2 dead PS2s (failed mod attempts)

[landshark]

My buddy got an Infinity modchip for his PS2 and didn't have much of a problem installing it on his (v7) PS2.

So I bought one and he was going to install mine. I have a v1. He got 1 wire on and the next 2 were supposed to be direct soldering to the legs of a chip. VERY VERY VERY small legs (smallest I could see on the board). He was having alot of difficulty getting the solder to stick, as well as not bridging 2 legs. I went up stairs and passed out for a while. When I woke up he was still trying and said he had to clear bridges several times.

He gave up, reassembled, and no PS2 boot screen anymore

Soooo... off to Game Stop. I pick up a used PS2. Turns out to be a V10. This one has easier solder points. He gets them all attached and we go upstairs to test it out.

Original PS2 - works fine.
Original PS1 - doesn't autodetect, forced to hold circle upon bootup.
Original Import PS1 - same thing.
Copied Import PS1 - same thing.
Copied PS2 - does not work.

Crap.

Just for fun, tried a different copied import PS1. The PS2 takes the disc and shuts off! It ate my CD If I pressed the eject button, it would blink the light green and go red again.

Crap.

Next day, my buddy says the wires leading to ground and from ac may not have been large enough and brings some different wire.

Soldering to the AC connection was a nightmare (it was the edge of a surface mount resistor). In the process, the edge of the resistor became unsoldered and flipped up.

Minus 2 PS2's.

I think it's time to give up

No more PS2 for me for a while V1's are crazy-hard for modding. Were still not quite sure what was up with the V10 as it even flashed itself ok when we updraded the firmware. But it just wouldn't play things correctly or autodetect.

My buddy took them both home and is going to try and fix them. He even offered to purchase a brand new pre-modded one for me because he felt bad (declined).

[zakk]

Just use the solderless DMS4 next time

[Yod@]

V7 boards are relatively easy.
As you found, V1 boards are not.

V10's have 3 tricky-ish wires, but the rest are ok. Get your mate to check that his wires aren't too long - the Matrix Infinity is a bit fussy about wire lengths, you should keep the wires as short as possible.
I assume he's already checked for shorts and that all wires are soldered securely.
Using thicker wires (and as short as possible) for the Ground, voltage and Clock signal (wire Y) are a good idea. I use thin Kynar wire for all the rest.

Might be a good idea to also do the "Romeo" laser fix on the V10 machine. It prevents the laser from drawing too much power when trying to read a dodgy disc (scratched, poorly burned or whatever).

EDIT: Oops. Just read about the damaged surface-mount resistor. My sincere condolences.

[Shatterhand]

What's this "romeo" laser fix?

I've been thinking about buying a PS2.. modded, as I live in Brazil . I've heard the infinity chip is the best one around... and there are some PS2s that are being sold with a "Laser Protector" which in theory makes the laser last a lot longer... it would last as much as if the PS2 wasn't modded.

This sounded very fishy to me... but a lot of people are offering this, and I would like to know, maybe that's this "romeo" laser fix you're talking about?

[nZero]

The Romeo mod was just providing giving the laser a different voltage source than it usually used, preventing it from drawing too much power. No reason not to do it on a V9/V10 PS2, really.

However, this fix wasn't possible to do on the slimline models, so alternative methods of protecting the laser were devised. Most modchip installs on a slimline PStwo will be paired some variety of laser protection (diode method, PIC laser-shutdown, whatever) to prevent burning up the laser on DVD+Rs and so forth.