When I was moving my WhoDunnit - the speaker panel fell out and hit the PF glass - when I plug in and turn on the game, the lights up fully (solid orange) with a few missing lines - the game still 'runs', I assumed the DMD screen was damaged..

I had an extra (failing) DMD around I tested in the game - it did not power up at all, but I chalked it up to it already being 'failing' (it has a loud ring). I then got another DMD (confirmed working well) which also did not power up at all when I tried .

I followed the power cable up to the driver board, and found the DMD power was running through an adapter(?) (Pictured). Does anybody know what this is? Any speculation as to what is going on here?

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By random chance I did that today before I left work - seeing this now. Unfortunately that didnt work. I reseated every ribbon and connector and the new dmd wouldnt light a bulb. From the speaker panel falling out, the ribbon to the Display section could have been pulled? I have a ColorDMD on order, and if it does not work (ruling out the HV connections?) I will try replacing the 14pin ribbon cable...

Reading this here I am wondering if my HV section was already weak? https://forums.arcade-museum.com/threads/installed-a-new-vishay-dmd-in-whodunnit-it-doesnt-work-wtf.130555/ so perhaps I broke my 'working' DMD and the other two Ive tried require slightly more voltage?

Yes seems to boot into attract mode, I can start a game (with proper audio and lighting.) Just the dmd displays not working.

Hey there - sorry yes did an edit, game does play. I just tried reseating J115-J118 connectors - got it to light one line on my new display.

I will take a tester to check the voltages tomorrow evening and see if anything is off

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Update : Tried replacing the ribbon cable that goes from board>dmd , no change, the old cable seems to be working fine.

Tried installing ColorDMD to bypass HV section of the board - the DMD just showed static.

So I pulled the DMD driver board out of the game and sent it to Tommy Pinball - apparently the HV section of the board was blown, but the logic section works fine...

I dont see why the ColorDMD did not work in spite of the blown HV section... but hopefully my good-as-new driver board solves the problem.

Craziest thing for me is: the HV section of the controller board 'blew', from dropping the speaker panel? with the game not plugged in at all.. so was the blunt force 'drop' of the DMD was enough to cause a short in the dmd board? Perhaps something broke within the DMD itself that shorted the board when I turned it on?... weird

Yes I had loaded the WD file and colordmd indicated it had loaded it and was running properly. Once I get the board back I will have to check that again

Very true. Thanks for your insights by the way I appreciate it! My new theory is - when I dropped the first dmd something in it broke, when I turned on the game it blew the HV section, and my ColorDMD not working was probably user-error. Board will arrive next week and I will know then.

I do have a Dirty Harry, Ive been thinking about plugging the driver board into whodunnit to see if it works, but I really dont want to mess them both up

It was a long ride - game is back working now , the original problem was definitely a broken DMD display, and running the game with it blew my HV section. When I got the dmd driver repaired it did not work - I assumed things blew further up, I went as far as sending the whole board-set away to Coldwater to be worked on, but those all tested 100% and the problem seems to have been a connector issue between DMD driver and the power or Cpu board, (possibly a result of the HV section burnout also? Who knows). Thanks again for the help, back to playing pinball !