I dont know that Andrew has the time or desire to resocket PCMs anymore, but you'd sure be a candidate. I wonder if its electrical, the laptop, cable or what, strange.

I almost lost mine in a split second when on battery mode apperantly there was a 2 minute power save mode in the BIOS setup (CMOS chip store). I got lucky, 400ms supposedly will nuke the PCM if I remember the number correctly.

 

I have a question about the flash chips. If i socket my pcm could i just go out and buy new chips instead of buying a $150 dollar programmer that i may never use? Would someone be able to supply me with a couple spare chips i could just throw in? Other than that i think i will be socketing my pcm before i attempt to reflash it.

 

K, it's obvious that there's some misunderstanding on what the chips are and what the sockets are. You already have the chips in your PCM. All your doing when you socket your PCM is remove the chips from the board by desoldering, solder the sockets to the old connections, then put the chips in the sockets. You can buy more chips if you want, but if you find a place to buy them (please tell me if you do, I've had no luck finding one) they do not come with the software programmed into them. You need to program the chips yourself (like when you corrupt them with the Tunercat programmer) with the EEPROM programmer. If you fried your PCM, socketing won't do you any good without the EEPROM programmer. If you plan on doing programming and are worried about frying your PCM, socketing won't do you much good without either spare programmed chips or an EEPROM programmer. As far as I know right now, there is nowhere that you can get the chips. So about your only option is to get an programmer, socket the PCM, and keep reusing the original flash chips.

 

Doom, thanks a lot for clearing that all up for me. I was lost for a little bit. So basicly it is still a good idea and am going to pursue it further when i get back home where my car is this spring. Sounds like a nice backup plan just in case tunercat fails.

 

I've been studying this PCM business for a few months and just realized I'm still only a newbie

So, if I were to get the PCM socketed, and I "fried" a chip with TunerCat, would the EEPROM programmer be able to fix it? Or is the chip really garbage? And also, if I were to get a spare PCM from a junkyard could those chips serve as backup chips, say if I were programming at the track and ran into an error, I'd have a backup chip to put in?

When you desolder the chip from the PCM, how is the chip still good to be used in a socket, wouldnt the solder be balled up on it making it unable to be "pushed" in to the socket???

One last thing... are there any sites for the EEPROM Programmer? Can you use TunerCat with it, just get a different definition file or something? (Is it hardware or software)

 

Sure, no prob 94-3.4, always glad to help out a fellow Camaro (or Firebird) owner. ablackcamaro, if you "fry" the PCM, that doesn't mean that the chips are bad. The chips are fine. It's the software on the chips that is corrupted or not even there. For example, when you program the PCM using the Tunercat flash program, it first erases the old file on the chips, then proceeds to write the new file. If it erases the old file, but then an error occurs, you have nothing on the chips. The PCM won't work, and because of the way it was designed, there is no way to reset the chips through the ALDL port or the PCM itself. Same thing if you are in the middle of the program and it fails. Only part of the file is there, and the PCM is "stuck" and cannot be used. This is how the PCM flash chips become corrupted (the actual term for when you "fry" the PCM). The corrupted chips can be overwritten by an EEPROM programmer, simply because it has the necessary equipment that the PCM does not to fully format the chips and then write a hex file directly to the chips. The PCM can only delete a full file, not a corrupted chip. If you want, you could get some chips out of some junkyard PCMs, but you don't need any extra chips. The chips in your PCM are just fine. As for the desoldering, only a real amateur would do that bad of a soldering job. If you have't soldered anything before, I wouldn't make desoldering your first test of your skills. Practice a bit first, ask someone to help you, or have it done for you by someone else. There are a number of different EEPROM programmers out there, from the Pocket Programmer to the EMP10 Chris B mentioned. As long as it will work with AN28F512 chips, it'll work for you. I think the Pocket Programmer is the cheapest, at about $150, and unfortunately I don't have the website anymore. I think you can find it through yahoo if you type it in. An EEPROM programmer is hardware, you hook it to your computer (usually through the serial or parallel port) and then you can do your direct flash chip programming.

 

If you got to www.tunercat.com and click on links there is a section for eeprom programmers and other info, all the links you need are right there. There is a link for a pocket programmer and several others along with the place to get the zif sockets from. It is kind a funny, that place, can't remember the name is like 15 minutes from me.

 

I'm starting to get all of this info in (finally hehe...) now you guys say Andrew doesn't like to socket the PCM's anymore? And you would upload the same *.bin file to the chip through the eeprom programmer as you would through tunercat's flash upload program, right?

 

That's the way I understand it.
Should basically be like programming a 93 LT1.

 

Bench programming...is this the same as the flashing we're all doing with the ALDL port, only the PCM isn't in the car? Meaning, are the same errors of frying the PCM (I don't like that term...but it's the one everybody knows) possible while doing bench programming? I'd think they are, but that they're much less likely to occur as there is nothing to go wrong, no accessories draining power, and with a power supply, the PCM can be plugged into the wall--no battery to drain. So as long as you're not writing to a bench programmer in a thunder and lightning storm, it seems much safer to do, this correct?

 

Actually, this isn't correct. What you need to do is have the original hex file, not a bin file. The information stored in the PCM is all hexadecimal code, but what the Tunercat reader program does is translate that hex code into the information you see in the Tunercat tuner so most people can easily tune their car. If you had a hex editor and knew what all the hex data ment, you can tune your car simply by entering new hex code and then uploading it to your PCM. But most people that work on cars don't know hex code (I know some, it can be very confusing if you don't have a direct readout of every single parameter). Basically, the bin file is a translated hex file. When you modify the information in the bin file, then upload it by the ALDL port through Tunercats programmer program, the programmer translates the bin file information into hex information and encodes it to the chip. I'm sure Andrew and PCMforless.com has the original hex files, if you email them and ask them for your years hex file, I'm sure they'd send it to you.

 

Interesting.
OK...so then tell me why I can take a blank chip for a 93 and load a bin file into my pocket programmer and program a chip and the car will run. That chip has no hex file programmed into it. It has no idea what a hex file is. It's blank. The programmer doesn't care what you're loading into it...it just wants the buffer to have some sort of a file in it so that it can "burn" it into the chip.

 

There is no socket, but when you desolder something, you suck or wick the solder away anyway. There is no socket unless you socket the PCM which is what Andrew USED to be able to do when he had more time. From there, you were supplied with multiple new chips in case you fried one.

If you can erase the EEPROM yourself I think you can reflash it yourself, but I could be mistaken, and maybe you need an EEPROM programmer. Thats why I said TALK TO ANDREW, if you are not trying already please do, he will know how to guide you along.

 

You are correct, but only on the 93. The 94-95 OBD1 FLASH PCM is entirely different from the OBD1 EPROM PCM. It's like comparing apples to oranges. FLASH chips operate on the hex code, rather than the binary information that EPROM chips operate on. Your correct in that the programmer does not care in what it uploads. You could actually upload a Word file to the FLASH or EPROM chips and it would take it. However, the PCM itself would not accept the information, and it would do essentially nothing. I'm not quite that knowledgeable on the old EPROM systems (yet, I'm in the process of learning), but I know they have a number of differences than the FLASH OBD1 PCMs

 

Ah....that answers my question.
Thanks!