PS3 Frankenstein PHAT PS3: CECHA with 40nm RSX

[RIP-Felix]

Welcome @devbug_mind!

Yeah, pictures and resistance values of the official SONY modifications would be helpful. The OP of this thread just came back a few days ago too! He's wondering about his tokins. So I'm hoping to get better pictures and some measurments from official mods. The more the better!

Those look fine. You will notice transient ripple and noise when the console is working hard away. What you don't want to see is a sawtooth on the RSX or rectified sin wave on the CPU. I wouldn't worry about it until you have an issue. Enjoy the tokins while they last.

Glad to hear from you again, been awhile! Before you disappear again, can I ask you to take some hi resolution pictures of your motherboard (front and Back)? I don't think you ever did. I'm interested in a few areas specifically. A higher resolution picture of the voltage divider at GSCLKI:

I need to confirm what Sony did with this voltage divider. It looks like they removed one of them in the pic above, but it's grainy and hard to tell. If you can take a closeup of that area that would help alot. Could you also measure resistance of them as well? Also the resistance of the one they placed diagonal? I want to make sure the value we think they are is the same.

Lastly I need to confirm resistance and get a better picture of the Official VDDR voltage mod.View attachment 34928
That's the best picture we have and no one has ever measured the resistance values of the resistors. It may help us to replicate the mod.

Super pleased to hear there are more A01's floating around out there with 40nm RSX. We would be happy to help you with the board here!

Post away!

 

[devbug_mind]

Great, I will post some pictures in a few minutes. I just hope to solve the issue that I'm having with the console. Before removing both IHS plates from the RSX and CELL, the console was turning off with some games (with no warning whatsoever). The console no longer was booting up and was giving me the YLOD, but I noticed that when I kept on tuning on the console back very fast, it stayed on for a little longer and then YLOD again. I went looking around the net to find what was the problem or how to fix it and came across an interesting comment that someone made on twitter to Mathieu about replacing the NEC/TOKEN:

> https://twitter.com/valbox_val/status/1019451968824082433

I started searching about the NEC/TOKEN after that, came across some Brazilian forum and the thread here about the NEC/TOKEN a week later after it was created. At that moment I decided to take a hair dryer and blow some hot air to the NEC/TOKEN. The console no longer was showing the YLOD and stayed on until the temperature of the console was low/cooler. It turned off again whenever it was cooler. I changed all the NEC/TOKEN from the top of the board (ended up knocking down one of those very small capacitors next to it) with Panasonic tantalum capacitors and it worked. No more YLOD.

Installed REBUG REX CFW, made a backup of the NAND, switched to everything DEX, then tried to convert it to a true DEX following some tutorial and didn't mind if things didn't go well since I had the E3 Flasher with the clip. I think I did something wrong while HEX editing because after installing the DEX OFW it turned off with the YLOD. The clip that came with the E3 Flasher also went bad and I wasn't able to flash back the original NAND backup. I'm hoping to be able to fix this even now after finding that it is a CECHA00 model with such a small die. Very rare indeed and special to have this.

 

[devbug_mind]

Welcome @devbug_mind!

Yeah, pictures and resistance values of the official SONY modifications would be helpful. The OP of this thread just came back a few days ago too! He's wondering about his tokins. So I'm hoping to get better pictures and some measurments from official mods. The more the better!

Super pleased to hear there are more A01's floating around out there with 40nm RSX. We would be happy to help you with the board here!

Post away!

Sorry, I made a mistake, after double checking it is a Japanese CECHA00 model. I will be taking pictures in a few minutes and upload them. Hopefully they come out great

 

[DeadEnd]

By the way, as for the cok-001 revision with the exposed chips. It may be that there is still an unconfirmed problem with ps2 games. I talked to botakompong, and he mentioned there may have been a problem with ps2 games because syscon is different on those boards. Syscon with a number 201 is a problematic one for the orbis-mod. The one on the board with black chips is 202, so no issues there.

 

[devbug_mind]

Here are the pictures: https//imgur.com/a/051YZhg

 

[truemaster]

wow another sony frankenstein im exited. @RIP-Felix looks loke only one pad is mandantory to fix. so this frankenstein2 mb havent seen its lasts.

 

[DoublesAdvocate]

Another proud owner here. I own a PS3 (CECHA01 model) with an official refurbished (COK-001) board by SONY. I thought the PS3 model/board was just like any other (COK-001) board of the same console model. I found out that it was a very different board after checking the NAND dump logs with (PS3DumpChecker) and seeing something different or some error report.

Did some research about it minutes later and found a comment here which I believe was from the user littlebalup saying that such report or error meant that it was an official refurbished board from SONY. This was more than two years ago. I really wasn't aware of such RSX of that size on a (CECHA01) model even after opening the console to remove both IHS.

I've been lurking and checking this thread since it was created and finally decided to sign-up. I opened the console once again a few days ago to check if it did came with such RSX of that size and yes it did. Now I know why the temperatures of this model were very low. I'm not sure if I should create another thread or to continue here since I need some help with the board.

No need for a new thread, we're trying to collect all the info we can about these units right here.
Excellent find BTW, did it come with all the repair documentation or was it just the console when you bought it?

 

[DoublesAdvocate]

Here are the pictures: https//imgur.com/a/051YZhg

Excellent pictures, just out of curiosity did you replace the capacitors out of habit or was the console having issues with YLoD?
edit: nvm just saw the later reply.

 

[devbug_mind]

No need for a new thread, we're trying to collect all the info we can about these units right here.
Excellent find BTW, did it come with all the repair documentation or was it just the console when you bought it?

Correct, but I wasn't sure if making a post here asking for help (to restore it back to the OFW after failing to install true DEX and getting YLOD) would fit here. And about the repair documentation, sadly no, It didn't come with any documentation, just the console.

 

[devbug_mind]

Excellent pictures, just out of curiosity did you replace the capacitors out of habit or was the console having issues with YLoD?
edit: nvm just saw the later reply.

The console was fine (including playing PS2 games) and with low temperatures during gameplay whenever I checked with webman mod, then out of nowhere it just started turning off when playing. If I lowered the fan speed for the console to get hotter, it wouldn't turn off and that's also when I decided to test the hair dryer on the NEC/TOKEN capacitors. It stayed on whenever I did the hair dryer test, but turned off back as soon as it got cold. At that moment I was positive about those capacitors being the problem and decided to change them.

UPDATE: Forgot to add that after fixing the turning off issue, while starting a PS2 game, the intro/game boot up was in slow motion and then a black screen. I was able to exit back to the PS3s XMB though.

 

[DoublesAdvocate]

Correct, but I wasn't sure if making a post here asking for help (to restore it back to the OFW after failing to install true DEX and getting YLOD) would fit here. And about the repair documentation, sadly no, It didn't come with any documentation, just the console.

Yup no worries, normally a new thread would be better but for the 40nm units it's probably best to keep all the info in this 1 thread even if it is slightly off topic.
Did you have any issues playing PS2 games with this unit or did you not have the chance to test that out before you tried installing the full DEX PUP?
edit: oops lol you just answered that right now.

 

[devbug_mind]

Yup no worries, normally a new thread would be better but for the 40nm units it's probably best to keep all the info in this 1 thread even if it is slightly off topic.
Did you have any issues playing PS2 games with this unit or did you not have the chance to test that out before you tried installing the full DEX PUP?
edit: oops lol you just answered that right now.

I think I have some videos that I recorded when I did all that stuff.

 

[devbug_mind]

I'm wondering if I can maybe get it into FSM with teensy and re-install the stock firmware?

 

[DoublesAdvocate]

I'm wondering if I can maybe get it into FSM with teensy and re-install the stock firmware?

As far as I'm aware FSM requires the firmware to actually be working, I've also seen frequent warnings to never install an update while in FSM.

 

[RIP-Felix]

Sorry, been working on N64Digital's today and had to mow the lawn. Just checked back in.

Spoiler: Today's proceeds (off topic)

Okay, I had a look at your pics and the area I'm interested in is too blurry to make out. Can you take a closeup of the area under the RSX (on the back side)? It looks like R2001 and R2002 are gone, but I can't tell.

Also, I have some light reading for you. Particularly the SYSCON Tutorial is going to be helpful. I'd like to see the error codes. If you can get it to boot longenought to install PS3 Advanced Tools (See my SYSCON tutorial for the link), then you can dump it from CFW. If you can't get the console to stay on, then you'll have to connect to the UART interface. The tutorial explains.

I have a hunch what you are experiencing is a BGA defect. The heat test with hair drier is a dead give away. So too is your warm start YLOD. If you are wondering why, read the FAQ and statistical analysis I did on the Tantalum fix. You can also read the NEC/TOKIN retrospectives too. I deep dove into the reasons. The SYSCON errorlog will confirm or refute my hypothesis. So that's the first place to start.

 

[RIP-Felix]

I'm wondering if I can maybe get it into FSM with teensy and re-install the stock firmware?

YLOD is a general HW failure. Usually software related issues cause a GLOD. So if there were any issue with your CFW installation, I wouldn't expect it to have caused a YLOD.

Given what you said about the tantalums and YLOD symptoms, this sounds like an unresolved HW issue. My guess is that you had a false positive tokin fix. The tokins weren't the issue to begin with and the work you did in the area temporarily fixed the issue due to thermo-mechanical strain (re-connection of a solder ball or pad), which relaxed over time and the YLOD returned. You just happened to be messing with CFW at the time and it's easy to attribute cause & effect to that instead of the real issue. It's called attribution BIAS. The SYSCON errorlog will reveal the truth.

 

[sandungas]

wait a bit before going the hardware way... in this sentence it seems he bricked it at software level

Installed REBUG REX CFW, made a backup of the NAND, switched to everything DEX, then tried to convert it to a true DEX following some tutorial and didn't mind if things didn't go well since I had the E3 Flasher with the clip. I think I did something wrong while HEX editing because after installing the DEX OFW it turned off with the YLOD...

To do the CEX/DEX conversions is needed to decrypt and re-encrypt an area named EID and it seems the process failed at that point... or whatever you wrote in it was corrupted or had invalid values
So.. the next step would be to take the flash dump you made (before modifyed) and flash it... with a teensy, but the installation is tricky, there are a few solder points that requires good tools or experience... or both

i think here would be great! I'm sure there will be requests for pictures and such, so it would help with documenting it. Hey, @sandungas, would it make sense to start a page on the dev wiki about the frankenstein? it would at least make it easier to consolidate data.

I thought in it (and other for the tokins, and reorganize a bit better the pages related with syscon...) but i dont feel confident about how to do it, if some other wiki editor wants to start i will give some assistance

 

[devbug_mind]

Okay, I had a look at your pics and the area I'm interested in is too blurry to make out. Can you take a closeup of the area under the RSX (on the back side)? It looks like R2001 and R2002 are gone, but I can't tell.

Here you go, a much better closeup shot: https//imgur.com/a/bUS113q

 

[RIP-Felix]

Yes okay, so like the other one they did remove R2001 but either replaced or left R2002. Those 2 resistors are a voltage divider for GS_CLKI. I'm guessing that stands for Graphics Synthesizer Clock Input. Removing R2001 pulls voltage low (0V).

It looks kinda blueish, the OG 49.9 ohm resistor is blue. So that "might" be the OG. @devbug_mind could you measure it's resistance? I just want to confirm it is the OG. If so then replicating the mod just requires removal of R2001, no need to add a 47K to R2002.

The resistor they placed diagonal to GND (R2054) has never had it's resistance measured and confirmed. We think it's supposed to be 10K, but no one has confirmed this on a sony refirb yet.

The other area I'm interested in is the little MOSFET next to the RSX tokins on the back side. Could we get a closeups of that too? Some measurements of the resistors there would be helpful...pretty please?

 

[devbug_mind]

Nice colors and great work too! I like those flex flat cables too, I wish someone did some custom flat flex cables like those for the PS3 NAND/NOR and not bother soldering a Teensy. Looks much better and low profile.

I have a hunch what you are experiencing is a BGA defect. The heat test with hair drier is a dead give away. So too is your warm start YLOD. If you are wondering why, read the FAQ and statistical analysis I did on the Tantalum fix. You can also read the NEC/TOKIN retrospectives too. I deep dove into the reasons. The SYSCON errorlog will confirm or refute my hypothesis. So that's the first place to start.

I followed the NEC/TOKIN tutorial thread here when I decided to give it a go and got the tantalum capacitors that were also recommended for that model. When I replaced the first NEC/TOKIN capacitor and booted the console, it stayed a bit longer on, then the second one I replaced made it stay even longer longer and so on. So I ended up replacing all the top ones, tested the console for a few days with some games and the only ones that were acting very different were the PS2 games after showing the PS2 logo when using HD but not if I switched to a lower resolution like 480P. Every PS3 games I tested ran well and also the temperature.

Since I wanted to convert the console to a "true" DEX, while on Rebug REX CFW, I switched to DEX using Rebug toolbox, modified the EID0 using HxD hex editor (which I wasn't sure if I was doing it right but didn't mind since I had the E3 Flasher with the clip for anything that went wrong since I already tried the same thing on a CECHL01 model that had the E3 Flasher for Dual Booting and whenever the DEX firmware update was almost done installing, it turned off with the blinking red light). Since the tutorial was done using a CECHA01 (I believe), I took the chance. Console turned off too after the DEX firmware update was almost done. Couldn't flash back the original dump I made since that cheap clip wasn't reading the NAND. I remember that whenever I did those things first with the CECHL01 it ended up the same way with the blinking red light. I had a cable also soldered somewhere to stop the console from turning off and to get it to boot into FSM.