Zaxxon machine video going awry

[irkenlurker]

Hello, I've been having a little trouble with my Sega 1982 Zaxxon machine. The video has been outputting in double per column so that each column is repeated. Also, playing the game will show the important sprites well but will have the background either black or once again repeating each column. The game will play well otherwise. I suspect something overheated from a lack of cleaning the vent, but I've heard this problem can be associated with a short on a trace. I'm hoping replacing a simple piece would be a quick fix. Any help would be appreciated, thanks!

[Malenko]

dont know a ton about Zaxxon boards, but cleaning it, the edge connector and any socketed roms can do wonders

[irkenlurker]

Hello, I'm updating this to bump the post.

I've not learned a single thing about the machine within the year since the post and the only experience I've had is cleaning the main connections on the sides of the board. I've tried contacting one arcade repair business (in the Bay Area, CA) and the only help I got was a complete lack of reply phone calls and lazy emails telling me, basically, to do it  myself. The repair business seems very unhelpful and I'm even slightly suspicious that by "cleaning the rom sockets" what people are actually telling me is to mess with them until they break and I absolutely MUST buy new things and pay for repairs from others. As anyone who mentions cleaning the roms also mentions they're easy to break, what else could their purpose be but to screw me over? Furthermore, I'm now taking every post I see from any forum whatsoever with a grain of salt, seeing that the only people with time to monitor forums are the people who have an advantage at economic gain should they reply that something must be bought (they always do). Therefore, I no longer will need help with this topic, unless someone can help, because I'm not willing to pay for someone's product advertisings when the knowledge is out there 10-fold on how to do it, anything, for free.

In summary, this hobby seems to be for suckers and manipulators, and I'm out. And I'm sorry if I've brought my stubbornness to this forum from the experience with the arcade repair shop here, but when you've messaged a shop over and over to simply look at a machine and they completely refuse and instead keep telling me that I must do the repair (and as I've told them, most likely breaking something from lack of experience - therefore having to buy even more than the start) by taking everything off myself to clean them, then I'll not even bother to try them again.

Thank you for keeping the forum, but no thank you to keeping these things alive if it's only to make these guys a buck.

[chopperthedog]

Hello, I'm updating this to bump the post.

I've not learned a single thing about the machine within the year since the post and the only experience I've had is cleaning the main connections on the sides of the board. I've tried contacting one arcade repair business (in the Bay Area, CA) and the only help I got was a complete lack of reply phone calls and lazy emails telling me, basically, to do it  myself. The repair business seems very unhelpful and I'm even slightly suspicious that by "cleaning the rom sockets" what people are actually telling me is to mess with them until they break and I absolutely MUST buy new things and pay for repairs from others. As anyone who mentions cleaning the roms also mentions they're easy to break, what else could their purpose be but to screw me over? Furthermore, I'm now taking every post I see from any forum whatsoever with a grain of salt, seeing that the only people with time to monitor forums are the people who have an advantage at economic gain should they reply that something must be bought (they always do). Therefore, I no longer will need help with this topic, unless someone can help, because I'm not willing to pay for someone's product advertisings when the knowledge is out there 10-fold on how to do it, anything, for free.

In summary, this hobby seems to be for suckers and manipulators, and I'm out. And I'm sorry if I've brought my stubbornness to this forum from the experience with the arcade repair shop here, but when you've messaged a shop over and over to simply look at a machine and they completely refuse and instead keep telling me that I must do the repair (and as I've told them, most likely breaking something from lack of experience - therefore having to buy even more than the start) by taking everything off myself to clean them, then I'll not even bother to try them again.

Thank you for keeping the forum, but no thank you to keeping these things alive if it's only to make these guys a buck.

Just needed to quote this piece of comedic gold before any edits. 



good day.

[yotsuya]

Just needed to quote this piece of comedic gold before any edits. 

I've learned SO MUCH about these machines just by trying to fix stuff myself, so much so that this summer I fixed a Centipede board that had been giving me a lot of trouble for over a year as well. Just try it. It's not working right anyway. You say the knowledge is out there for free - us it. 

[matsadona]

Well, in the end of the day this hobby is about keeping old and rudimentary electronics alive. If you have no knowledge about such things it is a bit daunting. So either you accept that you have to learn about (old) electronics and the basic theories regarding resistors, capacitors, semiconductors and logical circuitry or you need to hire someone else to do it. The lack of interest from “professionals” in the electronics business is probably caused by the simple facts that almost nobody does this anymore.