Has anyone ever SEEN the Cinematronics Baseball 'Stat Keys?'

[smalltownguy2]

Has anyone ever SEEN the Cinematronics Baseball 'Stat Keys?'

I recently acquired a Double Play Baseball Home Run Derby cabinet. Reading up on it at KLOV, I see that the other related cabs (World Series The Season and the like) all by Cinematronics had ports on the front of the CP labeled 'stat keys.'

Has anyone ever actually SEEN one of these stat keys? I presume they served as some sort of way for the player to either load/save their game statistics, but I'm not sure.

Anyone know anything?

 

[RalphT3]

I have always wondered about that also. Especially how they worked back then. It appears you can get one here:
http://www.videogameparts.com/produ...B4E6.qscstrfrnt02?productId=100&categoryId=28

 

[jetusenet]

Thanks for the link, I had forgotten about those.....
Jeff

 

[smalltownguy2]

I have always wondered about that also. Especially how they worked back then. It appears you can get one here:
http://www.videogameparts.com/produ...B4E6.qscstrfrnt02?productId=100&categoryId=28

UNREAL! I can't believe they actually exist. I'm going to get 2 of them just to say I have them

 

[DWJ]

Interesting. Dallas Semiconductor DS1201 "Electronic Tag".

User-insertable, nonvolatile 1024 bits of read/write memory. 10 years data retention, based on a small battery.

A little googling reveals a March 31, 1995 product change notice C51402, regarding DS1201 battery change. The built-in 2V GR927 battery was replaced with a 3V BR1225 battery to improve reliability.

 

[smalltownguy2]

Necro thread bump. Someone asked me about these today, so I did some extra research. Apparently these "keys" were nothing more than a Dallas DS1201 removable memory chip.

Here's the datasheet. Cool stuff. I wonder if anyone's still got them in stock anywhere.

 

[DogP]

You can still buy them on ebay ( https://www.ebay.com/itm/294838518865 )... $60 is probably more than the value of any of those Cinematronics baseball games though! They likely have dead batteries too.

It looks like it might just be a DS1200+battery inside a case, so maybe you could build your own with these chips: https://www.ebay.com/itm/325040990907 . Probably want to closely check datasheets to confirm.

DogP

 

[Vintage Pete]

Necro thread bump. Someone asked me about these today, so I did some extra research. Apparently these "keys" were nothing more than a Dallas DS1201 removable memory chip.

Here's the datasheet. Cool stuff. I wonder if anyone's still got them in stock anywhere.

You can still buy them on ebay ( https://www.ebay.com/itm/294838518865 )... $60 is probably more than the value of any of those Cinematronics baseball games though! They likely have dead batteries too.

It looks like it might just be a DS1200+battery inside a case, so maybe you could build your own with these chips: https://www.ebay.com/itm/325040990907 . Probably want to closely check datasheets to confirm.

DogP

So after I had asked SmallTownGuy about the stats key, I bought one of those DS1201 chips from the ebay listing above, but am not having any luck getting it to work.

I thought maybe the battery was dead as DogP mentioned or maybe it was missing some type of formatting that the original Cinematronics chips had, but wouldn't the PCB still at least give some sort of acknowledgement that a chip had been inserted? So I swapped out the little PCB board that the chip plugs into, but still nothing.

Has anyone gotten one of those regular off-the-shelf DS1201 chips to work as a stats key?

And is the PCB supposed give some sort of acknowledgement when a chip is inserted (i.e. a beep, "thank you very much," etc.)?

Thanks.

 

[72gto]

Here's a pic of my original stat key. Still have it!

https://forums.arcade-museum.com/attachments/7172ba88-ed6d-4278-9eac-ed54f528155d-jpg.384883/

 

[Vintage Pete]

Here's a pic of my original stat key. Still have it!

https://forums.arcade-museum.com/attachments/7172ba88-ed6d-4278-9eac-ed54f528155d-jpg.384883/

Which game did you/do you use it with? If it was Double Play or Strike Zone (and you still have it), maybe you'll want to participate in the friendly "longest home run" contest at the link below?

Longest Home Run in Leland (Cinematronics) Double Play & Strike Zone Baseball

Inviting all of you Double Play and Strike Zone baseball players to post your longest home runs. Sorry, no prizes just bragging rights. Posts must have a picture of either the home run distance on the scoreboard or (more practically) a picture of your stats showing longest home run. I just...

forums.arcade-museum.com

 

[GORFguyOhio]

I have a couple of stat keys that came with my World Series countertop.
No idea if they work, but I thought it was neat to have them.
I hadn't ever seen them before.