After hearing on John's Vs. SMB video about Matt Osborn's high score save chip and that it was a simple ROM swap, I decided to purchase one of those chips and try to install it myself. I picked up Vs. SMB, my first arcade machine, last summer and hadn't touched the insides since I cleaned all the dust on the bezel and replaced the plexiglass. So, taking out the PCB was pretty scary since I'm not very experienced with hardware. I even had to take the ROM chip out the "wrong way" (i.e. using a flathead screwdriver like John does). That was the hardest part. At first it seemed like the chip wouldn't budge. But it eventually came out without losing any legs. In the end it was a success! I played a couple of quick games to try out the save feature and I'm quite satisfied with the result.



It may have been a relatively simple install but I feel like I've come a long way since freaking out about dust that mistook for mold...
Now it's time to get some high scores! I think I could get 2 million if I really tried. My best score (that I got before installing the chip) is 1.7 million.

I think the idea of John doing arcade vs. console comparisons would be great. Here's my idea for a way he could approach it: he could do a Nintendo Vs. System vs. NES comparison series. Just as an example, he could play a game of Excitebike on the NES and then afterwards play a game of Vs. Excitebike. I know he's done plenty of videos on the Vs. games, but it would be interesting to see the differences between a Vs. game and its corresponding NES game in one video. I don't think there are many videos out there showing these often vast differences, much less ones showing them on real hardware. This is assuming he owns the NES versions of all the Vs. games, of course.

Whenever I get a game, I clean the heck out of it. It's ok. Bleach kills mold. Buy something like Fantastic or Simple Green with bleach,

I finally got around to cleaning it today. As it turns out, it was just dust after all. Phew!
Now, back to figuring out the coin doors. I posted the pictures above. Can you see any possible problems from those pictures? Do I need better pictures?

I'm working on getting my cleaning supplies together, but in the meantime, here are the coin mech pics.

Would I have to discharge and remove the monitor in the process?
Or is there a way to use a vacuum to clean the dust/mold off the back and the boards of the monitor?

I'll post the pictures of the coin mechs later, because I've discovered a more serious problem. The spotty dust on the cardboard and left wall and roof surrounding the monitor is actually mold. There's even some clinging to the metal and boards on the back of the monitor. This is definitely going to require a bit more work than I thought. What can I do to get rid of the mold?

Hello, everyone!

I just picked up my first arcade machine - a Vs. Super Mario Bros. upright cabinet. It's in decent shape, though not pristine. The only problem so far is that neither of the two Asahi Seiko coin mechs seem to work. I can put coins in, but they seem to disappear into the mech until I hit the coin release lever. As I mentioned, I'm totally new to this. Does anyone have any ideas?