I still have this original machine and it's a ROM 01 machine which means it may have more game compatibility. Apple also released a ROM 03 version which is newer, has more memory, but may not play every game that the ROM 01 could. I decided to purchase a ROM 03 a year or so ago so that if my siblings ever came and demanded the ROM 01 family machine back, I'd still have a IIgs that I could call my own :)
Well, the ROM 03 IIgs came and I left it in a box for many months. Finally, last Father's Day, I opened it and tried to show my kids some games. That's when I discovered that it had a sound problem!
Fast forward to a week ago. An accelerator board and a power supply replacement that I paid for literally 7 months ago finally showed up and I was eager to install it in my ROM 03. But I decided that I really wanted to fix the sound problem before messing with the accelerator.
So I did some basic troubleshooting and this stuff was happening:
My first attempt to fix the problem was to simply de-solder the sound chip and socket it.
I've done this sort of thing several times on arcade PCBs so not only was I familiar with how to do it, but I already had a de-soldering gun along with several 40 pin sockets so I didn't have to wait for any parts to arrive.
Unfortunately, it did not fix my problem.
I wanted to replace the sound chip, but didn't want to destroy a working Apple IIgs. Fortunately, someone was selling a "battery acid destroyed" IIgs motherboard on ebay, so I got it for fairly cheap.
The acid damage was really bad but it looked like the sound chip was still okay, so I desoldered it.
I plugged the replacement sound chip into my ROM 03 IIgs ...
and fired up the self-test...
I fired up a game to test the sound ...
and everything sounds great!
I'm one happy camper.
Now... to install that accelerator board... :)
