All of you have helped me, and you don't even know it.
I bought a Galaga cab for my wife for Christmas on CL. A very unexpected surprise Christmas gift, by the way.
Everything worked, but the cabinet itself needed restoration. I am handy, so I leaped.
While looking for new parts, side art, etc. I stumbled onto this forum.
It took a few hours a day for a week...in my best friend's garage so the Mrs's wouldn't see her surprise.
The cabinet came out beautiful.
Now, I had only played the game for a few minutes a night during the cabinet restoration.
Never really put any stress on the machine...
Last Saturday, my wife and I exchanged gifts. The look on her face when she walked into her in-house office to see her new toy was perfect!
A few hours into some heavy two player fun...
And the unthinkable happened.
Stalls, reboots, and then stuck on RAM OK screen. NOOO!
I guess the 30 year old machine was used to being put up in storage, and didn't care for it's new/ over excited owners!
Anyway, I came straight back to this forum. Now let me explain something. I can build anything with wood. I can bondo like a pro, paint, and apply decals like a beast... But electrical motherboards? Looks like a flux capacitor to me or even W.H.O.P.P.E.R from Wargames... I'm no computer guts guy. Let me put it this way- after a little research on KLOV I realized that step one was to buy a soldering iron and learn quick Yup, I had never even soldered two wires together.
I didn't even have to post any questions... There was already a wealth of info. Just took a little bit of trolling to get me started.
Oh my... The Galaga boards/ chips are a nightmare! It seemed the more I worked on it, the more would break! You get the idea. A few days, and a few 1000 $&@$&'s later.... The game was good as new... Except-
While researching I learned about recapping the monitor. My monitor was good... Just a little wavy, and one corner of the image was slightly curled. After the hours of solder work on the board, I felt confident I could bring the monitor back to life.
Got the cap kit, installed it fairly quickly, and felt good.
Put everything back together, prepare for the moment, and wait...no...this can't be happening... Vertical collapse. Frick! I made it worse! Wait... NoOOOoO!!!! The picture just went completely out. Ok, now I'm pissed!
Back to the forums for more research.
To make this long story short, a day later, and 40 trips back and forth with this dang monitor from my work bench to the cabinet, and it's good as new.
A beautiful work of art. The memories my wife and I have of this game... And now to actually own a piece of history- our history. And by GOD I feel like I personally built the dang thing!
So the testimonial...
I couldn't have done it without all of you. I've joined many forums over the years...for a dozen different genres and topics. By far this community is the best I've ever experienced on the net. So helpful. Experts. Willing to share ideas. I feel as if I had a personal professional technician the whole time, right by my side.
Thank you. You all made our Christmas special. I just wanted all of you to know that.
Happy holidays, and cheers!
I bought a Galaga cab for my wife for Christmas on CL. A very unexpected surprise Christmas gift, by the way.
Everything worked, but the cabinet itself needed restoration. I am handy, so I leaped.
While looking for new parts, side art, etc. I stumbled onto this forum.
It took a few hours a day for a week...in my best friend's garage so the Mrs's wouldn't see her surprise.
The cabinet came out beautiful.
Now, I had only played the game for a few minutes a night during the cabinet restoration.
Never really put any stress on the machine...
Last Saturday, my wife and I exchanged gifts. The look on her face when she walked into her in-house office to see her new toy was perfect!
A few hours into some heavy two player fun...
And the unthinkable happened.
Stalls, reboots, and then stuck on RAM OK screen. NOOO!
I guess the 30 year old machine was used to being put up in storage, and didn't care for it's new/ over excited owners!
Anyway, I came straight back to this forum. Now let me explain something. I can build anything with wood. I can bondo like a pro, paint, and apply decals like a beast... But electrical motherboards? Looks like a flux capacitor to me or even W.H.O.P.P.E.R from Wargames... I'm no computer guts guy. Let me put it this way- after a little research on KLOV I realized that step one was to buy a soldering iron and learn quick Yup, I had never even soldered two wires together.
I didn't even have to post any questions... There was already a wealth of info. Just took a little bit of trolling to get me started.
Oh my... The Galaga boards/ chips are a nightmare! It seemed the more I worked on it, the more would break! You get the idea. A few days, and a few 1000 $&@$&'s later.... The game was good as new... Except-
While researching I learned about recapping the monitor. My monitor was good... Just a little wavy, and one corner of the image was slightly curled. After the hours of solder work on the board, I felt confident I could bring the monitor back to life.
Got the cap kit, installed it fairly quickly, and felt good.
Put everything back together, prepare for the moment, and wait...no...this can't be happening... Vertical collapse. Frick! I made it worse! Wait... NoOOOoO!!!! The picture just went completely out. Ok, now I'm pissed!
Back to the forums for more research.
To make this long story short, a day later, and 40 trips back and forth with this dang monitor from my work bench to the cabinet, and it's good as new.
A beautiful work of art. The memories my wife and I have of this game... And now to actually own a piece of history- our history. And by GOD I feel like I personally built the dang thing!
So the testimonial...
I couldn't have done it without all of you. I've joined many forums over the years...for a dozen different genres and topics. By far this community is the best I've ever experienced on the net. So helpful. Experts. Willing to share ideas. I feel as if I had a personal professional technician the whole time, right by my side.
Thank you. You all made our Christmas special. I just wanted all of you to know that.
Happy holidays, and cheers!




