still in and happy.

Don't take these poll results too seriously. There's nothing to stop folks from the anti-MMR contingent from voting "out" when they were never in in the first place.

Those people are in.

the screen is full color and which color it displays is selectable through the menu. PPS has said a software update later will add full-color animations.

have not heard that about the artwork from a single other person, no. EDIT: never mind, i just saw Aurich say up close it looked a little blurry. i certainly trust his judgment.

Can anyone tell me if those games at expo are prototype games ? Or is this exactly what I'm getting?

they are what you are getting, they were built from production parts.

I'm hearing board problems?

no, there are no known board problems. there are a lot of people who want there to be board problems, though. i think the board will be great, and a major step forward for pinball tech in terms of maintenance. as a stress test, PPS strapped a shaker motor directly to the board and ran the shaker for 250 hours straight and the board still worked fine after that.

And the fact almost half the orders are cancelled?

this is NOT a fact by any means. some people have cancelled, sure, but there are a contingent of people on here who want MMR to fail and they are no doubt voting "out" when they were never really in in the first place. pathetic, but true. please do not take online polls as "fact".

Every LE that Stern makes, they make an "unlimited" number of non-LEs as well. Plus Rick left the door open from day one that standard MMRs could be made if demand was there.

neither the surprise nor the outrage over that decision has ever made any sense to me.

quadruple??? i don't think there is a market for 4000 AFMs regardless of price.

i don't think that has ever been the plan.

selling out a huge percentage of the games before they're even manufactured is still a huge accomplishment, whether it's 50% or 80% or whatever. in terms of games #2 and #3, a lot will depend on how these games are received once they arrive in homes. If the tech holds up, and PPS is responsive to what problems arise, and follows through on the colorDMD software update, etc, then that will go a long way towards reducing the perceived risk that is currently holding some buyers back.

it also would have cost $15,000.

if I were Rick, I would want to stop speculators too, purely out of self interest. in the long run, the housing industry didn't benefit from the bubble -- if it had been a small, niche, luxury item market like pinball, a bubble like that would have killed it off for good.

i hope people didn't misunderstand -- worth is not the same as cost to construct. building a brand new 1992-era computer would cost a fortune, but it'd still be worthless.

We have no idea what the numbers look like. For all we know, Stern could be making a killing assembling games and taking a cut while incurring zero design, R&D, licensing, support, marketing, or parts manufacturing costs.

i realize a lot have gotten out, but i also have no doubt a bunch of the regular MMR haters on here voted "out" whether they were never in to begin with. it'd be nice if polls listed who voted for which option.

it is absurd to me that people are acting like MMR's platform isn't a huge upgrade over the original. the WPC / WPC95 is far from flawless even by 1990s standards. burnt connectors, blown fuses, bad transistors or whatever happened all the time. the only advantage the original setup has is that the problems are well known and documented. that beaglebone setup in the backbox will have none of those issues -- virtualized hardware doesnt overheat. that beaglebone will run realiably for decades -- it is proven hardware, not something PPS invented. it's far more reliable tech than that wall of boards ever were, and will be far simpler and far cheaper to replace (i believe it retails for $45) even if it does have a problem.

i'm not hating on Williams -- you know i love them. but come on, these things are not the most reliable pins ever made. granted a lot of that is due to their complexity. but electronics have come a long, long way in 20 years and i'm glad PPS is taking advantage of those advancements.

of course, but you know what i mean.

this:

wpc91all.jpg

being condensed to this $45 part:

1278scale_LRG.jpg

is a huge improvement.

i'm no expert, but i believe you are mistaken. it's not just the CPU, it's that board, plus the sound board and lamp matrix as well, right? (edit: also the DMD board)

you are correct about the power driver.

sure, but that would just be an amp, right? all the DCS stuff other than signal amplification is handled by the beaglebone i assume?

i have no doubt there will be issues. it's a brand new platform. but i also believe it's potentially a fundamentally superior design to the old WPC stuff in terms of maintenence, cost, and reliability. i guess we'll find out soon enough where the gremlins are.