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So how much is too much for a NIB?

Just read the datasheet for the A6281 LED Driver chip, which based on the comments on this thread is the component that is failing? Is that right?

This SMD has a requirement to be mounted onto a heatsink pad underneath the chip which is electrically connected to pins 3 and 10. Wonder if they didn't get this quite right?
 
Nedreud said:
Ok, had a look at the schematics and think I've worked out what the "buffer" is.

On page D-103 of the current manual is the WOZ Single GI RGB LED Board 15-0019-00, Revision 1.3 which is the part you showed a photo of. This is a simple RGB LED driver which can be daisy-chained together:

View attachment 37692

Next is the manual is WOZ Single GI RGB LED Board 15-0019-00, Revision 1.4:

View attachment 37695

The core functionality remains the same but there are improvements and additions. First up the power supply section is more complex and also generates an additional 5.1V supply. Then there are some new capacitors on the data input lines next to J101. Interference suppression? And then finally there is the new buffer section containing a 74AHCT125, which is a QUAD BUS BUFFER. This chip is commonly used with Raspbery Pi projects to convert the Pi's 3.3V GPIO logic to 5V logic. Basically it's improving the output of U100 before it gets passed on to the next device in the daisy chain.

From you photo it looks as though they've added this as a daughter board add-on to a Revision 1.3 board.

One thing I have read whilst reading up about this is the Allegro A6821 3-Channel Constant Current LED Driver is now discontinued...
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They stopped making them 2014, but still huge numbers of stock about, I got 50 from China for next to nothing,I did get every component on the board for under $2 and if I wanted to get 100 of the PCB's made then you know that is also a very cheap process, but no point doing the repair with the same IC which we know will fail.
Did you read on the data sheet it said not to be used in any sort of life saving equipment, I have never seen that on a data sheet before, is that a way just to say its a pretty fragile IC and has a high fail rate..........
 
I've seen warnings like that before. Or military grade components that are extra super tough! The old Motorola MC6800 CPU used in so many pinball machines also came in military grade.

From what I can tell this is a pretty robust little device. Is this the only component that fails when each module fails? I saw your photos of you replacing it under USB microscope (!) but was anything else faulty? Did you only have to replace the A6281 to fix each board?

The thing I find strange about JJPs alterations between revision 1.3 and 1.4 is that (a) the fuse has been increased from 0.5A to 2.0A, meaning there's more likelihood for an overload before protection failure and (b) the output signal conditioning by the 74AHCT125 because the datasheet clearly states that these chips contain various mechanisms for ensuring data transmission between them in a chain:

Output Buffers
The A6281 is designed to allow daisy chaining many A6281s together. It can pass the clock, data, latch, and output enable signals from one A6821 to the next without any loss of data due to duty cycle skewing or signal degradation. The A6821 is equipped with output buffers that allow the data signals to travel over long distances through strings of A6281s without the need for extra driving hardware. The A6281 drives these signals to TTL levels.​

Also, I now notice on page D-101 on the manual there was a similar board with part number 15-0006-00 Revision 13 with the note "games manufactured before Sep 4, 2013". This only needs 5V supply instead of 7.5V and is very simple even compared to Revision 1.3 of 15-0019-00. So after the voltage upgrade is 15-0019-00 the replacement part for 15-0006-00?

upload_2016-10-22_15-36-46.png

Sorry. Answered my own question. RTFM ;) I see:

upload_2016-10-22_15-41-53.png
 
This gets more interesting...

This U101 (the T101 and T102 on Revision 1.4) are RailClamp TVS (Transient Voltage Suppresion) diode arrays which are designed to protect high data interfaces from ESD, CDE and EFT. So, 15-0006-00 Revision 13, had none of these, then 15-0019-00 had one on the input, and 15-0019-00 added a second on the output. Seems like they're really trying to eliminate something coming down the daisy-chain and frying these devices. I don't think that ESD (Electro-Static Discharge) or CDE (Cable Discharge Events) are likely in this case but EFT (Electrical Fast Transients) could be generated by the solenoids in a pinball machine. But I'm not sure it would ever be enough to destroya device, merely mess up the data signal and cause timing errors or the like.

I think only an explanation from JJP will suffice, but the fact they've changed the design several times kinda makes it look like they're fumbling around in the dark too!
 
I have repaired 2 boards, on one just the IC was bad, on the other D101 was SC, F1 OC and also the IC, with everything removed but the IC still in place I was still getting a short between ground and the 5v supply, so they can fail in different ways.
Im no expert by any means, im just having a tinker with the old parts
My intention was to repair them and put them back, this was before I read about the problems and the upgrade of the buffer.
 
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No I mean the IC was still in place, I replaced parts and still had a short to ground, so then removed everything but the IC and still had a short. I then replaced the IC and short had gone, replaced all other parts and that one then worked.
I would have to pick up on the 5v line past anything such as F1.
 
I still have 2 left which have not been touched, will send you one if you PM address
 
I, like everyone, was somewhat horrified by the prices attached to B66, at first I suspected the new line up of Premium, LE and Super LE was just an excuse to jack up prices. But on closer inspection they do seem to have upped their game on the specs, e.g. they haven’t supplied toppers in the past, and there is the new display.

These price aren’t really down to Stern, a GB was priced the same as GOT, released a year ago. So if you accept that the specs are higher and Stern are entitled to an annual price rise, it looks like this.

GB premium $7595 and LE $8795. B66 premium $8599 and LE $9999.

That is only around £800 between premiums and £1000 between LE’s, which given the fact they will want to claw back some of the r&d cost for the new system and display, isn’t that surprising.

The exchange rate is playing the larger part in these prices.

$8600 (a B66 Premium) at a rate of 1.22 is £7050, at 1.53 (this time last year) £5620. That is a difference of £1430.

This is all based on Sterns RRP’s, so before VAT.

The VAT on £1430 is another £286, so that makes £1716. Phil has a B66 premium at £9000, so a year ago it would have been around £7284.

So if the exchange rate pulls itself together, hopefully we will see prices back down around the 7k mark for a premium.
 
But LCDs cost less than DMDs these days and Batman is just a re-hash of an existing game.
 
stoptap said:
But LCDs cost less than DMDs these days and Batman is just a re-hash of an existing game.
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I think your right, but I think the individual part costs are such a small part of the pricing, I don't think that makes much difference. But it is still a change that is going to have taken some effort to implement. As for a re-hash I do see some similarities, but again I don't think re using some ideas makes much difference to the costs.
 
Tom Satch said:
GB premium $7595 and LE $8795. B66 premium $8599 and LE $9999.
Click to expand...


Yes, but it's a trick! There is no 'Pro' Batman. But in real life the Premium is the Pro. The LE is the premium and the Super LE is the LE. It's total ******** so not really fair to compare to previous titles. If you actually compare like for like with this reasoning you see a huge, unjustified price increase.
 
B66 is re-theme of BTDK but with new big display, right? And am I right that the control system has changed from S.A.M. to SPIKE-2? So, all they've really saved here is the R&D on the table design. Everything else is "new". I guess maybe they might have saved a little if they had some left-over custom parts from BTDK in stock and maybe they still had any custom dies or moulds to had to remake parts.

Also, is there a SPIKE-1 system? What and when changed with SPIKE-2?
 
Fintan Stack said:
Yes, but it's a trick! There is no 'Pro' Batman. But in real life the Premium is the Pro. The LE is the premium and the Super LE is the LE. It's total ******** so not really fair to compare to previous titles. If you actually compare like for like with this reasoning you see a huge, unjustified price increase.
Click to expand...

That is what I thought, but I don’t think it’s the case. A Pro always has less playfield features than a Premium or LE, but on B66 they all have the same main features.

The only differences between the Premium and LE are trim, art, topper and shaker motor.

The only differences between the LE and Super LE are extra playfield toys (just toys not mechanisms), the bat signal projector, 3 translates and a better sound system.

Also the Super LE really does have some stuff that previous LE haven’t, the topper, the bat signal projector, 3 translates and a better sound system.

Now i’m not saying I would pay the extra or that the extras are good value for money, but I don't think they have just renamed a Pro, Premium and LE.
 
i think the pins will sell especially if they are good - and the higher prices means they have to be good and well made!
 
we need ops to buy pins so in a few years they feed through to home users. ops have bought gb and I'm sure would have gone for bm66 at the same price but the hike will put most off. annoying as game looks great and being a sad old git this is a great theme for me. just hope the pro pricing comes back on future titles
 
Neil McRae said:
i think the pins will sell especially if they are good - and the higher prices means they have to be good and well made!
Click to expand...

But who are they going to sell to? I think we've settled it's not OPs. If it's also not to the normal suspects on here then there's a big question mark on who will be buying them. There are only so many premier league footballers out there looking to buy a games room;)

Stern's Iron Maiden is going to miss a huge target market if the UK and Europe are priced out.

It doesn't matter how good a product is if it's too expensive
 
I think there are some of us that will buy them - but also I don't think the batman pricing is sterns ongoing pricing I think it will return to the pricing that ghostbusters had.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Even if people buy them, the second hand price will be too high.
Then there are the distributors to think of. I fear greed may be the undoing of the hobby. Hope I'm wrong and somebody like Homepin can come good and blow these fat cats away.
 
I am pinning my hopes on heighway pinball really taking off with their next few games. I have been impressed with FT and I think they will be the future for more reasonably priced new games.

Any competition to stern can only be a good thing
 
WRT to JJP ... or more specifically WOZ LED boards, a question:

Has anyone experienced failing revised boards, or seen much if any reports of such instances? I've seen nary a whisper. Unless they've suddenly started failing en-masse since I did my research regarding WOZ early this year.

For the record, I imported an ECLE from the US. I wanted an ECLE rather than RR or Standard. My machine came with the revised boards - fitted by the previous owner after JJP sent out replacements, though his original boards had not (yet) failed.

He had no issues with the new boards, neither have I, and I don't know anyone who has.

Also, people do realise that Spike node boards have a pretty high failure rate on Sterns, and there have been no documented revisions and failures keep happening.

I know which I'd rather have ... a ****ty, unreliable design that's fixed relatively quickly, as opposed to a ****ty, unreliable design that hasn't been fixed a couple of years later, awful quality control, playfields with massive defects, and many machines with either terrible or abandoned code.

There's much wrong with Dialled In (or its pricing / market positioning), but I don't think the LED boards are really a stick to beat JJP with.
 
Sonny_Jim said:
The guy who's job it was to design the original WoZ lamp boards made a complete cock up of it, lied on his resume about his abilities and was promptly fired and replaced with someone vastly more competent. So I'd be very surprised if the revised ones had any problems.

I
Click to expand...

Seems like a familiar refrain in the pinball industry ...
 
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