So I'm helping a friend with his LotR, and we're having trouble getting the DMD to work.

Game starts and plays normally, except the DMD is stuck on this splash screen on startup. And never changes.

20221020_125743 (resized).jpg

If we put a Rottendog DMD Display Board in the game, in place of the factory display board, we get garbled nonsense, that also does not change or react to gameplay.

20221020_122937 (resized).jpg

We also get this same behavior if we use a ColorDMD, instead of the original HV Plasma display. We have swapped cpu and display roms, and we have swapped ribbon cables. No change at all.

All of this adds up to me thinking that the problem lies somewhere on the MPU, and that for some reason a display signal is not making it out to the dmd board. But I will readily admit to being fairly unfamiliar with the Whitestar boardset. Has anyone seen this display behavior before, and can anyone recommend what I should check next? I checked U201 with the diode setting on my dmm, and one of the pins reads low at .2. This is however, with the chip still installed in system.

My current plan would be to pull the MPU and visually inspect for damage, bad solder joints, ect., especially near U201. And then consider pulling and checking U201 when it is not installed into the board and/or simply replacing it, since one of the pins is low.

Anyone have any other recommendations? Thanks.

So funnily enough, when my friend brought me on for help, the HV power board was malfunctioning and kept blowing fuses. I replaced it with a new one.

So the current hv power board "should" be good.

But in any case, the display still didn't work even with an LCD colordmd, which doesn't use the high voltage at all. So I don't think that's my issue, but I do appreciate the suggestion. Everything helps.

-Conclusion for future generations-

It was indeed a bad U201 chip. Replaced it, and back in business! Thanks pinwiki / Chris Hibler!

Thank you. As is good practice, I made sure to socket the new chip as well.