Impromptu Arcade Game Pickup Last Night (UPDATED)

If there is a lock on the back door and a lock on the coin door, then always open the back door first. Then you can dismantle the lock on the coin door from the inside. Probably common knowledge, but I thought I'd just put this tidbit of trivia out there. :001_sbiggrin:

Anyway, always enjoy an Asteroids story ... nice. Thanks for sharing. Looking forward to seeing it working.
 
We have life. After replacing all the fuses and messing with the interlock switches, I noticed the one by the coin door is facing down so nothing would ever push it in. It looks like it was that way from the factory, but when I hold it in, things work. Here's where I am now. Marquee light works, even the coin door light still works. Monitor has neck glow. Both pcb and monitor boards have LEDs lit solid. The coin player start buttons flash rapidly though and I can't coin up a game. Monitor is dark, nothing at all and if it wasn't for the neck glow I wouldn't even think it was on. When I put it into test mode, those coin button lights stay solid and I hear the test beeps. From the manual, I think it should have 6 test tones, one for each good ram chip.
If that is the case, at least one chip is bad because I know I didn't hear 6 tones. Progress though. Now I just need to get the game to play blind or the monitor to show something on the screen. If anyone has any ideas I would be happy to hear them.
 

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Check the voltage on that Big Blue, and the test points on the PCB. I'd also suggest checking to make sure the connections are solid.
 
Damn - spot killer. :(

If I had bad ram chip(s) on the board, could that be the cause of the spot killer? With the spot killer, would the monitor appear totally black like it isn't even on visually from the front or should it appear like it the monitor is on when you are looking at it, even though it is just a black screen.
 
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Spot killer is doing its job. You likely don't have correct XOUT and YOUT signals. You can measure these with scope (preferred) or DVM.

Not advisable to keep the monitor plugged in if the logic board is not working correctly.

Fast flashing PLYR1/2 buttons is a bad sign.
Logic board is not running code properly.
Check power (5VDC should have low AC ripple for example).
I'd reseat the ROMs and CPU (carefully) considering the game has been in a garage for 20yrs. :(

There's many many threads (even recent ones) regarding Asteroids debug/repair. Might want to do some reading. :)
 
always check the back door before you drill. Plus you can usually turn the rear lock on an Atari door and open it without a key. I think I have drilled a handful locks in my lifetime. its far easier to shove a screwdriver between the coin door frame and door and pry it open.

I would advocate not to do that (bend the coin door). Try the key number trick first please.

Once you bend the coin door, it never goes back straight. It's an owl eye - I hope you find a way to open it. Even drilling is better than bending that coin door in my opinion.

Great grab by the way - I keep looking for one - no dice.
 
I would advocate not to do that (bend the coin door). Try the key number trick first please.

Once you bend the coin door, it never goes back straight. It's an owl eye - I hope you find a way to open it. Even drilling is better than bending that coin door in my opinion.

Great grab by the way - I keep looking for one - no dice.

He meant the back door lock. There is a gap between the back door and the cabinet that you can stick a solid piece of metal in to push the metal lock hinge down. I'm past that now, it's all open and troubleshooting is in progress. :)

Got a few things to try and a bunch of stuff to read. I know another local guy here too that has a working Asteroids that I could potentially use to help trouble shoot as well if it gets to that point.
 
Thanks for all the help and suggestions so far. I tried reseating all the chips today. One chip has a bent pin that definitely could be affecting it. I tried straightening it, but I think it still could bending when inserted and not making good contact. When I go into test I hear two low beeps and the lower tone on the third beep and that's where it stops.

Also, looking at the board, it looks like it was definitely repaired at some point right by the harness on top. Not sure what happened there. After trying to bend that pin on the chip back and reseating all the chips, I don't get any change yet, so I'll keep pushing on.
 

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The circled chip is an original masked ROM. A quick continuity check with a DMM will tell you if that pin is making contact in the socket. It can be replaced with an EPROM if needed. The sockets may also need replacing.

A lower third tone during the self test suggests a bad 2114 RAM at location M4. A first repair step would be to replace that RAM chip and then re-run the self test to see if that fixes it. Since the self test stops at the first bad RAM, it's possible to then find more bad RAM later in the test sequence.

Thanks for all the help and suggestions so far. I tried reseating all the chips today. One chip has a bent pin that definitely could be affecting it. I tried straightening it, but I think it still could bending when inserted and not making good contact. When I go into test I hear two low beeps and the lower tone on the third beep and that's where it stops.

Also, looking at the board, it looks like it was definitely repaired at some point right by the harness on top. Not sure what happened there. After trying to bend that pin on the chip back and reseating all the chips, I don't get any change yet, so I'll keep pushing on.
 
Thought I would post an update to this.

Asteroids Lives! The game was "born" on December 4th, 1979...I should stamp it with it's rebirth date of June 6th, 2017. :)

To get it going, first I had to put a new plug on the game since the old one was ripped off. Then I had to replace the metal leg levelers as most of them had almost completely deteriorated over the last 35 years, but they did their job, the bottom was super solid and not damaged. Then I had a couple bad ram chips fixed on the main board, replaced some caps and the big blue and finally replaced the voltage doubler unique to the early G05 monitor. Now she's up and fully playable and about as bullet proofed for the future as you can get. I'm going to spruce up the control panel and owl eye coin door, but until I get around to that, she's good to play. Finally another "working" game in the game room.

Also, Goo Gone and Magic Eraser worked wonders on the 30+ year old duct tape someone had put a strip of across the front of the cabinet. All the residue came off with that combo and an old credit card to do some scrapping. Looks great now.
 

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I love that story.

I have always loved the stories about how things end up where they do. It's fascinating to me all the circumstances that surround games and I really enjoy reading all the cool stories other people post. I felt obligated to post the same for others when something like this happens to me, so I hope people do enjoy the story. With any luck, I'll have a few more stories to post like this in the future. :)
 
Cool story. Glad you were able to get it going.
Asteroids rocks!
 
Great news to hear this, remember they are still out there!

Now you can change your name to Mor Manley...

:D (yeah, like you've never heard that joke before...)

Now get the multi kit!
 
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