iank99

Kevin's right - the 5 volt rail is probably ok but the 12v rail will cause issues with the floppy drive as I outlined above (is there a desk lamp plugged in? If this is faulty or a cheap one then this has been known to pull the 12v rail down). I've had a quick look at the schematics for the zero88 produced boards and they do seem to rely on the 5 volt rail but there were never published schematics for the STMain (they were considered unrepairable and designed outside of Zero88 from memory) so I don't know if the 12v rail is used on the processor board for LCD illuminators and so forth. I would be tempted to say that it sounds like the PSU itself might be failing (they do and it's a more common fault than folks realise) - a PSU from a Jester or another Frog would go some way to proving this. I'll be frank though - if it's not the PSU & it's the mainboard failing (and again - they do) then the desk isn't really repairable because there are no spare STMains anymore (& it's not a repairable board) & you take the same risk buying a second hand Frog from eBay.

Glad to see you got sorted - dead Frogs are not a happy sight. I'm guessing the displaced power cable for the FDD caused a lack of response when the drive is "polled" to see if there's a disk inserted with upgrade software - the lack of power causing the drive not to be able to respond probably threw the software in to a "loop" waiting. I would hope that the loop is only programmed to take so many cycles (some drives might be slow initialising & responding) rather than wait forever.

Yay - result! Glad you got sorted

If you let me know the PCB number of the board - I'm at my workshop on Friday & I'm pretty sure I should have one in my recovered spares stock, I'll have a look and check.

Dave, If you can release the middle wheel from the front panel - check the small PCB on the side of the wheel is locked in place under the clips. Sometimes the PCB comes adrift slightly and the electronics don't read the wheel movement - click it back in to place and it should be OK. I've rarely known these to fail to be honest. If you do need to replace - I have some good used encoders for sale - you can find my website under my profile or search "The Service Guy".

I've just had a quick look through the circuit diagrams for the Level, Alcora/Elara & Diablo (which used the same processor as the Mark 2 Alcora) and everything seems to be running from a 5v reg rail (it would leave a lot to chance for a reliable 12v rail that could also potentially surge). The Alcora/Elara's could have an optional Analogue output card fitted and that did need a 15v rail but there were issues sourcing a reliable supply of PSU's that had the twin voltage rails but by the time the Mark 2's were in common use nearly all sites were using DMX so the analogue option was discontinued. The only other feature that might have needed a higher voltage appears to be on the Diablo for what looks like an CAN Bus option (though I never saw one) - it might have been part of a plan to use the processor for another product. The option to offer a 12v PSU spare was a choice so that it rationalised the supply chain and kept the spares pricelist easier I suspect.

Kevin's correct - the acid seems to creep along under the solder resist - depending how long the old battery was left in-situ, the more damage has likely been done I'm afraid. There are some fine tracks near the power supply molex on the main board that seem especially susceptible to corrosion - I had to scrap a Demux 48 because too much had been eaten away and it wasn't worth the time to try and get it sorted

There's a voltage regulator inside the desks anyway to drop the voltage to what the electronics need but you don't want that to do much "work" hence trying to keep near to 9v (it's a 5v reg from memory). If the input voltage is more than 9v then the regulator will do its job but the excess voltage gets "dumped" as heat which can shorten the life of the regulator. Any decent smoothed DC 9v PSU will do the job

I think Edward is correct - been a while since I had to swap out this particular PCB - might be worth checking the pins for the LCD for dry joints, they can happen and cause weirdness. If that's no good then it will have to be a new PCB - I can supply the PCB (though not from stock sadly) if that helps you? My Profile has my website address - I would expect the PCB's to be 7-10 working days to stock but I can check this if you want to order from me.

Yeah - Edwards right, it sounds like a fader dying - the clock issue is because of a dead battery but generally that's all it tends to affect aside from having to reload a show every time you power the desk on. There's a self test internally that I'm sure Keith has told you about by now - that will help identify the suspects - perhaps some Servisol Super 10 sprayed minutely in to those suspects will help.

Glad you got it working! Most Zero kit just needs an educated "poke" rather than a soldering iron or major surgery when it goes wrong - one of the main reasons I always enjoyed selling the kit

If the encoder assembly is the same as on the other Frogs - what can happen sometimes is the small PCB with the sensor "pops" out of it's clips so it doesn't "see" the wheel moving. It just needs pushing back home on to the clips... If you're happy to open the desk and look at the wheels - it will be obvious (and only needs to be adrift by a few millimetres to not read the wheel).

Yeah - these dimmers are usually very quiet in use unless you're trying to use them with some sort of transformer'd load e.g. birdies or fairy lights - then they do get a bit upset. Is the dimmer working smoothly between 0 and 100% or do you see flickering/steps in the intensity as you move the fader? I'd also be interested to know if the problem exists with just the internal faders or via a DMX or analogue desk plugged in to the unit. Of course, you might have discovered the reason it was being sold - the previous owner didn't realise it's an easy unit to repair (sort of :P)

I've still got the schematic - if you want to eMail me - ian at Serviceguy.co.uk I'll send you a copy.

It doesn't sound like a battery issue per se but the fact that it's affecting all the outputs suggest it's more than just an LM324 driver failing - what dimmers is it driving? Does it have the negative output kit fitted? If it does have the Neg output kit, then it might be the voltage rail that drives those starting to go thermal but the other thought is "When did you have the internal battery replaced?" - if it's never been replaced, the battery might be leaking and "eating" the PCB - often the tracks that provide some of the power on reset cycles.

Yeah - those pesky DIP switches have a mind of their own... If it hadn't been the DIP switches - I do have a stock of reclaimed fader boards for the Frog series

They are the same PCB - configuration between the two types is done by a combination of firmware & data on the CF card I believe. I would save a show file if you're able to - just in case (I believe in Miurphy's law!). I'm not sure about swapping the CF Card over but as you're fitting a CF from an LF48 on to a board that was a 96 - you won't lose anything in terms of "identity". A quick phone call to Keith should confirm this (I've never done it so can't be certain) - swap the battery on the "new" mainboard too for good measure.

I have some Frog fader boards around as reclaimed spares - they're largely untested having been removed from desks that were put away in to "store" as desk upgrades happened, however the most that will be wrong might be failed/dirty faders. If you're looking for a board to replace one with damaged tracks or chips - they would certainly do the job. If you want to pursue this - drop me an eMail to ian@serviceguy.co.uk.

Yeah - I have Sirius Keyswitches about and I have Keys too - drop me an eMail at ian@serviceguy.co.uk

Looking at the Schematic's for this PCB - there's a DIP switch on there that probably sets an "ID" for each PCB once it's in the desk - multiple boards will need a unique ID setting. Check that the board you put in has the same DIP switch settings as the board you removed... There's no processor as such on the PCB so there's no firmware to update - the ZerOS updates affect the processor board itself so doing an update won't cure the issue.

The noisy fan will be in one of the Performer Hex fixtures - they use a mass produced fan to cool the drivers and sometimes you get a rogue one that either has bearings that ages prematurely or the fan might have been not quite assembled properly. Talk to the dealer you bought them from if they're still in warranty - they might be able to swap it for a quieter fan BUT there's always some fan noise from these units, they're not thermostatically controlled so you have to accept a rise in the overall background noise level in the hall.

I see Jon's multi-tasking as ever... Serving Ice creams in Edingburgh, console training and maintaining the forum 😉

Not "new" to me - it's the £26 "not working" one that we talked about a few weeks ago... An hour on the bench and it's happy as larry - someone wasn't very careful when they replaced the battery and broke a PCB track without realising.

It's not just you - the number buttons, "next" or the direct selector dropdown doesn't seem to work. The browser shows the URL for the page you want but nothing happens which suggests a backend issue in the forum software caused by database corruption or an bad index perhaps?

That's great news - at least you have a desk working for the moment - you can now consider what to do next and find someone to effect a repair if that's how you decide to proceed.