Sorry to write a novel here, but these details could come in handy to help diagnose a problem that so far has not had an obvious solution.

Earlier in the year my Led Zep LE sometimes wouldn't boot code. Maybe 1 of every 5 attempts failed, but it would always boot up next try. The success rate became more and more rare until it got to the point where maybe 1 in 10 tries would boot, then 1 in 20, etc. Also, it froze in attract mode a few times when I was away from the machine. On the Spike 2 CPU I always get all the voltage lights (48, 3.3, 5, 12) but never VA or VNB unless the boot was successful. Power is being distributed successfully around the cabinet and playfield to all boards as indicated by their red lights, but the CPU/code doesn't get engaged.

The first step with the no VA/VNB problem is to burn a new SD card with the specific game code and try that, or try an SD card from a working Spike 2 game to see if the non-working game would at least boot. I've tried both, hasn't made a difference. I've tried SD cards from a bunch of my other working Spike 2s, so a defective SD card clearly isn't it.

At this point I emailed Stern (no more phone support, it seems), they said it's likely a bad CPU board and to get another from my distributor. One month and $400 later, putting a different CPU board into Zep hasn't made a difference...

EXCEPT one time when I reseated everything on the power distribution board, turned it on and it booted up! I then played three games, shut it off, and went to sleep late that night happy that my Zep was more or less fixed, there's just a flaky connection somewhere that I could root out. But it didn't boot the next day or any time since then in at least 50 more power ups. I have tried a long list of things since then, including:

- Different SD cards
- Reseating *everything, everywhere* (especially PDB) 10 times over
- Wiggling PDB, CPU, cabinet, and playfield board connections while powered up to see if I could trigger VA/VNB
- Examining wires for frays, boards for bent pins, molexes for loose wires, and anywhere there might be a potential for a short
- Taking everything off VA (voltage audio) and VNB (voltage node bus) one connection at a time while powered down and rebooting to see if that would trigger the CPU
- Swapping a working PDB to CPU wire harness from one of my other Spike 2 games. This was my last shot ace in the hole and it didn't work. The same wire harness worked fine when I put it back in its original game (Munsters)

Pretty stumped at this point. Remaining ideas are I somehow got a bad replacement CPU board (or fried it) but this seems unlikely since the new CPU board wouldn't boot at first (roughly 5x), then it did *once* and played a few games, but hasn't since in about 50 tries.

Or maybe (probably?) the power distribution board is bad. I have another one incoming. Serial number ending in 00A instead of 00, but I don't think that matters as far as I can tell. Obviously the next step before that new board comes in is to swap a PDB from one of my working Spike 2s into the Zep, but could anything in the Zep (like the power supply) be harming the PDB and then I'd be down two power distribution boards?

Thank you for any suggestions or ideas!

Thanks. It's about 6 months out of warranty right now so both the distro and Stern are helping, but it's hardly a top priority for either. I don't want to push too hard until it's really necessary.

Thanks Vic, I was hoping you'd see this, you have a good knowledge of Spike 2. I've reseated the power cord many times, pretty much any time I'm reseating anything on the PDB. Would the 48v on the CPU light up if it was getting significantly +/- 48v? But I'll measure it like you suggest.

Nope, no power-drawing mods, just a couple cosmetic things like rubbers, translite.

Update. Didn't get a chance to troubleshoot this week with a dog on death's door who we put down yesterday (RIP, Ruby). Was also waiting for the new power distribution board to come in.

First thing I did was to install that. Not the most efficient idea given it was a bit of a pain in the ass. What I should have done first was this like PinMonk suggested:

LZLE 48v.jpg

Mind you that is coming out of the new PDB, but I assume the old one was fine anyway.

Ready to pack everything up and give up again in frustration, I remembered an idea I had during the week, put a USB in with the latest LZLE code (1.15) even though the SD card in the machine already had 1.15. It worked! Booted for the first time in the last 100 tries, installs the same code over the old one, verifies, and worked again on reboot. Awesome. I'm gonna play it 100 times tonight if it keeps working.

This may not be the end of the story, though, as I mentioned in the first post I previously somehow got it to boot twice in a row, played a few games, but it never booted again until today.

Any idea at all what's going on here? This pinball was already not booting with its original factory SD (running 1.14) or SDs from my other working Spike 2 games, so it's just hard to understand what the problem is and what to look for in the future if it doesn't boot again.

Yep, Sandisk ultra class 10 from Walmart, albeit 32gb rather than 16 or 8 since that's about all you can find at brick & mortar. No other Stern cheapo SD cards from other working Spike 2 games work in my Led Zep, so it's puzzling. Even though they're crappy cards, if they work in another Spike 2 they should work in the Zep. Which is the first thing Stern tech support suggested to me when I wrote a month ago -- try a SD from another game. Second thing they suggested: buy a new Spike 2 CPU board... somehow... but not through us since we don't have any. Which I did finally, and bzzt.

Thank you, I appreciate it.

Hi @sawyer23. Nope, nothing really fixed it for me, sometimes it boots up and sometimes it doesn't, but I've not been tinkering with it much lately. I've swapped in different CPUs, PDBs, wire harnesses, and SD cards, and it still just boots up once in a rare while. At some point when I get time I'm going to try PinkMonk's suggestion above and swap a different power supply into it.

Aw shoot. Stop in for a beer or a coffee any time you're in the area!