60 to 72 pin adapter problems

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Albert1983
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60 to 72 pin adapter problems

Post by Albert1983 »

I bought an adapter to be able to play with Family cartridges, but when I tried it on my NES the red light kept blinking. I pressed the RESET button several times and it remains the same.

What could be done in that case?

Image

This is the photo of the adapter that I have.
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Ben Boldt
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Re: 60 to 72 pin adapter problems

Post by Ben Boldt »

The adapter probably does not have a CIC chip inside. You can either add one, or defeat your NES’s internal CIC chip.
Fiskbit
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Re: 60 to 72 pin adapter problems

Post by Fiskbit »

To disable the CIC, there is a common mod where you clip one of the CIC's pins, but you can instead avoid permanently damaging the chip using the newer "two wire" mod that involves soldering 2 wires.

That said, it might be worth opening your adapter and seeing if it has a CIC of some kind in it. Modern adapters use an ATtiny13 as a multi-region CIC replacement, which can change region if you press reset repeatedly. This adapter may have an actual CIC of the wrong region (or no CIC, as Ben points out).
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Albert1983
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Re: 60 to 72 pin adapter problems

Post by Albert1983 »

Finally! After several days I managed to open it.

Image

Image

These are the photos of my adapter.
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Quietust
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Re: 60 to 72 pin adapter problems

Post by Quietust »

It looks like the adapter contains some sort of primitive "lockout defeat" circuitry in it (in the form of a transistor, some resistors, and some capacitors). I cannot speculate as to how it's supposed to work, but clearly it doesn't work on your console, and there's no room to install a real CIC so you're probably going to have to follow Fiskbit's advice above.
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Albert1983
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Re: 60 to 72 pin adapter problems

Post by Albert1983 »

Quietust wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 12:33 pm It looks like the adapter contains some sort of primitive "lockout defeat" circuitry in it (in the form of a transistor, some resistors, and some capacitors). I cannot speculate as to how it's supposed to work, but clearly it doesn't work on your console, and there's no room to install a real CIC so you're probably going to have to follow Fiskbit's advice above.
Ok, but if I do the disabling CIC chip on the NES, will the console be likely to get damaged later?
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Ben Boldt
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Re: 60 to 72 pin adapter problems

Post by Ben Boldt »

No, it won't damage your console unless you cause some damage soldering or disassembling/reassembling. The console will no longer blink when you have a dirty cart/connector for any game after you defeat the CIC. Some people see that as an obvious advantage, and others (as myself) see it as nostalgic and would not want to remove that blinking.
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