Various problems - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

26 Nov 2006

On 11/26/06, John Robertson <jrr at flippers.com> wrote:
...
  I have similar trouble in my day job which is
restoring early arcade
 games from the 1960's and 70s.... 
What a fun job.  I'll bet you see some nice items pass by.

...
  Oddly enough the old logic boards seem to keep
working, have a few
 games from the very early 70's (Computer Space and Pong that are
 quite serviceable. so much for the old time theory that cosmic rays
 led to TTL failures as these boards would all be dead if that was the
 case. 
I think the cosmic ray theory went away when there was an issue with
some 4K Intel DRAMs that turned out to be alpha particles from
something radioactive in the clay for the ceramic package, _not_
particles from outer space.  The story lived on, though.

I've looked at the schematics for Computer Space - looks like it could
still be built, if you could stand the rather simplistic gameplay.
I've thought about a modern implementation, but it's a "ship in a
bottle" project - I'd probably build it, then put it aside fairly
quickly

-ethan