth invasion. I also would like to see the Need 4 Speed opener, as well. I can't even remember how it went. I would like to see Space Hulks again, as well.

The 3D0 must run one more time!

There's just gotta be a way to make it happen... I won't settle for declaring ToD. I stored it in bubble wrap for Godsake! There's no reason for it to just go kaput whilst in stasis!

 

[Mize]

so if you manually power it with the 5 V while powering the rest of the machine does it work?
Also there's Free3o (emulator) out there...

 

[randycat99]

I haven't tried that, but it sounds complicated. The wire harness that feeds the spindle motor also contains wires that feed some other component on the optical unit. So I would have to cut wires and run a bypass if I wanted to keep the wiring harness intact in order to maintain the connection to the other thingy on the optical unit. I suppose if I get desperate enough, I might try it out.

I was thinking about powering it all up and just start taking voltage readings in various points of the circuit board to see if power is getting places. This is a real bummer. I thought I would just get lucky and simply have to replace a dead motor or something simple like that.

I've looked around for potential emulator solutions, but I'm not so resourceful when it comes to tracking down the "warez". Not much to go by in Google, but like I said, I'm not that resourceful when it comes to finding that which is kept on the down low.

EDIT: Ok, I found FreeDO. That would be sweet if they actually get the OSX version out...

 

[fallguy]

I still have my Panasonic version.. costed $700 at the time. Got great gameplay out of it at the time. There are some good emulators, not sure on the laws about it though either.

 

[Darkon]

Got mine just yesterday, just to play fan subbed policenauts