what is a good arcade dart game

If you want reliable get a Medalist brand.

If you want cheap get any of these:

Arachnid "English Mark Darts"

Merit "Pubtime" or "Scorpion"

Valley "Cougar" or "Ernie"
 
Not sure what ken is talking about, but i dont think he deals in darts that much. I have sold over 200 dartboards, so i think i might know a thing or two

Cheap: pub time or super 6 boards

If ken is taslking about the Spectrum by medalist, i would avoid it like the plague. Worst part being that they are about 9 foot tall since they have a monitor mounted on top. but they are almost always in nice shape since they are in a plastic cabinet

good boards:

Arachnid Top gun Galaxy dart boards. I sell alot of these and everyone is happy with them, but i personnaly do not like the amber monior, and they always seem to have decent amount of screen burn. but have many game choices and are all around good boards with parts almost always available


Great dartboards, and are available for a good price are

Merit Scorpion, I prefer the Scorpion 9000, but as long as the game has solo-challenger, then it is good, the main difference between them is that the 9000 has pick-it cricket, where others dont. Solo Challenger is a computer you can play against at different difficulty levels so that you dont always have to have a second person to play against in games like cricket

Valley Cougar, there are several different models, and basically are all about the same, I would look for one with "hinest ernie" which is a computer to play against like scorpion's solo challenger

If money dont meand anything to you:
Valley IQ, is about the best board put out by valley. I still like this board, but If for casual play, i dont see the extra value in the difference in price between it and other valley's

Arachnid Black Widow: Nice and sharp looking board, but again, the price is just not viable for home use in my opinion.

Im not sure where you are located at since its not in your title, but if your in the chicago area, you can look at about a dozen boards that i have up there ready for sale. I sell cougars and scorpions often and have them right now for 400.00. I also have some galaxy's for 350.00

And if you like project ones, i sell them for half the price of the working ones

Troy
 
I have an English Mark Darts by Arachnid. It works great. This is the kind that hangs on the wall and while it is not coin op, it does not take up any floor space. WHen people come over nobody really cares that it is not the big fancy one with all the bells and whistles.

They show up on Ebay fairly often. I got mine pretty cheap. I think I paid more in shipping than I did for the game :(.

ken
 
I worked for a route operator for 25 years. We had over 150 dart boards on the route. About 100 were English Mark Darts "Super 6" (6000, 6100, 6200, 6300 series) and Galaxy. The rest were both Medalist "Dartstar", "Dartstar 2000", and "Spectrum".

We ended up selling ALL the English Mark Dart games because they were so unreliable. Power supply, monitor, gameboard, and target head were the main problems. I was always having to on location and fix the damn things.

That's when we started switching the route to all Medalist brand dart boards. Very good cabinets, target heads, and nice design. Yes they are tall cabinets, but they are designed and intended for commercial businesses not homes. Once we switched to Medalist brand, service calls went way down dramatically. True, some Medalist boards came from the factory with crappy Tekbilt (and other brand) screw terminal switching power supplies. We removed those power supplies and installed Peter Chou 15 amp power supplies instead. Medalist issued a service bulletin on the early Spectrum cabinets not having enough ventilation. The early cabinets had TWO 4" speakers (mono!) wired in parallel. They said to remove the right hand speaker and replace it with a 120mm size 120VAC fan and grill which we did. Current production Spectrums have the fan. These have been very reliable dart games. Medalist's business office and manufacturing plant are only 45 miles from me. Many of the operators around western Washington use Medalist boards.
 
In my opinion, I think as far as reliability Valley Cougars are the best for the simple fact of you still see tons around from the early 90's. Powersupplys really seem to be the only thing we ever have to replace on them. Yeah, other problems do happen but it is not very often. We have a couple of Arachnid Galaxy II's on route as well and they are very nice. The monitor to me is kind of cool. Valley's are what the MDA use as standard regulation tournament boards. I think preference on dart boards is all about what your dart leagues use since different areas use different boards. Illinois uses Arachnids like crazy. If I were looking for a dart board for my house I would try to go with one where parts can still be readily found as I wouldn't be wanting a brand new board.

Just to add to the thread.....I am searching for 2-4 valley cougar 8's (blue faces), however you may refer to them. i HATE the shelti eye 2's. I need these for a location.
 
My vote is for the Valley Cougars too. I just sold my SM model because I upgraded to the IQ model. The IQ is absolutely amazing because not only does it have a monitor on the front but the game allows you to select what quadrants you want to use for cricket. I've never had a single issue with my SM or IQ.
 
The SM and HO (or HB) are the ones we have. I think really the only difference between the 2 is the button layout on the front and obviously the amount of buttons.
 
Scorpion 9000

I have a Scorpion 9000 which needs a motherboard. Everything else seems to be complete and I hate to part it out. Any thoughts of who might have a board?

I will likley part it out if I cannot find a motherboard. Is there anyone out there who needs parts for a Scorpion 9000 ?


chasjohn
 
i picked up a english mark darts at an auction for $33.50 brought it cleaned it up (seems to have been in a bar) and been playing it ever since,i play it ALOT never had any problems.
 
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