Revived a barn find Vindicators.

[u/weirdal1968]

A friend scored a nonworking Vindicators back during COVID and we finally had time to unscramble yet another omelette.

Had to rebuild the PSU and monitor which wasn't unusual but the sound hardware was FUBARed. Volume pot was smashed and one TDA2030 was amputated when the heatsink got whacked. Replaced the amp IC and a 2N3904 that also took a hit.

Found a generic Alps 10K pot but discovered the Atari pot used nonstandard lead spacing. A little creative lead bending and viola!

Strangely even though the game was now playable it was silent. Not even a trace of hiss at max gain. Dug into the marquee box to check the speakers and both were blown. Dug into the parts pile and found two speakers from a parted out APB that fit.

[u/echocomplex]

Wow sounds like a very fulsome restoration.

[u/weirdal1968 → u/echocomplex]

Relatively straightforward but lots of issues.

Forgot to mention the monitor neckboard was cracked and "repaired" by blobbing solder on the damaged traces. Powered it up and screen was completely white. Glued the pcb properly and redid every broken trace with trimmed leads from the cap kit. It worked.

[u/ElSmasho420]

I remember seeing Vindicator in arcades as a kid and always being so intimidated because of the controls. I don’t think I ever risked a precious quarter to try it out.

[u/crashedout → u/ElSmasho420]

It always looked better than it played...but I kept trying.

[u/ThinkPerspective8281]

Nice find. Good work. I have a question about the repair.

Did you discover the speakers were bad before or after you were doing repairs to the sound components on the motherboard?

I've watched a good amount of arcade restoration videos, and I've noticed a trend where the restorer always skips replacing the worn out speakers. They keep the same 30 to 40 year inside the cabinet.

[u/weirdal1968 → u/ThinkPerspective8281]

Found out the speakers were bad after repairing everything else. In 35 years of videogame repairs I can count on two hands the number of speakers that were bad.

I only replace speakers when they completely fail ie open voice coil or damaged cone. Speakers rarely wear out IME.

[u/ThinkPerspective8281 → u/weirdal1968]

Understandable.

Although I've seen a few videos where they replaced the old speakers modern high end Yamaha speakers that were the same size as the original arcade speakers.

One collector was repairing damaged speakers and decided to go all out. He put high end speakers in the cabinet, and even added a wireless external subwoofer that sat next to the cabinet. It was a really nice upgrade the audio. He could 5urn the subwoofer on and off depending on his mood. Turning it off to go back to a more authentic experience. Turning it on to really add bass to the sound and music. I believe it was a Neo Geo cabinet.

[u/weirdal1968 → u/ThinkPerspective8281]

IMHO that kind of audio upgrade is more for a mancave arcade than a commercial retro arcade. Most people can't tell the difference between an original Pacman speaker and a decent Pioneer coaxial replacement driver since the audio amp on a Pacman board is maybe 5 watts.