I was talking with rbudrick about a Terminator 2 NES proto he owns, and noticed it does something on a real NES that doesn't make sense to me. The proto contains the same code as the final version; the CRC matches the US retail release recorded in bootgod's database. However, according to rbudrick, on a real system, the proto always skips the opening copyright screen that the retail version normally displays on power on. When testing the rom on his Powerpak, it displays the copyright screen. Would a difference in cartridge hardware be able to cause this to happen? That seems to be the only difference here.
A picture of the PCB is here.
A picture of the PCB is here.