Wubs GP32 - Nand replacement.

[wub]

Brilliant stuff! I'm really glad everything is going ok so far!

I seem to remember that the corruption had basically shifted words of data left or right. This is why some text characters were shifted, "m" being drawn as "o" for example. 2 bytes off, not 1. If the data looks off this might be worth checking for.

Still, great to see that things have moved on so quickly!

[rubber_jonnie]

I've programmed the replacement Nand, but will install tomorrow as too tired for fiddly soldering tonight.

Will have a look see if I can figure out what the corruption is.

We'll see what tomorrow brings

[wub]

Sounds like a good plan, looking forward to seeing how it goes!

[rubber_jonnie]

OK, so the GP32 is back together after installing the new Nand today:

IMG20240914111740.jpg (357.02 KiB) Viewed 621 times

It boots up:

IMG20240914113648.jpg (225.14 KiB) Viewed 621 times

And can read the SMC card:

IMG20240914113607.jpg (252.16 KiB) Viewed 621 times

So definitely progress

@wub

I tried a few games on it and some ran, and some crashed to the monitor and some hand during loading. I know they can be picky, especially if they are games that use overclocking, and that results can vary from GP32 to GP32.

It seems to be working however what I would say is that the firmware is completely different to mine, so I honestly don't know what's right/wrong when I look at it.

I can post it back to you, or if whilst I have it you want a different firmware let me know as I have the tools for flashing to hand now.

[wub]

w00t! What a result! Great work Jon, seeing that PacRom screenshot is just fantastic!

I would have thought that Lacuna or Rick Dangerous would run ok, but there was always a bit of buggering about with these things so maybe something is in the wrong place. This is a brand new SMC that I bought last year and I set it up for the BLU so maybe there is some difference..

As for the firmware, the one I sent with the unit should have been a multi-rom firmware with the standard European one , PacRom and another one called Wind-Ups that was a windows type thing.

I always preferred PacRom and of the three I would have expected it to have less trouble loading software than the others.

It's great to know that the NAND was the correct type though, and as long as you're happy I'd say it's ok to start arranging to send it back, I'll PM you with the details and arrange to send you some money to cover postage.

Thanks again! This is not something I would have been able to do, so without your help it would have been a permanently dead console!

[rubber_jonnie]

As for the firmware, the one I sent with the unit should have been a multi-rom firmware with the standard European one , PacRom and another one called Wind-Ups that was a windows type thing.

I always preferred PacRom and of the three I would have expected it to have less trouble loading software than the others.

It's great to know that the NAND was the correct type though, and as long as you're happy I'd say it's ok to start arranging to send it back, I'll PM you with the details and arrange to send you some money to cover postage.

Thanks again! This is not something I would have been able to do, so without your help it would have been a permanently dead console!

Is there a way to select the ROM at start up, might be worth a try before I send it back to you. They were always a fiddle but mine is a late model BLU+ IIRC and stuff that runs on mine may not work on yours.

It's not that nothing would run, because some would, so I suspect it is just the GP32 quirkiness at play. And yes, it's good to know that the Nand works and if mine ever goes, I have the knowledge and tools to fix it.

As it goes it was surprisingly easy to work on, despite the fine pin pitch of the Nand.

No problems at all, and it is nice to have been able to resurrect it One thing it has proved to me is that my hot air skills are slowly getting better.

[wub]

Is there a way to select the ROM at start up, might be worth a try before I send it back to you. They were always a fiddle but mine is a late model BLU+ IIRC and stuff that runs on mine may not work on yours.

https://dl.openhandhelds.org/cgi-bin/gp ... 0,0,42,389

You can use this program to force the GP32 into the bios select mode. I'd avoid trying the official European one as it may not be possible to run the select program again depending on how this has been configured.. Mr Spiv was extremely competent and sensible and so my instinct is to trust that he thought of this. The official bios needed to be "signed" through an official website, otherwise you couldn't run anything. If the version here is a perfect copy, without a hack to remove this issue, then you could brick it and have to re-flash!

*I've edited this next paragraph (twice!) and added a bit as I still wasn't thinking clearly! *

When I sent the unit to you I had forgotten that the LCD controller is different for the BLU+, which that SMC was being used on.
If I sent you BLU+ executables then that might explain what you've been looking at when it crashes to the exception handler. It could also be looking for a folder to exist in one of the main directories, although I tried to remove anything like that when I prepared the card for you.

I'm familiar with what happens when you use non-BLU+ software on a BLU+, there should just be a single row of pixels not being drawn, either the first row or the last, I can't remember which, if the program was built using the official dev files. Programs built in other ways could have way more corruption on screen, like a big white bar across the screen.

I don't recall ever getting it the other way round and running BLU+ software on the FLU by mistake, but I'm guessing that's what you're seeing. I'd be happy to link to some non-BLU+ software so you can test properly!

There should be no over-clocking issues as the machine, and all software, boots to the default CPU speed unless you specifically set something up to do otherwise.

As it goes it was surprisingly easy to work on, despite the fine pin pitch of the Nand.

No problems at all, and it is nice to have been able to resurrect it One thing it has proved to me is that my hot air skills are slowly getting better.

This is great to hear! It certainly looks like you've done an excellent job and you've inspired me to finally bite the bullet and get a hot air station. I have plenty of old motherboards to practice removing and replacing components on without doing any harm!

[rubber_jonnie]

Ok, will see if I can download and run the selector later, but we may just be in a position of it 'just working' and not liking some of what I tried to run.

As for hot air, it is a double edged sword, since it can be great, especially for SMT, but you really do need to practice a lot to avoid 'popcorning' which is where the air trapped in the PCB heats up and expands. It's really variable from board to board so you have to make decisions about airflow and temp based on what's in front of you.

For example, I did some testing on an old dead ST mainboard and they popcorn really easily, but then moving over to something like a PS4 board, they are thick and take an astonishing amount of heat. Then there is the Switch, which seems resilient but heats up ridiculously quickly because it's so thin. Every board is an adventure!!!

[rubber_jonnie]

OK, so I tried the download and sure enough I can pick between firmware options, though not knowing quite how they should look, I'm not 100% sure what I'm looking at, but I get a boot choice now and can boot to all of them.

So I think we're good to go and just falling foul of FLU/BLU differences, so if you can PM me your address I'll get it posted back to you

[agranlund]

Seeing that thing makes me want to dig out my old GP32 too
Such a nice and quirky handheld at the time. Great work reviving it!