… ooops, sorry for the typo,André, it was actually on Amiga disks..
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-27141201

http://kotaku.com/youve-never-heard-of-half-of-these-songs-about-video-g-1451686048?utm_campaign=Socialflow_Kotaku_Facebook&utm_source=Kotaku_Facebook&utm_medium=Socialflow
There's even an Italo Disco Dragon's Lair for Bruno (in the comments section).

1. Go to any youTube video.
2. Pause it.
3. Click anywhere outside the video.
4. Type 1980.

 

Could somebody pick up an item in Saint Géréon for me?
I found a Dreamcast with the 2 Shenmue games there.
I've always loved that game and would like to play it one more time on the original hardware.
Thanks!

Friends, due to the usual and often fatal combination of lack of Stims (=Space, Time, Money and Skills), I decided to downsize the collection a tiny bit and to sell some stuff.
I'm offering the cabs here first because I'd love them to go to a nice arcade loving home.

Here we go:
I'm first selling a Crystal Castles that desperately needs some TLC...



MORE PICS AVAILABLE HERE : http://min.us/mcrystalcastles

I think at some point this cab must have been stored in a humid place because the wood is flaky on some parts.

I bought it from Paul 50's and his description was "working but dark screen".
I have to admit I never plugged it.
The trackball is not rolling.
No backdoor.
There was no kickplate sticker and as they are none available anywhere, I asked Mikonos to print a repro sticker for me (check the link with the pictures to view it).
So it's not silkscreened, it's just inkjet and to be honest the packing job was not optimal so there are some creases in the sticker (you can see it on the pictures).
I will of course include it with the cab.
Not pictured here is the original manual, that I will include too.

Anyway, something to keep you busy during the summer for sure  

I bought it for silly money BITD because I was young and excited and I had lost hopes of finding one in Europe.
This cab is now located in Belgium in a secret base close to the town "Nivelles".

Make me an offer and honk 3 times if you're into teddy bears and M.C. Escher!

The excellent people from Retroludix did it again!
The "Game Over" exhibition is taking place in Louvain-La-Neuve Belgium until March 1st.
It's officially about demystifying a few recurrent stereotypes regarding video games in general but really it's mostly about spreading the retro gaming love  

Most of the games are playable of course...
Here are a few shots of wednesday's opening party for your viewing pleasure.

Need some help from the team here.
Somebody in the area could please collect a package for me in Voiron, France?
I found some parts there via "leboncoin.fr" but the seller wants me to send him money cash in an envelope. (NO way!)
So I'd rather have somebody trustworthy picking up the items for me.
It's quite small about 60cm tall and weighing 2 kilos.
Thanks already, may the euro distribution network do his magic one more time.

You now I'm not a tecchie at all so I'm probably going to ask stupid questions here, please be indulgent...

Here's my attempt to fix a TAITO Space Invaders "L" Shaped PCB with the tremendous help of my friend "4l4in" AKA the technigician.
He has the tools, the knowledge, the patience to explain me even the basics and he agreed to help me on this mission.
Thank you, thank you for that, buddy!

First of all, you have to know there are 2 similar boards involved.
Let's call them "Oxford" and "Lancaster" which are roughly the names of the places where I picked them up.

Also note that we doubled check the voltages and they are correct (+5,+12,-5V measured from the board).

Here's the log of where we are (stuck) at the moment.
Any help or suggestions are welcome.

Lancaster PCB:
When plugged is showing only 2 flashing dashes on the screen.
Checked with an oscilloscope, the processor and memories seem OK.
No sound.

When checking the original ROMs, they seem defectives.
So we swapped them with the eproms from the Oxford board.
Game starts, displays scores and targets, then offers to select either 1 or 2 players.
When I start the game, the game screens start to appear and then the game resets.
Credits are stuck on 40.

We decided to program a set of EPROMS to try it.
We programmed the set with the ROMs from MAME "invaders.zip".
Didn't work at all.

We then compared the original ROMs with what was available on the internet and found out that what we needed was the "Space Invaders (TV Version)" ROMset called sitv.zip
After a close check it appeared that our original ROMS had the exact same content as that set so the problem doesn't come from the ROMs.
"Fausse route" as we say

So, so far we still have our problem: game keeps on resetting after attract screen.

When launching the selftest mode, it stops at the RAMs.
Found on the net that the test mode displays which RAM is defective using a code from "1 to 8" and from "A to H".
Amongst the garbled screen we could see a letter G displayed in the middle of the screen.
We then replaced the 7th RAM.
Selftest is now OK.
Text now displays fine on the screen.
Unfortunately as soon as an invaders appears on the screen, game resets itself…
As long as it's only displaying text everything seems OK.
to be continued...


Oxford PCB:
Doesn't start at all.
Found an IC defective that was preventing the synchonisation of the RAMS.
Replaced the IC.
Now we can launch the selftest procedure.
It says that RAMs are OK and you can hear various sounds.
The game is stuck at the first screen.
Graphics in test mode are OK but are garbled in game mode.
to be continued...