White Atari Asteroids

JerryO

New member
Joined
Jul 5, 2006
Messages
626
Reaction score
1
Location
Duncanville, Texas
I see an add on Ebay for an Atari Asteroids in a white cabinet. How rare is this, and does anyone have any information about these such as why Atari made the white cabinets and how many were made.
 
I have never seen or heard of one or those. I would pick it up if your close enough!!:cool: Email the seller ask for a link to the information from atari, he had to get his info somewhere.
 
I remember reading somewhere that the white cabinets were made to attract more players to the machine since the mfg thought that the white edges pop out visually more than the original black cabinets, thereby attracting more players.

This reasoning may be why the majority of subsequent Atari cabinets where primarily white.
 
I did read something about the white cabinets awhile back but just couldn't remember why Atari did this. I'm sure that there is no way to verify if the cabinet was originaly white or black.
 
gene at vintage arcade had a white asteroids so they do exist. i do believe he said they were the very first cabs to go into production before they changed to black. they are rare from what i was told
 
White Asteroids

I dont know if it is first production. It has the newer style coin door. Could have been replaced. It also has the newer style bezel. Would like to know what monitor is in it. Looks like someone just put a white stripe on it. Maybe hiding damage?
http://cgi.ebay.com/RARE-White-Atar...in_0?hash=item4148d9bbf0&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

BE1h2kKGrHgoH-D8EjlLlcYWBKpvSy2bkg_.jpg
 
I seem to recall they were actually later production machines that had the scheme changed to white to match the games that were coming out later (Warlords, Centipede, Monte Carlo, etc.). Who knows if that's true or not!
 
They sold a lot of Asteroids machines back in the day. There were several versions. The first few hundred were converted Lunar Lander cabinets. Then they made the black w/ Asteroids side graphics cabinet with the owl eye coin door (which was also used for Lunar Lander), then they went with a more modern coin door and I believe that was the configuration for the majority of the games produced. I think there were at least two different kinds of coin doors used after that. They also made a cocktail version and a cabaret. I think the white version was perhaps made for overseas use and is not very common in the US. There was also two different versions of the software - I believe known as A and B and one version had the enemy ships come out faster. This was helpful when using the lurking technique and was the version that was used when the world record was set by Scott Safran. All hail THE SAF.........
 
The are from the last few runs of machines. Not Proto's, not rare, not conversions, nothing special at all. Just the last of the Asteroids machines to come off the assembly line.
 
A friend said that it could be a reimport. That machines like this were exported overseas....

Its a theory..
 
The are from the last few runs of machines. Not Proto's, not rare, not conversions, nothing special at all. Just the last of the Asteroids machines to come off the assembly line. I own all of the artwork screens for ALL of the Atari Games. The screens with the 'white band' are the Rev C artwork for the cabinet, and the dates on the 'white band' are AFTER the standard black versions.


I believe this was the original cabinet. The guy standing next to it is the creator of Asteroids. I bought my asteroids off the guy who took the picture - he used to work at Atari and was friends was Ed.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ed_Logg.jpg
 
looks neat, better overall look versus the regular look.

i would say it is rare simply because you dont see that many around now.

it will be interesting to see what price it will fetch.

the white strip really accents the side art in a nice way.
 
I just seen this machine in a warehouse. I've never seen "Asteroids" on the sideart before. Early production?
 

Attachments

  • arcade.jpg
    arcade.jpg
    93.8 KB · Views: 104
The are from the last few runs of machines. Not Proto's, not rare, not conversions, nothing special at all. Just the last of the Asteroids machines to come off the assembly line. I own all of the artwork screens for ALL of the Atari Games. The screens with the 'white band' are the Rev C artwork for the cabinet, and the dates on the 'white band' are AFTER the standard black versions.

Yeah....I've had five Asteroids over the years.....two were white. I've seen many more. I'd say...yes, less common than the black version....but not exactly uncommon.

Edward
 
Some asteroids were silkscreened right on the cab and others had vinyl art. I had three asteroids at once and one had the vinyl art. I think it was the export machine that had this but cant remember. I just remember one of them was built in Ireland and another was a low serial...4967. Can anyone else confirm that the Ireland cabs had vinyl?
 
Back
Top Bottom