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Region changing
Posted: Fri May 02, 2025 9:25 am
by al73r
Long story short I swapped my bios and wanted the blue swirl. Flashed to Europe. However my video keeps swapping back and fourth during boot. I tried to flash back but it's like I'm region locked to Europe and the region changer now shows red xs on all the options. I tried the retrodream flashrom reset but still all red xs. The system is usable but I feel my flash ROM is done
Any ideas?
Re: Region changing
Posted: Fri May 02, 2025 5:57 pm
by MoeFoh
al73r wrote: ↑Fri May 02, 2025 9:25 am
Long story short I swapped my bios and wanted the blue swirl. Flashed to Europe. However my video keeps swapping back and fourth during boot. I tried to flash back but it's like I'm region locked to Europe and the region changer now shows red xs on all the options. I tried the retrodream flashrom reset but still all red xs. The system is usable but I feel my flash ROM is done
Any ideas?
What the heck is going on with Dreamcast's 25 year old flashroms? The data sheet for the 3.3v version says data retention for minimum 20 years (upped from 10 years initially). Maybe @megavolt85 or any hardware guru can chime in? Should we not be trying to flash the boot part of a 25 year old flash chip?
Re: Region changing
Posted: Fri May 02, 2025 8:13 pm
by al73r
I ordered some of those chips and will attempt to replace it and use retrodreams flashrom reset rom. I can't think of anything else other than the flash is done for. The system still works fine since i'm on a devkit no gdrom bios so no region check .. its just kind of annoying that my video is on and off now during boot or when its switching. For instance when I go into dreamshell it prompts for 60hz press Y. ... i want my smooth boot up again
EDIT: Yes I bridged 422
Re: Region changing
Posted: Fri May 02, 2025 8:15 pm
by al73r
Oh to add I do have the equipment to pull the chip off the board and dump it. So i was thinking of going that route as well.. Oh i forgot to add .. if I pull the SSD/GDROM i get a black swirl of death as they call it
Re: Region changing
Posted: Fri May 02, 2025 9:32 pm
by MoeFoh
al73r wrote: ↑Fri May 02, 2025 8:13 pm
I ordered some of those chips and will attempt to replace it and use retrodreams flashrom reset rom. I can't think of anything else other than the flash is done for. The system still works fine since i'm on a devkit no gdrom bios so no region check .. its just kind of annoying that my video is on and off now during boot or when its switching. For instance when I go into dreamshell it prompts for 60hz press Y. ... i want my smooth boot up again
EDIT: Yes I bridged 422
What happens when you unbridge R422?
Not 100% sure, but I thought if R422 is bridged an NTSC system would output PAL and if R424 is bridged a PAL system would now output an NTSC signal.
Re: Region changing
Posted: Fri May 02, 2025 10:50 pm
by al73r
I started poking around as I found a short near the caps on the video. Removed all the caps related to video out and resoldered them back on. Video and boot are back to normal. Now to fix my black swirl issue with a new flashrom.
I will be dumping a working flashrom as I feel it's something that has not been done
Re: Region changing
Posted: Sat May 03, 2025 2:18 am
by PengoJetz
Which BIOS revision are you using? Japanese Cake v1.32 allows you to pick the boot swirl color from system menu, so might be easier to install than flash and all regions should play. I have heard anecdotal claims that it doesn’t work with GDEMU (can anyone verify?)
Re: Region changing
Posted: Sat May 03, 2025 11:20 am
by al73r
I'm told 1.31 Japanese cake works perfectly fine with gdemu but 32 doesn't
I will be dumping a working flashrom as I feel it's something that has not been done