Star Wars Amplifone dead? Thoughts?

Jedidentist

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So I powered up my Star Wars today and I was greeted by this:



Basically, nothing visible on the screen. I recorded this with my iPhone so you can't see that the brightest whites from the explosions are actually visible. The monitor has been slow to warm up for a while. The deflection board was completely rebuilt by Arcrevival. The HV board is one of the repro ones from 2003, installed before I purchased the game. I really done even know what to test or where to test it...so before someone says "test the voltage", could you actually tell me, like a dummy, where the test points would be? There's a lot of crap in this game and it's not as cut and dry like my 720 boards where the ground and 5V points are clearly labeled. Thanks so much guys!

Derek
 
I just pm'ed you my number in case you lost it. Call me and we can run through some things. Have a voltmeter ready :)

edit: have the game pulled out and the back door off too.
 
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Thanks for taking my call last night, Dave. Stupid brightness adjustment! It was good to test the voltages anyways. However, when I tested it, it was the only game I had on, and then when I plugged it back into my surge protector and powered up all of my games...it took a little longer to warm up and seemed to be slightly dimmer again. I'm going to retest the voltages with them all powered up and see what I get. Seeing that I can't get 20 amp power, I wonder if getting one of those surge protector/power monitoring gizmos might work? The ones that are supposed to regulate your power and assure that you're always getting 110? I can't think of anything else to try...
 
decent crt socket connection?.. is the brightness doing any sort of quick snaps from bright to dim?. or is it gradual?
 
The game is fine, it's just too many games on one circuit. He does not have a lot of options as far as house wiring goes. A lot of the guys on here think that because the circuit does not blow everything is ok. It's just not true.
 
For a while now, it's been slow to warm up...sometimes taking 30-45 seconds before you could see anything. I just powered it up yesterday for the first time in a couple of weeks and there was essentially nothing...could see just the faintest of the brightest whites. Dave and I ran through all of the voltages and everything seemed to be good. Then he suggested the obvious brightness, and that worked. However, the alarming part was that the game hasn't been moved and there shouldn't really be a reason for the brightness going down. I wasn't getting any flickering or anything. However, after getting off the phone last night, I powered it up with my other games and it got a little dimmer again. I didn't get a chance to check the voltages with everything powered up, but I will this weekend. Unfortunately, I'm stuck with 15 amp power...unless I rip apart all of the walls of my finished basement due to the type of wire I used. I never thought I'd get into this hobby and need the additional power when my dad and I finished the basement 3 years ago...
 
Thanks for taking my call last night, Dave. Stupid brightness adjustment! It was good to test the voltages anyways. However, when I tested it, it was the only game I had on, and then when I plugged it back into my surge protector and powered up all of my games...it took a little longer to warm up and seemed to be slightly dimmer again. I'm going to retest the voltages with them all powered up and see what I get. Seeing that I can't get 20 amp power, I wonder if getting one of those surge protector/power monitoring gizmos might work? The ones that are supposed to regulate your power and assure that you're always getting 110? I can't think of anything else to try...

How many games are you running on the one circuit?
 
9 games. I've only had 1 other issue with my games...720 was losing voltage an putting garbage on the screen. Turned up the switcher just a tad and it fixed it. Initially, I noticed this last night when only 5 were powered up.
 
I'm stuck with 15 amp power...unless I rip apart all of the walls of my finished basement due to the type of wire I used. I never thought I'd get into this hobby and need the additional power when my dad and I finished the basement 3 years ago...

Bummer. I will always use 12 as opposed to 14 wire even on a 15A circuit (unless it is only a lighting circuit) in case I want to upgrade to 20A down the road. Lesson learned.
 
Bummer. I will always use 12 as opposed to 14 wire even on a 15A circuit (unless it is only a lighting circuit) in case I want to upgrade to 20A down the road. Lesson learned.

Exactly. The wire goes through all of the studs and down to an outlet every 6'. I might be able to do it if I get bored enough and tie a string to each of the wires as I undo them from the outlets.
 
Crap...yeah, forgot about that. My dad and I built it all to code, so they are stapled as they travel vertically along the studs...and unfortunately, the holes that they go through aren't big enough to run a second wire through.
 
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