Jeez! Do pinball machines ever STAY working right?
Thought I had everything working 100% and now I've lost some sounds. In test mode all music and sounds test good. I recently got my CPU back from being repaired for another issue and was assured the board was 100%. Was upgraded with new roms as well.

After I installed my CPU and played some games, some times the speech would work and other times it would be gone altogether. It seems to have gotten gradually worse now I have little or no speech at all. It's kind of random. Another thing happening during play is the background music will occasionally fade to a lower volume for 2 or 3 seconds. I can't associate this with any particular event.

I have read everything I can about sys 11 issues and found the speech sounds are coming from the CPU. I swapped the ribbon cable with my F14 and that made no difference. Replaced all of the radial caps on the sound board. From what I've read, it looks like U4 and U5 1458 op amps and U3 55536 could be suspect. Is there a way to test these in a random situation? Is there anything else I should be looking at?
I have a logic tester but don't really know how to use it.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Just got my mail from GPE for a new ribbon cable, installed it and no difference.

Played several games and still have random voice/sounds. Sometimes there, sometimes not.

May be wrong but seems my problem is associated with the volume fluctuation. Hard to tell during play but when the background music goes low it appears that's where the speech plus other sounds are lost. Just finished a game where this happened, drained the ball and the next ball everything started normally but ended up the same way.

Thank you Pana. I did not change out my sound board rom as I think my problem is on the CPU but maybe I should look into it. Just checked it and the label it has on it says "Music/Spch" I thought all of the speach was coming from the CPU.

Thank you too Grange. I did mess with this pot. I thought it was a volume pot in addition to the one in the bottom cabinet. High, low, back and forth and wiggle, it didn't appear to make any difference. I'm kind of on the same page as you about the CVSD but looking for a way to verify without the "shotgunning" approach.

It's hard to say for certain but I think all of the sounds were working okay before I sent my board in. The repair was basically transistor and predriver replacement for special solenoids. Not related. Upgraded ROMs were also installed. I have to wonder if something might be wrong with the ROMs. Maybe my Bot liked the old version better? Can't imagine that would be the case.

Thank you for the responses.

Does anyone know if I can put my F14 board in the Pinbot. If so would I just need to swap the sound rom?

Thanks Grange. Actually I was thinking about swapping the sound board but makes better sense to swap the CPU since that's where the suspected problem lies.

Thank you too erak. I think I'll go this route. Wondering if it would be a good idea to add new 1458 amps while I'm at it or leave well enough alone. Kind of a shot gun approach. Wish I could tell for certain.

Are there certain caps for just the sound section on the CPU? If so how do I tell which ones they are? I'm thinking maybe C2 and C3?

Thanks for chiming in John.

Yes, definitely worth a try. Not something I would have thought of.

Very happy with the work you did on my board and the quick turnaround. Everything else appears to be working 100%

Do you still have my mailing information?

I'll let you know the results as soon as I can put them in.

That will be my next approach if the roms don't fix it. Might as well start with the easy stuff first. Especially since JohnWart offered to send them out to try.

It really sucks not having all the sounds! I don't think I could put up with it for a "few years".

Like John said, you might look into upgraded roms for the CPU as well as the sound card. At least there's no soldering involved and I think John can provide them for you.

If the roms don't do it for me I will be looking into the CVSD replacement.

Good luck

John Wart was kind enough to send me a full set of replacement roms for the sound board as well as the CPU. Problem solved!

It sure is nice to have ALL of the sounds ALL of the time. I ordered the CVSD and the amps so if they become a problem I'll be ready.

Thanks for everyone's input.