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Stern, Spike and the furture of Pinball


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My thoughts would be to rip out the entire SPIKE system and make a replacement electronics set - all the boards - the whole lot!

 

Exactly what I was thinking and also why quizzing you the other day.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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Stern, Spike and the furture of Pinball

 

SOME opps have had zero problems.

 

How do yo KNOW percentages of failures, not everybody bothers to post on pinside.

 

Very political isn't it.... hmmm

 

"their" not "there", as well ;)

 

Who gives a **** you knob

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Re-posted word for word from the same thread as this one on Pinside:

 

 

"A short on a node board can destroy it, costing hundreds of dollars and days to fix.

A short on a Sam game results in a blown fuse or transistor, pennies and minutes to fix.

These are pinball machines, it's inevitable something will break, which system would you rather have when it does?"

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Is it about the title or the OS? I think a title will always win this argument especially for the "dream title" that many want made for themselves regardless of whats driving it because in reality we don't have that choice.
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This is about System, not Titles.

 

Each new Title has kits own shitfight thread.

 

Spike 2 came about pretty quick meaning the original Spike must have had some issues.

 

Another thing we noticed on Spike 2 was the removal of the audio outs on the main board. Due to what??

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This is about System, not Titles.

 

Each new Title has kits own shitfight thread.

 

Spike 2 came about pretty quick meaning the original Spike must have had some issues.

 

Another thing we noticed on Spike 2 was the removal of the audio outs on the main board. Due to what??

50c usd part saving?
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You mean 2.3%.

 

You are spot on. Thanks for that. Must've been too tired at 1am when I was typing.

 

- - - Updated - - -

 

Maybe ask them why the prices are increasing as opposed to whats actually in the machine.

Lets look back on this in 5 years time and judge then. Salesmen are suppose to talk up their product.

 

Yes, understand re salesmen. My wife is in sales and 'talk it up' she can do very well. Luckily she does as it helps pay for my pins!

 

I agree re the 5 years as I will be (and many others too I am tipping) very interested to see where these games are at.

 

Cheers.

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As far as repairs go proprietary electronics will make it very difficult if not near impossible to economically repair a board, especially where firmware is involved.

As Mike pointed out Stern are not likely to release to thr end user the code in their chips.

 

I also noted what very much looked like a microchip PIC microcontroller on Mikes example of one of his "repairable" boards. Does this mean we will be supplied the micro-code from "homepin" to facilitate repairs if required.

 

Certainly not stirring anything here, I do have the absolute utmost respect for what Mike is doing and I am excited to see the results..... just wondering is all.

 

Cheers

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This is an interesting discussion. I don't think there is much that can be said about SPIKE that hasn't already been said.

 

The real test will be to see how SPIKE games are operating in four or five years. It is irrelevant having this discussion now because none of the SPIKE games have actually been played much. It would be interesting to compare the number of failures on a WPC game to a SPIKE game after the same number of plays and in a commercial environment.

 

I'm just frustrated that I'm only just getting my head around the WPC system and now there's another one I'll eventually have to learn...

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It would be interesting to compare the number of failures on a WPC game to a SPIKE game after the same number of plays and in a commercial environment.

Quite possible more failures overall with WPC (leds & globes counted as a failure included), however WPC is repairable, & that's the big difference.

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I also noted what very much looked like a microchip PIC microcontroller on Mikes example of one of his "repairable" boards. Does this mean we will be supplied the micro-code from "homepin" to facilitate repairs if required.

 

Certainly not stirring anything here, I do have the absolute utmost respect for what Mike is doing and I am excited to see the results..... just wondering is all.

 

 

We are using several small microcontrollers for a couple of reasons.

 

We wanted certain, complex mechanisms to work on their own - to be autonomous. This allows an entire mechanism, let's use the Tracy Island mech as the example here, to be removed from the machine and adjusted or repaired on the bench. This mech has 7 opto inputs, two motors to drive and two different effects lamps. If we designed it the traditional way, that would gobble up 11 of the I/O available from the main board.

 

Now we only need three and a bonus is we have added test switches to the board. With any fault on this board, the board is 100% through hole parts and they are pretty well all common electronics so a competent person skilled in electronics repair will have no problem diagnosing and repairing this board. The microcontroller is fitted in a socket so could easily be replaced if it was suspected and........

 

.......we will have the hex code available on the Homepin website, downloadable for anyone who wants to have it. Not the source, but the hex so a replacement chip could be programmed at any time in the future.

 

I don't envisage any problems with the electronics BUT, (and I don't have final prices - this is just my "guesstimate") a replacement chip should be around $10, a complete (tested) board around $150 and we will also offer a repair service as many others might also.

 

The biggest advantage doing things this way is the ease of assembly and testing for us in the factory and for the end user, the ease of testing or repairing each of our assemblies that are designed this way. This will make diagnosing a problem and fixing it much more straightforward in my opinion.

 

I like the Stern bus system and we certainly were looking at doing something similar but for every positive, the idea has several negatives.

 

I'm very comfortable with the way our electronics has developed despite our initial setbacks when we lost all of the work done. That's a story for a different thread.

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We are using several small microcontrollers for a couple of reasons.

 

We wanted certain, complex mechanisms to work on their own - to be autonomous. This allows an entire mechanism, let's use the Tracy Island mech as the example here, to be removed from the machine and adjusted or repaired on the bench. This mech has 7 opto inputs, two motors to drive and two different effects lamps. If we designed it the traditional way, that would gobble up 11 of the I/O available from the main board.

 

Now we only need three and a bonus is we have added test switches to the board. With any fault on this board, the board is 100% through hole parts and they are pretty well all common electronics so a competent person skilled in electronics repair will have no problem diagnosing and repairing this board. The microcontroller is fitted in a socket so could easily be replaced if it was suspected and........

 

.......we will have the hex code available on the Homepin website, downloadable for anyone who wants to have it. Not the source, but the hex so a replacement chip could be programmed at any time in the future.

 

I don't envisage any problems with the electronics BUT, (and I don't have final prices - this is just my "guesstimate") a replacement chip should be around $10, a complete (tested) board around $150 and we will also offer a repair service as many others might also.

 

The biggest advantage doing things this way is the ease of assembly and testing for us in the factory and for the end user, the ease of testing or repairing each of our assemblies that are designed this way. This will make diagnosing a problem and fixing it much more straightforward in my opinion.

 

I like the Stern bus system and we certainly were looking at doing something similar but for every positive, the idea has several negatives.

 

I'm very comfortable with the way our electronics has developed despite our initial setbacks when we lost all of the work done. That's a story for a different thread.

 

Thanks for clearing that up Mike, not that there was any issue. I applaud your decision to allow download of proprietary hex code to allow future repairs possible.

I also understand why you decided to go the microcontroller route as it does allow more flexibility. My only concern was that microcontrollers do have (mostly) secure code and replication can be an issue if in the future replacements with the code weren't available. Thanks for clearing that up.

 

Keep up the good work Mike.

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Is it about the title or the OS? I think a title will always win this argument especially for the "dream title" that many want made for themselves regardless of whats driving it because in reality we don't have that choice.

 

Not for me. Star Wars is far and away my favourite movie, but the litany of failures from Stern over the last few years killed any interest I would- SHOULD- have had in this game. Had JJP got the licence I would probably now be trying to scrape together $14k for a NIB.

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Not for me. Star Wars is far and away my favourite movie, but the litany of failures from Stern over the last few years killed any interest I would- SHOULD- have had in this game.

 

Not fully related to the subject but my Williams Indiana Jones fully meets my expectations with respect to the movie franchise it represents. It's sad when a title is released and fulls short. :(

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