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The Seven Deadly Segments (encore) Mystery Cache

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RedHiker: Archiving this cache as there has been no response and/or no update and it has been unavailable for a while now.

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RedHiker
Volunteer Reviewer Northern California

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Difficulty:
3.5 out of 5
Terrain:
1.5 out of 5

Size: Size:   small (small)

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Geocache Description:


The cache is not at the posted coordinates but is less than 1 mile away

A foreign agent is attempting to recover a secret package. Can you find it first?

We had been tracking Agent Smith for quite a while when we received intelligence from Inspector Vine at Scotland Yard that he would be arriving in the country to pick up a secret package. Sure enough, at the expected time he arrived on an international flight at SFO. He picked up a rental car, left the airport, and then took I-380 West to I-280 South. We had our best trail team on the case, but they weren't good enough. As Smith approached the Foothill Expressway exit, he rolled down his window, waved to the trail car, and exited the freeway, stopping at the pullout at the posted coordinates. The trail had no choice but to pull over and take him in. So we still don't know where the secret package is.

We had hoped that Smith would have something in his possession which would indicate where the package was hidden. Unfortunately, the only thing unusual he had in his possession was a hermetically sealed black box. The only features of this black box are a 7-segment display (like the one described at Wikipedia) and a 10-pin connector. No matter what we have done, we have been unable to get any output to appear on the 7-segment display. At first we thought that perhaps the power source had died, but further research has disproved that, so all we can do is speculate that Agent Smith somehow disabled the display.

Our research began by probing the pins on the connector with a multimeter. It was observed that some of the pins seemed to have fluctuating voltages on them, but two of the pins seem to be grounded. We then attached a signal analyzer to the connector, and a repeating pattern with a cycle time of 34 seconds was observed, as described in the following table:

Time Connector Pin Voltage
  Pin 1 Pin 2 Pin 3 Pin 4 Pin 5 Pin 6 Pin 7 Pin 8 Pin 9 Pin 10
0 0.0 0.0 2.89 0.0 2.60 0.0 2.66 0.0 2.92 0.0
1 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
2 0.0 0.0 2.69 2.83 0.0 2.71 2.94 0.0 2.65 0.0
3 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
4 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
5 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.63 0.0 2.80 0.0 0.0 0.0
6 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
7 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.85 2.91 2.85 0.0 2.78 2.72 0.0
8 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
9 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.85 2.91 2.90 0.0 2.66 2.92 0.0
10 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
11 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
12 0.0 0.0 2.77 2.75 2.63 2.71 2.69 2.86 0.0 0.0
13 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
14 0.0 2.84 2.77 0.0 2.67 0.0 2.76 0.0 2.68 0.0
15 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
16 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.74 0.0 2.63 0.0 0.0 0.0
17 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
18 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.92 2.64 2.66 0.0 2.63 2.92 0.0
19 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
20 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.87 0.0 2.80 0.0 0.0 0.0
21 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
22 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
23 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.85 2.94 2.74 2.67 0.0 2.78 0.0
24 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
25 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.61 2.88 2.64 0.0 0.0 0.0
26 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
27 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
28 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.64 2.75 2.64 0.0 2.63 2.68 0.0
29 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
30 0.0 2.63 2.70 2.71 2.65 2.61 2.84 2.67 0.0 0.0
31 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
32 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.63 2.88 2.93 0.0 2.60 2.91 0.0
33 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0

So we know the box is powered, that two pins on the connector are grounded, and that a repeating pattern is observed on the remaining 8 pins of the connector. Now this may be just a coincidence, but many 7-segment display chips also have 10 pins, two that are grounded, and eight that are used individually to illuminate the 7 segments of the display as well as the decimal point.

Can you determine if this is just coincidence, or if there is a correlation between the pattern on the connector pins and the pins of a typical seven-segment display? And if there is a correlation, will it lead us to the secret package?

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