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It seemed every arcade in the Portland area had Asteroids. I remember playing this game at Rico's Pizza, at Clackamas Town Center, and at the local Leather's gas station. As for Asteroids Deluxe, it was a bit tougher to find. I know I played it because I remember how difficult it was compared to the original.
For some reason Asteroids didn't draw me in like other games of the time, such as Donkey Kong and Pac-Man. However, now that I am older, I can truly appreciate why so many people liked it. For one, the vector graphics are sharp and crisp, and the game is truly challenging and constantly changing.
So, when I saw an ad for an Asteroids Deluxe in the local paper, I jumped on it. Unfortunately, I may have been a little too ambitious. When I went to see the machine, the owner said that it had been working for some time, and then just stopped one day. I asked him what the condition of the monitor was at the time (because I knew vector monitors can be a pain), and he said it was in, "great" condition.
After a little hesitation, I decided to go ahead and pick it up. To be honest this was only the fourth game I had purchased, and up to this time everyone had been fairly honest with their evaluations of the games. This machine turned out to be a different story. It turns out the board was missing several components. Further, once I got the board repaired, the monitor constantly bloomed to the point of being unplayable. That particular issue turned out to be a bad HV diode. After performing all the repairs listed below, the game is running great now.
Repair Log
To date, I have performed the following repairs on this game:
- Installed a cap kit w/transistors (WG 19v2000)
- Replaced the HV diode
- Had the board repaired, which ultimately failed again
- Purchased a working board
- Installed a cap kit on the audio regulator board
- Replaced the big blue capacitor
- Replaced PCB edge connector (22/44 molex)
Photos
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