My Apple II Europlus Revival (help needed)

[CedsRepairs]

Hi everyone,

I usually don't repair desktops, but someone exchanged me an Apple II Europlus for some soldering repairs I did for him, so here am I with a Apple II with 2 floppies (a thick and a slim)
Currently the thing is as dead as can be, and is absolutely filthy (and I don't use that word often),



and I'm opening this thread so that you can follow along, and maybe ask the community some questions along the way.
I won't have the time to work on this like "every day",

I'm not experienced at all in Apple IIs, and my big problem with starting this repair is that the thing is full of bodge wires.
I suppose this is related to the fact the thing has two video outputs, and a few hacks (a joystick port ? )





I'd like to start over from scratch, remove everything including the wires, put everything in the dishwasher or at least the shower, then try to debug a blank AppleII.
Could someone maybe help me to identify what some of those wires are and why they are there ? That would greatly help me start this repair (eg can I safely remove them)

Especially all of these : that go directly to chips.



thanks !

 

[oldpcguy]

Welcome. I'm willing to help where I can. As for providing advice on these modifications I can't comment as I am unfamiliar with these modifications and I don't want to steer you wrong.

First thing to do is clean it up, at least the system board and associated cards that are attached via wires. I would recommend any troubleshooting you do be done with the case apart. Do you have any diagnostic equipment such as a multimeter and oscope?

First thing to do is ensure the power supply is supplying the proper voltages. This is best done when it is connected to the logic board.

 

[CedsRepairs]

Yes I have all the lab equipment you can dream of, I do repair laptops and electronics for me and my friends.

My fear here is that I don't understand what I'm doing by removing "the bodges". I suppose they are there for "adding features" , and that I would get back to a stock APple II by removing them, but I could as well remove something that I don't understand (and that experienced APple II people would find obvious).

Why would there be such bodges in the first place ? Is that, like, commonplace ? For what I can seem to understand, this seem to be convulated way to switch between two video cards ( composite, tv, and possibly 80 columns modes)

But yeah, I'm afraid to remove a single wire as I just don't know what i'm doign at this stage

 

[oldpcguy]

One of the Apple IIs strengths can also be a downside when it comes to troubleshooting. It's open architecture and Apple provided publications which detailed how it works made it a tinkers dream. It appears someone took advantage of this with your system.. Hopefully you'll be able to find someone who is familiar with these modifications.

Barring that the only two recommendations I can make are:

1. Pull out the schematics and trace where each wire is connected to on the logic board. That may help identify what it might be used for.
2. Get the system working as is and then start disconnecting wires one at a time.