My Gameroom

Jr. Pac-man has arrived

It finally came on Thursday, as smoothly as planned. The truck came, they dropped off the game wrapped up tightly and well protected, they took some photos of my “gameroom” which was a small disarrayed mess, and they headed out. They didn’t want a drink, food or anything.

I will try to post some photos of it, it’s still sitting in the garage as I wait to have a little more space hopefully after Tuesday. I haven’t figured out how to hook up the monitor just yet either, but I am sure that won’t be too hard.


Installed a switcher in the Pengo

That was over a week ago already, last weekend to be exact. I was talking with Richard, and looking inside the cabinet, and then I figured out how the switcher had to be wired. I had an extra two pronged plug that was some sort of AC power source. All I needed to do was snip that connector, tie that positive and negative into the switcher position and negative, and I knew the other voltages that I needed to supply for the PCB, so I went ahead and did it.

I was nervous about clipping connectors, but I kept telling myself that I could always put it back if I needed. I would have done this earlier, but I had it in my mind that the power was coming out from the linear power supply and going to the isolation transformer. But I wasn’t looking at the wiring. The power comes in from one main source and through the isolation transformer. the transformer then powers the monitor and the linear power supply. The linear power supply takes the AC voltages and changes them into DC voltages so the board and sound can use them.

Here are the photos of what I did. I even made a little harness out of different molex connectors for the power supply connection.

Pengo Switcher 1Pengo Switcher 2

I double checked my pinouts before plugging everything in. At first, the game came up, but it did it’s typical thing. I put in a ton of credits, it started resetting, and then when I pressed player 1, I got one character on screen and everything froze. I heard some clicking noises in the coin box area, and that was it.

On Sunday, I stopped and got some clips to put on my wire connections just to make sure that I had good connections. I emailed Richard about what I did, everything sounded right to him, and I explained it with intricate little questions down to if it matter how many wires you had tied to one 5v connection head.

Well, the lesson I learned, you always have to test voltages coming from the power supply again. Come to find out, I was supplying around 5.83 V instead of 5V, so I probably just toasted my board. I didn’t have it on for long, but I know it doesn’t take much. But, the funny thing is, I thought with a switcher I would be able to get very exact voltages. But you only have one knob to adjust, and I am only able to get the same voltages to the Pengo PCB as I was with the linear power supply. I have to do about 5.1 V and that gives me about 11.9 V for the sound.

I don’t know. I am extremely frustrated, don’t know if my board works anymore, and out of options again.


Jr. Pac-man arriving tomorrow!

I knew when the truck left Pittsburgh a couple of days ago that my time had finally come, but I just wasn’t sure when.

I got ahold of Troy yesterday, and he said he was in Columbus, and thought he would be my way in the next couple of days. It sounded like he had to swing down to Cincinnati first, and since Mudmantim wasn’t going to be free until the weekend, would stop by my place next.

Well, he called tonight and said that he should be at my place by around noon or 1. I am really pumped, the timing is just about perfect. I have the day off tomorrow, and in the next couple of days I should be moving out two more games, so I should have the room to move things around and rearrange them as needed.


Jr. Pac-man truck progress update

The Jr. Pac-man truck is now in Pittsburgh. I was blown away, it was like they totally skipped the last leg of the course up the coast.

Rick met with Troy last night, and they were talking about how to pack up the Jr. Pac. But, come to find out, Troy is going to be going to NY and NJ and then he will come back through PA to pick up the other games. So, I think I have another 4-5 days before he is back in PA. Maybe not that long…

They did have some space issues, and are renting temporary storage units. What a costly, amazing trip for this truck. But the time is nearing, a week from today I may have my Jr. Pac-man in the basement.


Jr. Pac-man truck progress

The truck continues to move along, but at a little slower pace than the beginning.

The last I heard it is still in North Carolina with the disassemble project they were working on. But, there is some good news for those getting games. There will be no new stops added, so hopefully the route it has is final and we can better judge when it will arrive.

I heard Rick is going to be out of town for a week, so I figure that the truck won’t even be to his place for another week. That puts the truck at my place now somewhere around the 21st of September. I assume they are still coordinating with Rick, he has other games than mine that they want.

The time is benefiting me from a savings point, but it is hard to stay patient.


Jr. Pac-man truck update

Well. As I thought, it is taking longer for the truck to get here than planned. In theory I may have had the machine today, but that is fine. I get to keep my money longer and have more time to try to sell the R-Type.

The main reason it is taking longer is the generous and expanded route by DanOfEarth. He is having Troy swoop way south to Atlanta and back up the east coast. My guesses are that he should be up to PA sometime in the first few days of next week. That would put my machine here probably in a week from Saturday or Sunday…maybe:)

I am just worried now, with the expanded route, that something might happen to the machine, or they might run out of room. That would be even worse.


Photos of Sega Pengo Isolation Transformer

Photos of the isolation transformer. Pretty old and crappy looking like most of these from the 80’s, but how it looks isn’t an indication of how it works. I just need to figure out what voltages are going in these wires from the Power Supply so I can tie in a switching power supply instead.

Sega Pengo Isolation Transforme Top Right ViewSega Pengo Isolation Transformer Front ViewSega Pengo Isolation Transformer Top ViewSega Pengo Isolation Transformer Far Right View