It’s been hard, I haven’t really touched an arcade game since summer of 2010. I have an Asteroids cocktail that I want to restore, it’s a complete wreck. The monitor is shot, the CRT tube is of no use. Fortunately I ordered a 15” b/w CRT from Richards Electronics that I have sitting in a box, waiting for me to resurrect the display.
Of course getting a vector CRT display working again is no picnic. Without an existing game that works to drive it, what is one to do? The answer is using a Zektor ZVG, I can drive test patterns to any vector display. Since I have the appropriate harness (I use the Zektor ordinarily to drive a 19” b/w vector display), I now have something to generate known good signals to test against.
The ZVG (Zektor Vector Generator) is an amazing device. To think that someone would create a product that can drive 30 year old vector display technology using modern computers is amazing. While the ZVG is no longer manufactured, if you were lucky enough to get your hands on one you are blessed. My ZVG allows me to play old vector games using VectorMAME, a version of MAME specially modified to drive the ZVG. Since I have a 19V200 (a 19” b/w vector monitor that was used in the Atari vector games), and the necessary cables and power supply – I can play the old vector games on a real vector monitor! Now I just need to make a cabinet for the system.
I drive my ZVG using a micro-ATX board (about 5” x 5”) and boot to DOS from a flash card. No moving parts, highly reliable, and modern electronics (except the monitor).
