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The original frankenpanel?
SavannahLion:
--- Quote from: Howard_Casto on February 20, 2012, 08:05:53 pm ---
--- Quote from: SavannahLion on February 19, 2012, 11:36:22 am ---Your example for a hard drive tester is piss poor and misunderstood.
--- End quote ---
Watch your attitude..... misunderstood is valid critism... "piss poor" is not.
--- End quote ---
Coming from someone who was all gung-ho for a CrapMAME 2? Right, whatever. ::) It's a poor comparison, period.
--- Quote ---I'm aware of the use you are talking about but I've never seen them used like that outside of a largish company that builds pcs. The fact remains that they still try to sell the little paper weights to service technicians.
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So what? If manufacturer A offers a product, why shouldn't they sell said product to any entity they choose? Not like any of these service shops are forced to buy their product.
--- Quote ---I didn't realize that this product was intended for the local technician, if that's the case then it makes even less sense to me. As Cheffo said, it seems like it would make more economic sense to just buy a new board and have the old one sent back for repair or as a trade in. You know, like modern pcs today... you don't try to fix a motherboard when it goes bad... you buy a new one.
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You're just cherry picking now. It's in the first sentence:
--- Quote ---In 1976, Atari released one of its most obscure products, the CTF I (Computer Test Fixture). This bulky diagnostic tool specifically aided in the troubleshooting and repair of Atari coin-operated video games.
The CTF served as a universal Atari game machine; a service technician was able to remove any Atari arcade printed circuit board from its original cabinet and play it with the CTF I, which came equipped with dual joysticks, paddles, and everything else needed to test the function of the game.
--- End quote ---
This was sold to service technicians. This wasn't just an in-house service tool, it was a product that was specifically made, marketed (if ever) and sold outside the company. Everyone else (including Cheffo) supports this statement. No company releases in-house only tools.
You need to stop applying current modern economics to late 1970's through 1980's tech. This device hails from an era of solid DIYers. C.L. Stong kind of ---steaming pile of meadow muffin---. The Book wasn't published just for Atari technicians, for $39.00, anybody could have gotten their hands on it. Ever wonder why a lot of those old arcade manuals also included schematics and full blown parts lists? C'mon Howard, you of all people should know this. Are you really comparing the economics of modern PC motherboard "repair" with the economics of 1976-era PCB repair? Seriously?
paigeoliver:
A brief search showed no one seemed to have a working one. There are some collectors of Atari stuff out there with deep pockets who might be interested, and I could see any board repair shop being interested. The $5000 was a guesstimate, but I am pretty certain one of those would sell for thousands, not hundreds.
--- Quote from: pinballjim on February 20, 2012, 10:07:44 pm ---
--- Quote from: paigeoliver on February 20, 2012, 09:26:03 pm ---I would venture to say a working one of those would probably be worth about $5000 today.
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Where exactly?
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BobA:
--- Quote from: paigeoliver on February 20, 2012, 09:26:03 pm ---I would venture to say a working one of those would probably be worth about $5000 today.
--- End quote ---
You might even get more depending on how many still exit. Even test panels have gotten bids in the thousands.
javeryh:
I wasn't far off - I thought for sure this thread was going to be about the 5200 controller.
paigeoliver:
A new motherboard is like $100 in todays dollars and so complex that repair is not feasible. While a replacement circuit board during the classic era could cost more than 10 times that (adjusted for inflation), but more importantly it was simple enough to repair.
Places did a lot of their own repairs because it was much cheaper than sending out the boards, even then they were probably not going back to the factory. Operators were already used to having to deal with pinball machines and EM arcade games (both of which broke all the time).
Some operators still have warehouses full of junk today because they did all their own repairs.
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