**UPDATED on 06-October-2018**

The new version of the display tester work on Bally/Stern & Zaccaria displays!

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Dear friends and pinball lovers,

it has been a very long time I have started working on this new project but due other priorities and project I have been constantly postponing it.

As some of you have already seen that I normally test my LED displays with some automatic routines and I started being asked if such a tester would have been available for sale.
Initially I didn't really want to dig into it but I finally decided to develop something more user friendly, without hanging wires and robust enough to be provided to anyone else without worrying about any possible wiring failures and headaches.
The most complicated part was the molex header plug in method because I didn't want to use what it's currently available on the market so I had to find something really specific until I succeeded.
Then I needed an easy way to power it up, cables, DC jack and so on...
...finally why not to have some LED indicators to make it more fancy and sexy?
And finally all this ended up to what I'm presenting today.

This is the previous Bally/Stern display tester:

This is the brand new Bally/Stern & Zaccaria display tester:

I don't know if it will be a success story but I know that I'm happy to have produced it.

Now coming to the details:

This is an automatic tool which runs 4 different cycles of tests in order to test all combinations and segments of your plasma or LED Bally/Stern displays.
The different cycles are indicated by the BarGraph LED installed

This tester is compact and easy to use, you just need to plug it on the J1 header of the display and provide the power.

Two options are available:

- For LED displays you can power it up using the USB cable provided with the kit and an USB power source;
- For old plasma displays you must provide the HV from an external power source in addition to the USB power.

This tester is portable and can be used wherever you want, if on LED displays, as no HV is needed.
The USB power cord gives you the possibility to connect and power it from a normal USB port (power bank, laptop, PC, USB power supply, ...)

A 2 pins 3.96mm (1.56 inches) male header is provided in order to help plugging the HV for the correct functioning of the original plasma displays.
This tester is sold already assembled and tested.

This tester includes:
- The main tester board;
- 2 pins male header 3.96mm;
- An USB power cord.
- Assembly costs

Price for the Bally/Stern version is 45$
Price for the Bally/Stern & Zaccaria version is 55$

If you think you would like to have it just send me a PM and I'll reply to you with the order details.

Gianfri

_________________________________________
Pinball Solutions
www.pinballsolutions.eu
LED displays for Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Williams/Data East and much more... visit our website.

Thanks folks, receiving a lot of messages and requests which shows that you're really interested.

This tool is awesome and you'll be the first ones having the chance to try it and eventually give me some feedback and suggestions.

BTW
Last 5 testers to go and then there will be some delay for the new run.

Gianfri

_________________________________________
Pinball Solutions
http://www.pinballsolutions.eu
LED displays for Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Williams/Data East and much more... visit our website.

Hi
That's quite strange because the website works quite well.

Please send me a PM with the error message if you can.

Cheers
Gianfri

Dear folks,

some of you asked me where to take the HV
Well, several options, either you have a generic DC source between 165v and 185v or you use an existing pinball machine power board.

In my video I used two crocodile cables and I connected them to the HV header of a Zaccaria power board which works with around 170v output.

The only important thing is to avoid any accidental short between the two leads.

Gianfri

_________________________________________
Pinball Solutions
www.pinballsolutions.eu
LED displays for Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Williams/Data East and much more... visit our website.

Many many thanks to all of you who have supported me in this project.

The first run of the display tester has been sold out.

Now waiting for some feedback while working already on the next run since it looks like there is some interest out there.

_________________________________________
Pinball Solutions
http://www.pinballsolutions.eu
LED displays for Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Williams/Data East and much more... visit our website.

Hi Mike,

many thanks for your feedback, I think I missed it out that's why I didn't reply earlier
I already had several feddbacks but any other missing feedback will be welcomed.

One comment was about the speed of the different cycles, I'm open to any speed change but before doing it I would like to know if you think this would make the testing process a bit slower and maybe boring.
Being the developer of this tester I have my own opinion but I know that owner always sees the product as the better possible one ever
So feel free to give yours.

Gianfri

Hi all,

I would like to thank al the ones who came back to me with comments and feedbacks. (Of course some never came back but it's never too late!)
I have been extremely busy with all the ongoing projects therefore I didn't have much time to work on the next release but...
...I'm ready now to present some of your requests.

To be honest there is just one comment which is the recurring one: reduce the animation speed in order to have it less in attraction mode and more in repair mode

I'll tell you more and post a video later on.

Gianfri
_________________________________________
Pinball Solutions
www.pinballsolutions.eu
LED displays for Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Williams/Data East and much more... visit our website.

Hi there, I can understand because it's the same here
I have been sooooo busy on tons of projects that sometimes I realize I don't have enough time to do what I have to do and things remain aside.

Some of you already know, some don't, but we're now producing all range of LED displays for almost all brands, Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Bally/Midway, Williams/Data East and this is really A LOOOOT of work!
We are now covering all display models from System 3 to System 11 and we are currently working on the aesthetical details for all our models in order to have them even nicer.

That said, it can be easily understandable why I'm not able to invest more time on already existing projects:
diagnostic tools are nice to have and give satisfaction on the way others can enjoy and exploit them even if market is very limited but they don't give economic return, they just pay themselves back for all the work you have been doing from prototyping to production passing by testing and studying

Coming back soon with more news.
Gianfri

_________________________________________
Pinball Solutions
www.pinballsolutions.eu
LED displays for Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Williams/Data East and much more... visit our website.

So, here we are, that's a short video of the new tester revision, I hope you'll like it.
The quality is not the best, digits are a bit blury but, believe me, in real they are ok

I understand, let me know as soon as you test it, I'm still tuning the code for the new release.

Gianfri

Dear Wayne,

thanks for your comments and yes, as I said I'm not going to concentrate too much efforts on this kind of products because it's not going to pay back.
I think that we all can imagine nicer features but some are just out of the target due to limitations of the technology and dimensions I use.

The HV risk it's a concern I have, but the only thing I can say is to write on the guide to pay attention and be careful when playing with 180v, touching pin1 would give some nice and pleasant moments to the one touching

The current video has the slowed down animations compared to the first version, the question is: is it enough?

As from your points:
1) it's easy to implement, I already cycle from 0 to 9, I can add the way around from 9 to 0
2) already there
3) could be done but a bit more work and even if nice to see I have some doubts on the added value on repair because those displays have just a decoder which when defect is going to give visible signs already with those testing cycles.
4) could be done, again a bit more work on coding which I'm afraid I don't have
5) didn't understand what should be different from the current "Knight Rider Car mode"

For the other points, the switch to cycle could be nice but I have used all the possibilities I had and I should sacrifice other things to do that.

The tester uses multiplexing but I never heard about the Bally theory.

Last detail on single segments to light on, that's on my knowledge impossible, as the tester uses the decoder to control the segments and that decoder is just a basic BtoD decoder which doesn't control single segments independently.

And for more, my partner has developed a much complex tester for all kind of Williams system 3 to 11 led displays, Bally/Midway led displays and DOT matrix led displays, it's a completely different product and it's used only for our internal needs but... maybe one day we will do the same I did with this Zaccaria/Bally display tester.

Gianfri

Btw I have omitted to say that the new version of the display tester has been expanded in order to be able to test both Zaccaria and Bally/Stern displays

A micro switch will allow you to select the Brand you want to test.

In the following video you'll see a test on Zaccaria displays, two details:
- I have mixed 3 different Zaccaria models to show the fact that it works on all models using a multi connector flat ribbon cable
- some displays are coming from a stock I have recently acquired and you can see that 2 are defective.

The tester gave me the opportunity to detect a problem on the digit selection of the 8 digits display which uses only 4 digits twice (digit selection is a binary combination and this means that one bit is not correctly decoded)
The other display has 2 dead digits.

thanks for feedback, I'll do it

And here we are:

the second version of the display tester is ready.

As discussed before this tester is capable to test both Bally/Stern and Zaccaria displays.
It works with an external USB 5v power supply and with the HV needed for the classic plasma displays.
LED displays do not need HV therefore you can use the tester with a simple USB power source like a power bank and you can even use it in the middle of a forest in case you would feel this need

I have reduced the speed of the different cycles but didn't want to have it too boring too therefore I hope you'll like it:

Dear pinsiders,

fos some of you it could be interesting to read this discussion about the external HV power source for powering the plasma displays while testing them with the Zaccaria/Bally display tester:

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/cheap-power-for-bally-stern-displays-will-this-work

_________________________________________
Pinball Solutions
www.pinballsolutions.eu
LED displays for Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Williams/Data East and much more... visit our website.

Hi Mitch, I would avoid working with 200VDC, try to lower it to 170VDC.

Gianfri

Hello folks,

the new version of the tester has arrived.

What's new? Actually not much

I have just updated the PCB layout, moved the Bally/Zaccaria selector, corrected a small PCB mistake and added few warnings.

If you're hesitating... that's the right moment to take the right decision and buy one

gianfri

_________________________________________
Pinball Solutions
www.pinballsolutions.eu
LED displays for Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Williams/Data East and much more... visit our website.

Hello again,

here the next bunch on testers ready to ship

20190512_103402 (resized).jpg

On the left a Bally LED display, on the right a Zaccaria 8D LED display.

_________________________________________
Pinball Solutions
www.pinballsolutions.eu
LED displays for Zaccaria, Bally/Stern, Williams/Data East and much more... visit our website.