That's what 'dirty pool' is all about

Rob

Dirty pool is very rare. Diverting to the kicker happens a bit.

I'm missing the reference . . . .

From the first Addams movie. From TAF.

LTG : )

You Cheat Dr. jones

Just saw an i3-4170 CPU (tested / working) on Ebay for $39.99US + tax, free shipping to continental US. Looks like the same model Mageek used in his upgrade. There were 2 for sale, I bought 1. One still left, if anyone wants it.

ebay.com link: itm

I'm sure it will be a really good cpu. I upgraded to a Core I5 4590 (3.3 ghz) and there's no more phone video lag issues.

Rob

Just snagged it thanks! Was on the fence but for $40 may as well make my 9k game play as intended

I’m joining this club next weekend. I’m going to try and read through this whole thread. It’s going to take me a while. Any tips about things to bullet proof or fix before I get to playing this game?

Congrats!! I can’t stop playing mine

When I got my DI (about 3 or 4 weeks ago), I very quickly upgraded it to 1.71. I don't see the lag even though I've got the Celeron processor. Very strange.

I suppose I'm not seeing it because I didn't ever experience the original appearance? But I'm typically very aware of lag issues and don't see anything.

Some other have been OK too so you may just be lucky. I have been meaning to upgrade (I have a celeron) but still haven't gotten around to it...

I haven't done the upgrade yet, and once I do I don't really want to go back. So for $40 I'll have the i3 chip on hand to install if necessary.

Yep, that was pretty much my line of thinking as well.

I just bought a i5-4670 on ebay for $57....101% faster than the G3260 dual core Pentium that was in it. I would have gone with a slower cpu maybe.....but thought JJP might continue updating the software a bit and require faster and faster cpus so wanted to hedge against that a bit.

Try playing Alien Invasion with the glass off. Put the ball in the scoop to trigger 2nd or possibly 3rd animations. Those ones always lagged on my game. See video.

There's 2 side effects I have seen with the faster cpu. The timing of QED moving to block a dropped ball is slightly changed. Also, the phone tends to dial rather fast sometimes. No big deal though on either.

Rob

My DILE has the Celeron processor, I'm on release 1.71, and I see a bit of delay in some of the animations, however these don't impact the gameplay in any way. I don't want to take the risk of replacing the CPU in view of potential side effects and risk of impact with future new software releases by JJP. I wouldn't count on JJP testing future software releases on the entire range of CPU's that readers of this forum have installed. I do expect JJP to fix any observed issues (e.g. the video lags) with new SW releases for the 'original' CPU's. Have to be patient though...

Just wanted to follow up. I bent the scoop back down just a little. Game’s scoop is playing perfectly now!

In my case I didn’t need to adjust strength.

There is a 1.72 beta code in test at the moment

Woohoo! Hopefully it fixes the lag issues. I'll hold off on buying a CPU replacement until I hear if the new update fixes it or not.

I played it the other day over at SS Billiards. I’m new to the game though, so I couldn’t tell you what was different.

I took delivery of a new LE earlier this year. From my experience so far, nothing in DI really needed to be altered before play. However, there are a few things you might want to keep an eye on:

1) I was seeing recurring issues with balls not feeding in the trough during game play. They seemed to be getting stuck together, and not rolling toward the VUK in there. Problem was the balls were getting magnetized after about 70 games, and so wouldn't roll when grouped together in the trough. The fix is to demagnetize the balls when I see that becoming an issue. I bought a cheap degausser on ebay that does the trick. (pic below) I'm a bit surprised others here aren't reporting this problem... I play with Ball Baron standards and rotate them out for a demagged set about every 70 plays.
2) Mylar covering the Theater and Drone magnets got chewed up after about 500 games. You'll find in the thread here that the best long term fix is simply to cut the mylar away from around these magnets using a brand new X-Acto knife. I did that, and no more issues.
3) Have a good look at the Bob trap door. Run a test on it: when in the UP position, it should NOT hit the wire form ramp going into Station 3. Many here have reported a broken trap door flap due to it hitting the ramp. I'm surprised that would ever happen, since the ramp flap is made from hardened spring steel, but it does happen. It is adjustable if needed... just make sure its not hitting the ramp when the door is raised up. Mine is over 1000 plays now and no issues at all.
4) Take some time setting the game up correctly so you don't get STDM drains when a ball is released out of the Theater. The fix is to simply adjust the right rear leg a bit so the ball doesn't go STDM if released. Mine was doing that, and it was a simple fix.
5) Also on the Theater magnet: the magnet probably will need some setup to properly "toss" the ball up and around to the side. Read up on how to do that and get your magnet strength adjusted correctly for the "toss".
6) Make sure the lightening bolts that the QED guy is holding on to are correctly positioned in his hands. I've read of more than one case where they weren't mounted properly, and wound up causing the $300 InvisiGlass getting scratched. Just be careful about that.

Enjoy the game! Its thoroughly amazing, extremely challenging and always fun.

- Bill.
s-l1600 (resized).jpg

@silverwings, so you like this demagnetizer? Have you used balls that have been demagnetized back in the game and if so, did they last long?
Have you demagnetized the same ball more than once?

As to #1, I use carbon steel balls which shouldn’t magnetize easily, but DI has such crazy magnet activity, that I find the need to swap them as much as you. I too am curious how well the de-magnetizer works. Do you have a link to where you can get it?

https://www.micromark.com/Electronic-Demagnetizer-110V-AC?gclid=Cj0KCQjwt5zsBRD8ARIsAJfI4BjHg18p9JVnIWnfUYgKZOmriVc_19N6ychhjyEmSfdrIAFHmybSRMkaAmQXEALw_wcB

Search Google for demagnetizer. Lots of choices.

LTG : )

same here, easy to notice when it happends or even before it happends, you know it already by looking in the rack

Hey there... I'm a bit surprised this topic hasn't been thrashed about here in the thread yet. DI has more EMP action than any other pin I'm aware of. The magnets used are bigger and seem to be pulsed much harder than anything else. So this is why I've been forced into degaussing the balls on DI. Other games with magnets don't seem to have the EMP pulse DI has. Hell, it even has a mode called "EMP Pulse" that does real damage to stuff! (where's the warning sticker for players who have a pacemaker installed?)

The little Chinese degausser works fine for the intended purpose, but I wouldn't count on it lasting very long. To demagnetize a ball, I position the ball on the degausser, and press the button to give just a very short ON burst - maybe 1 second. Then I sort of randomly turn the ball to a different orientation and do it again... this done maybe 20 times in all sorts of different orientations at random as best I can. Then I test to see if the ball is still magnetized.

To test if the ball is still magnetized, simply put a paper clip up to it and see if it can hold the clip up. Try this in a few different orientations. If so, then probably needs more demagnetizing. If it can't hold a paper clip up, then that one is done. I also happen to have a very sensitive magnetic field tester in my shop, so I do know the actual gauss level of every ball. So I know the paper clip test is adequate.

I'm running Ball Baron standard carbon steel pinballs. Exactly the same thing shipped with DI, and exactly the same as SilverJet's you can get from Marco. And YES, I do demag these balls as many times as needed. To date, the set in the game now has been degaussed 8 times.

From what I've found about the magnetic properties of carbon steel, through-hardening makes the steel MUCH more capable of holding a magnetic state than non hardened steel. For that reason, I don't run Ninja balls in DI. Just standard high quality carbon steel balls.

The thing that stops balls getting re-used is surface wear. When pulled for degaussing, I also inspect the surface finish of each ball with a 60x pocket microscope. When they start showing too much wear, they're replaced. Balls that are torn up are the main source of playfield wear, along with dirt/debris on the PF.

The link that LTG sent looks perfect. Or do a search on eBay for "degausser" or "demagnetizer" and find one like the picture I posted on this page. They're cheap, and do the job good enough.

I thought in-trough degaussing might really be the answer, but after more research found its more complicated than meets the eye. So just have a couple sets of balls or more: when the ones you're playing begin to get stuck in the trough, rotate in another set and you're good for a while. I seem to be degaussing here about every 70 games or so.

Or just buy new pinballs.

How many games are occurring before you see signs of magnetism?

I'd guess it needs to be a LOT. I'm pretty sure my DI has 2000+ plays on the current pinballs and they are not magnetized.

I’ve never tested mine because I didn’t know it was a thing..... but I do have issues with lag on the balls coming out of the trough and the scoop fairly often

I would say mine start sticking to the trough every 75-100 games or so.

Wow.

I'm wondering if we are finding out that some Carbon Steel pinballs are more pure than others.

My ones from pinballlife, which I don’t think they sell anymore, seemed to last longer than the ones from Ball Baron.

I have an issue in that my dialed in doesn't fully power up.

I get the main display and phone. Software fully loads.

No playfield lights. Only cabinet based light is near the coin door.
I do have red status lights on the I/O board however.
The cpu light is flashing (D201)

I've looked in the manual and can't seem to find how I am supposed to troubleshoot this nor what the flashing D201 light indicates.

My first stop was going to be testing all fuses on the I/O board.

Have you checked the mini USB connector at the USB1 connection on the CPU board? It connects to the BAG controller board at J101. If that mini USB connector has come loose I don't believe you will have any lights on the playfield. If you are looking straight at the CPU board, it is the USB connection on the far left bottom corner of the CPU board.

I have the same trough magnetization issue, been meaning to order a plastic trough shim from Marco, I think those help with the magnetic ‘stickiness’ in the trough.

Reseated every usb and where it leads to.

Its not just lights but everything apart from 2 screens, game can't be played at all.\
Start button doesn't work, flippers dont work. Mr electric guy doesn't do its calibration move etc.

edit: I checked my pirates for similar flashing cpu light behaviour.

Pirates was faster, dialed in was slower.

All boards underneath were green.

Did a quick restore of a previous version of 1.59 i'd backed up (was on 1.6x something) and its working again.

So im guessing some sort of software detection of board issue? *shrugs* Time to close that jjp ticket.

i will try this demagnetizer model for 17€

41QXLv8TvVL._AC_ (resized).jpg

Just a note on beta code v1.72, KevInBuffalo streamed this code over the weekend. I asked him about his hardware specs and it looks like he's running the 2.8 GHZ processor. From the little bit that I could see on the stream, it looks like the animations were running smoothly enough. Maybe Kevin can comment. I didn't see the major culprit (Acid Rain), but I'm hopeful that the animations are running smoothly.

on mine, no real change (my son agree) with 1.72b
but OK let's admit we're not all equal about this lag prob... :/
btw, and as said before, almost we know Joe/Ted are still working on it

What is this lag problem that you speak of? Picking up my Dialed In this weekend and want to know what I'm looking for.

On code after v1.57, there is video lag on the cell phone, and sometimes on the main display, when there are a lot of animations going on. The worst example IME is during Acid Rain. Prior to v1.57, there wasn't an issue with the video keeping up with audio. Some people have bought new CPUs (Intel i5 3.3 gHz processors) to address the problem via hardware, vs waiting for Ted/Joe to address via software.

For those of you that have the beta, what do the release notes say?

https://www.marcospecialties.com/control/keywordsearch?SEARCH_STRING=ball+trough+shim

LTG : )

Lloyd, does this work with Stern and JJP games? It shows for Bally/Williams games.

I don't believe Stern.

It works with any game using the Williams ball trough. Bally/Williams DMD era. Jersey Jack Pinball, PPS/CGC Remakes, and American Pinball.

LTG : )

Seems like the code smooths out the video nicely, the stream is here if anyone wants to see for themselves: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/484645830

This is absolutely the case! I found the ball barron balls terrible, pinball life used to be good but not anymore and this is not just the case with DI but any magnet game. I have finally given up on all 'extra shiny' carbon steel. I have had VERY good luck with the basic Marco standard balls and these are my new go to.

https://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/PB116-5

I'm having good luck with the standard Titan pinballs too: https://www.titanpinball.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=57&product_id=69

Is there anything that controls the starting value of the UAMB jackpots? 4K doesn't seem like much to begin with. I checked the rulesheet on Tilt and there's nothing there about this specifically.

Rob

I guess if you're going to lose an entire LED on the phone, this is the one to lose (bottom middle). I am wondering if the ball is possibly hitting the underside of the phone as it ejects and that caused this LED to fail? Has anyone ever attempted to repair one of these? The board is about $90US, so after shipping it is kind of cost prohibitive to replace for just 1 bad LED.

I'm going to lower the kickout power of the phone scoop, but I will probably not bend the scoop itself. I think it would probably bend back eventually.

Rob

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