Just bought my first arcade game - Asteroids, 2 days later won't work

[infotime]

Just bought my first arcade game - Asteroids, 2 days later won't work

Hi everybody! Sorry for the long first post, but I need some help please.

As a teenager I played Asteroids a lot! Long story short - last week I finally fulfilled the dream of having my own machine. Bought from a local guy who had a nice gameroom with lots of machines. My neighbor across the street is in the business and helped me move in to my basement. He said my machine was in great shape and hadn't spent much time "on the street". It was very exciting to have my own machine, for a couple of days anyway ...

My neighbor helped me get it in the basement Wednesday night. There was a little glitch with the display when we fired it up. Hard to describe. The neighbor pulled the PCB and pushed some chips in tighter and it was fine. I played it Wed and Thursday several times and left it on most of that time. It was working great.

When I got home yesterday it was acting up.

See the photos here:

The first photo is the test screen. I think the junk in the lower left is supposed to be a diagonal grid that fills the screen.

The second photo shows game play with the ship in it's default spawn position. Everything looks normal.

Until, you turn the ship in either direction. Minimal movement left or right of the ship will cause what you see in the third picture. If I turn the ship a few times the game will restart. Not a cold boot power cycle restart, just a soft-boot - it goes back to the "press play" to start screen.

I've taken the PCB out and tried cleaning the edge connector and cleaning the female connector on the wiring harness. Also tried pressing any loose chips in like Bruce did. I also tried turning the X and Y gain controls at the end of the PCB.

One more thing I just noticed. I leave the ship in the middle of the screen, no thrusting. The default starting position is the ship pointing at 3:00. I can turn the ship up and down from about 12:30 to 6:00 and no ill effects (other than the video distortion). As I turn up to 12:00 or 11:30 the machine slows down a little. Same if I turn down to 6:30 or 7:00. If I turn past either of those positions the game crashes to the main screen. If I turn back toward 3:00 and away from the problem areas the game speeds back up to normal.

Today I took the board out took some more chips out and cleaned them with an eraser and put them back. Didn't take all of them out. The others I pried up a little and pressed them back in. When I put the board back things got worse - similar to the first run a few days ago (before the chips were pressed back in). So, went to lunch. Came back and pushed around a few chips again and fixed the "it got worse" problem, but that's it.

I did notice that one of the chips is pretty loose in its socket (it's on about the 3rd or 4th row, I'd have to check it again).

The only thing left to try is some spray electronics cleaner on the main PCB and a spray cleaner for the female edge connector on the wiring harness going to the PCB.

 

[TheDrewster]

Make sure your edge connector is clean and if its burnt, repair any damaged fingers. Also, it sounds like you may need to replace the sockets on the board.

Hi everybody! Sorry for the long first post, but I need some help please.

As a teenager I played Asteroids a lot! Long story short - last week I finally fulfilled the dream of having my own machine. Bought from a local guy who had a nice gameroom with lots of machines. My neighbor across the street is in the business and helped me move in to my basement. He said my machine was in great shape and hadn't spent much time "on the street". It was very exciting to have my own machine, for a couple of days anyway ...

My neighbor helped me get it in the basement Wednesday night. There was a little glitch with the display when we fired it up. Hard to describe. The neighbor pulled the PCB and pushed some chips in tighter and it was fine. I played it Wed and Thursday several times and left it on most of that time. It was working great.

When I got home yesterday it was acting up.

See the photos here:

The first photo is the test screen. I think the junk in the lower left is supposed to be a diagonal grid that fills the screen.

The second photo shows game play with the ship in it's default spawn position. Everything looks normal.

Until, you turn the ship in either direction. Minimal movement left or right of the ship will cause what you see in the third picture. If I turn the ship a few times the game will restart. Not a cold boot power cycle restart, just a soft-boot - it goes back to the "press play" to start screen.

I've taken the PCB out and tried cleaning the edge connector and cleaning the female connector on the wiring harness. Also tried pressing any loose chips in like Bruce did. I also tried turning the X and Y gain controls at the end of the PCB.

One more thing I just noticed. I leave the ship in the middle of the screen, no thrusting. The default starting position is the ship pointing at 3:00. I can turn the ship up and down from about 12:30 to 6:00 and no ill effects (other than the video distortion). As I turn up to 12:00 or 11:30 the machine slows down a little. Same if I turn down to 6:30 or 7:00. If I turn past either of those positions the game crashes to the main screen. If I turn back toward 3:00 and away from the problem areas the game speeds back up to normal.

Today I took the board out took some more chips out and cleaned them with an eraser and put them back. Didn't take all of them out. The others I pried up a little and pressed them back in. When I put the board back things got worse - similar to the first run a few days ago (before the chips were pressed back in). So, went to lunch. Came back and pushed around a few chips again and fixed the "it got worse" problem, but that's it.

I did notice that one of the chips is pretty loose in its socket (it's on about the 3rd or 4th row, I'd have to check it again).

The only thing left to try is some spray electronics cleaner on the main PCB and a spray cleaner for the female edge connector on the wiring harness going to the PCB.

 

[infotime]

Are you referring to the edge connector on on the PCB or the female connector on the wiring harness? I've cleaned and cleaned the connector on the board. It looks pretty good, best I can tell.

Are you saying some of the sockets need to be replaced because I mentioned a chip or two being loose?

Finally, does the problem look like something related to the main PCB or could it be in another board, or monitor problem?

 

[infotime]

The guy who sold me the machine had a spare board. I bought the board from him and installed it. Works fine.

One odd thing. When you blow up a rock or an alien ship it makes a musical tone. When you thrust to fly your ship there is no sound. Every time I've ever played Asteroids there's a crashing / splashing sound when you hit things.

This board is not identical to the one it replaced. There is a small red jumper wire connected to the bottom of the board. It also has an extra DIP switch block with four switches. Wonder if those control the sounds?

The original board I'm going to take to a local guy that does repairs. That way I'll always have a spare.

 

[dezbaz]

Have a read of this

there are different revisions of asteroids boards

http://forums.arcade-museum.com/showthread.php?t=177597&highlight=asteroids

Go to post #23

Yours is different that's all

The dip switches are not for sound

Do you have any beeps on the 2nd board in test mode?

 

[infotime]

Do you have any beeps on the 2nd board in test mode?

Yes I do. (Would have replied sooner, but I kept thinking "there's only one board that I'm aware of for this machine, I wonder what other board he's talking about". Then I realized you meant the extra PCB I bought )

The beeps are hard to decipher. The test pattern doesn't come on the screen and stay there, it flashes somewhat randomly. It was nice having a working machine again, albeit with weird sound, after having it down Friday and Saturday. I was tired of troubleshooting and just wanted to enjoy my new toy.

 

[infotime]

CRAP!

Played on the new board last night and a little while tonight. Sat at my desk and worked for a while tonight. Walked past the machine and noticed this:

Everything on the screen is compressed and scooted off to the right as you can see.

Thought: am I screwing this machine up by playing with the back off?

Thursday night I noticed the machine was shutting off, rebooting. Turns out the switch on the back that shuts the machine off when you remove the back cover was tripping. The back cover is a little loose, so if the machine shifts the switch is tripped. So, Thursday night I left the cover off. Friday it's acting up.

Saturday I put a new board in and play and leave it on and play again Sunday night. Take back off again. Later Sunday night there's a new problem (screen shot above).

We're having a lot of rain this weekend, so lots of humidity around. Also, the machine is in a basement near a bare foundation wall. Hmmm.

 

[infotime]

Took the PCB out. There's an oily residue on top of some of the chips, including the CPU. The edge connector had the same residue on it. I noticed that yesterday on the original PCB. Thought it may have been from the cleaner spray I used on it. When I saw the oily residue on board #2 then I presumed there was no connection to the spray since I didn't use any spray on board #2.

The spray I used is DeoxIT that I bought a Radio Shack. There were two items in the package. D Series DeoxIT (used on chips around their connectors and the PCB edge connector) and the G Series DeoxIT Gold sprayed on the female wiring harness connector to try to clean the contacts on it.

Here's the test pattern now:

 

[TheDrewster]

Clean all that oily junk off, reseat all your chips, and you may need to reseat/reflow the video header on the monitor chassis. Also, check your voltages on the board to make sure your getting the necessary +5 at all times.

 

[ELutz]

Are you leaving it turned on 24/7.....it kinda sounds like it. That's incredibly hard on an old machine (especially a vector).

Edward

 

[RetroHacker]

Have you checked your power supply? If the voltages are off, or you're getting ripple, then unstable stuff can happen. Not that it would directly cause this fault, but you should always verify the power supply before trying to fix the board.

Do you have beeps in test mode? That first pic looks a LOT like a bad RAM chip.

-Ian

 

[infotime]

Thanks for all the helpful responses!

Clean all that oily junk off, reseat all your chips, and you may need to reseat/reflow the video header on the monitor chassis. Also, check your voltages on the board to make sure your getting the necessary +5 at all times.

Where does the oily junk come from?

Are you leaving it turned on 24/7.....it kinda sounds like it. That's incredibly hard on an old machine (especially a vector).

Edward

Should I only turn it on to play it then turn it back off when done? Isn't it hard on electronics to constantly be turned on and off?

Have you checked your power supply? If the voltages are off, or you're getting ripple, then unstable stuff can happen. Not that it would directly cause this fault, but you should always verify the power supply before trying to fix the board.

Do you have beeps in test mode? That first pic looks a LOT like a bad RAM chip.

-Ian

There were some beeps in test mode earlier, when it was working. I couldn't quite decipher them.

But now there are no beeps. Just that split screen in test mode.

Sorry for the n00b questions, but how do I check the power supply? I'm a computer guy with pretty good experience, but when I need to repair something on a PC it's usually a matter of swapping and testing parts. I have several voltmeters. Can I remove the PCB and turn on the machine and test the voltage on the connector on the wiring harness? Or, should I test the voltages on the PCB itself?

Maybe there's a beginners guide around here that will walk me through some basic troubleshooting (before getting into actual board repair)?

 

[DarrenF]

Should I only turn it on to play it then turn it back off when done? Isn't it hard on electronics to constantly be turned on and off?

There were some beeps in test mode earlier, when it was working. I couldn't quite decipher them.

Sorry for the n00b questions, but how do I check the power supply? I'm a computer guy with pretty good experience, but when I need to repair something on a PC it's usually a matter of swapping and testing parts. I have several voltmeters. Can I remove the PCB and turn on the machine and test the voltage on the connector on the wiring harness? Or, should I test the voltages on the PCB itself?

Maybe there's a beginners guide around here that will walk me through some basic troubleshooting (before getting into actual board repair)?

I only turn my games on in the evenings when I intend to play them. They get left on for only a few hours at a time. I'd much rather have the hot/cool cycles than leave them on constantly (saves $ too).

The best beginner document to read (cover to cover) is the owners manual: http://arcarc.xmission.com/PDF_Arcade_Atari_Kee/Asteroids/Asteroids_TM-143_7th_Printing.pdf

Elektron Forge has a little article on measuring and adjusting the +5VDC on Atari games like Asteroids: http://www.elektronforge.com/AdjustAtariPS.htm

There's also another resource, but it's a little bit beyond stark beginner level: http://www.ionpool.net/arcade/asteroidtech/asteroidsrepair.html

You should also know that the OEM sockets on these PCBs are frequently a problem. To eliminate some of these problems (the ones related to EPROM sockets), some people (myself included) have installed the Braze Tech High Score Save Kit, which uses on-board ROMs, and eliminates the need for the original EPROMs: http://www.brasington.org/arcade/products/hs/asteroids/

Yes, you can remove the PCB and check voltages on the harness connector. In fact, I'd likely do that first. Then I'd connect the PCB and check them again (to see if any are being pulled down significantly). Only the +5V is technically needed for it to "run" and "play blind", but you need the other voltages on the harness for audio & video outputs.

Somebody should write a noobie-friendly document detailing how to check out an Asteroids from the "ground-up." There are thousands of them out there, and this seems to arise about every month.

 

[ELutz]

Should I only turn it on to play it then turn it back off when done? Isn't it hard on electronics to constantly be turned on and off?

That game was built in 1979. It was made with a life expectancy of 5 years. You do the math! What else you have in your house that's 32 years old......and still working!

Another way to look at it.....you had the game 2-3 days. You probably put more hours on it in that time frame, than the guy you bought it from has put on it in the last 6 months. In one month, you would have accumulated 720+ hours. In a "normal" home environment.....I'd guesstimate that's 8 months-to-a-year's worth of "on" time.


Regarding the oily stuff.....it's hard to say what it is without seeing it. It could be years of gunk built up, something could have been spilled on it, or at some point a capacitor could have blown it's guts.

Edward

 

[dezbaz]

The other side of the coin:
Some nights I accidentally leave my asteroids on all night, and it's still running fine the next day.

If the machine is reliable and all suspect things are replaced the machine will easily handle some decent use.

It come down to how much time and money people are willing to put into it I guess

 

[RetroHacker]

These machines were *designed* for constant use. The only problem now is that they're getting old. Electrolytic capacitors age badly and drift. Under-specced connectors are wearing out. Left unrepaired, it's amazing it works at all, and I can definitely see it crapping out after a few days of constant use. But, if you fix it - go through and rebuild the power supply, and especially rebuild the monitor. New caps, new connectors, get it all dialed in to the specs... I'd have no problem leaving it on all the time. But, unless the game is on location, you should really shut it off when you're not using it. Leaving it on when you're not home is silly, wastes electricity, and just causes that much more wear and tear on items like the picture tube. Ever see games with lots of fuzzy text burned into the monitor? That's because they were on location for ages and never shut off...

So, yeah, no problem leaving the games on all night when you're around, but shut them off when you're not.

-Ian

 

[ELutz]

Don't get me wrong......I'm not saying you should be scared or worried about turning your game on. A game should, definately, be able to handle being left "on". Forget to turn it off and it's left on all night......sure. Having a big party or family event and its on for 10 hours straight.....sure. Those two scenario are way different than leaving the machine on 24/7. I don't care how much preventative maintenance and/or rebuilding/cap out you've done......24/7 is hard on an old machine, and it will drastically increase your need for repair.

Edward

 

[dezbaz]

Don't get me wrong......I'm not saying you should be scared or worried about turning your game on. A game should, definately, be able to handle being left "on". Forget to turn it off and it's left on all night......sure. Having a big party or family event and its on for 10 hours straight.....sure. Those two scenario are way different than leaving the machine on 24/7. I don't care how much preventative maintenance and/or rebuilding/cap out you've done......24/7 is hard on an old machine, and it will drastically increase your need for repair.

Edward

True

Molex plugs, for example are designed to withstand 46 disconnects. Yes only 46.

I replace all female pins during a repro, 46 ain't a lot

 

[infotime]

OK, finally got around to testing.

First, here's the voltages I was able to measure on the PCB. I took measurements wherever there was a test point on the board. I also tested to both ground points. The first set of voltages are for the ground point nearest the edge connector, second set is measurements near the CPU.

DISP - would not lock a reading
R/W - 3.4 / 3.5
02 - 1.9 / 1.8
WDOG DISABLE - 4.95 / 4.93
6MHZ - 1.748 / 1.XXX (X = fluctuates)
+5V - 4.97 / 4.96
COINR - 5.01 / 4.99
COINL - 5.01 / 5.00
START2 - 5.01 / 4.99
COINC - 5.01 / 4.99
START1 - 5.01 / 4.99
AUD1 - 5.91 / 5.89
ZOUT - would not lock a reading
XOUT - would not lock a reading
YOUT - would not lock a reading

Also measured some points on the power regulator / audio board (1st numbers from the lower GND, 2nd from upper GND)

10.3VDC - 11.94-11.96 / 11.96-11.98 (fluctuated a bit)
+5VDC - 5.26 / 5.25
SPKR1 - 6.01-6.09 / (forgot to measure 2nd GND point)
SPKR2 - 6.02-6.09 / (forgot to measure 2nd GND point)

 

[infotime]

Here is what I see on screen with each of the two PCBs that I have for this machine. The first pictures are of the second PCB I got for the machine (after the first one failed. It worked for a day or so, except for the tones in place of explosions and no thrust sounds). The game will play, but you can't tell what the hell is going on

Here's what the original PCB looks like when powered on. Its similar to what it did after it's arrival in my basement, before my helper pushed some chips in tighter. It worked for a few days perfectly fine until it quit. Right now you can't even get it to play.