Sad IIsi chime with no video

Nov 27, 2022
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Hi Folks!
So a friend asked me to take a look at a Mac IIsi he had purchased a while back. Unfortunately the board has been damaged by a previous recapping job gone bad. There were multiple missing pads and trace breaks when he brought it to me so I told him I would do my best to try to fix the damage and see if we can't get this old girl going again.

I ended up replacing pads and repairing traces for 11 Capacitors and Resistors in total including:
R12
R13
R33
R43
R44
R45
C20
C22
C31
C34
C37

The via's around C20 and C22 were also destroyed but I was able to route a wire through and connect them on the back to the underside via (NOTE: I am not sure if these should connect anywhere else besides this location as I have no schematic to follow I just have them going to the bottom via atm)

With that work done I tested the power supply that was included and it seemed to be putting out good voltage so I connected it and tried to power on the machine with no Rom Simm and no Memory installed (threw in a battery as well cause why not).

The machine chimed! and then only a grey screen. If I trigger a reboot using keyboard commands the grey screen is sometimes replaced with a yellow and green bar'd screen then a chime...then nothing...

If I add in memory and try to power on I get a chime followed immediately by death chimes.

My friend also gave me a Rominator as he couldn't remember if the IIsi he had came with a Rom Simm or not. The symptoms are the same with or without the Rominator-II in place.

I know the Mac SE/30 has that great matrix for checking trace connectivity is there anything like that for the IIsi by chance?
Is there something in particular anyone can think of that I should look at next? I was thinking about probing around the onboard memory and generally looking for more bad traces; maybe even removing cleaning and re-soldering the memory altogether but that's more just a shot in the dark than anything.

I have access to a multi-meter and an oscilloscope so if anyone has a wave forms and schematics I'm happy to check things but atm I'm playing things by ear here.

Thanks for any assistance!
 
Last edited:

Kai Robinson

TinkerDifferent Board President 2023
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Sep 2, 2021
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The RBV chip used in the IIsi is the same as used in the IIci - I have a pinout for this ASIC, if this helps with your troubleshooting:

 
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Nov 27, 2022
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The RBV chip used in the IIsi is the same as used in the IIci - I have a pinout for this ASIC, if this helps with your troubleshooting:

Thanks Kai! So would the RBV explain why I get a sad mac death chime if memory is installed? Or would this be just for the video not displaying?
 

Kai Robinson

TinkerDifferent Board President 2023
Staff member
Founder
Sep 2, 2021
1,032
1
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Worthing, UK
Well, the RBV is a good place to start testing continuity - after all, if theres an address or data line that's broken then it has no access to RAM which it needs for the display.