It’s a bit of a crap shoot, with some people reporting that they have had no or minimal issues and some reporting many issues. You have been lucky so far, but odds are you will have a problem with at least a board at some point. For some, when the problems start, they just seem to continue. The most reliable board set, and the one that will continue to be supported going forward is the 2.0. I would say it depends upon whether you want to keep your game for the long haul. If you do, upgrading makes sense. If you think you will just keep it for another year or so before selling, then you could risk it.

Thanks, I appreciate the comments. I think the smart play is to buy the 2.0 kit and keep it until a problem arises. If I sell it someday, the 2.0 boards will help with the sale, even if the 1.1 version hasn’t failed yet.

Are these 2.0 light board kits available anywhere still? Jersey Jack is sold out.

Email them. They probably just have a waiting list, but I’m sure more kits will be available soon.

You might have to wait a little bit, but it shouldn't be long. Call Frank at JJP tomorrow 732-364-9900 ext 1222 and ask. He can tell you how to get on a list.

Awesome, thanks!

Rainbow hurry up on the left??? Please post a picture of what insert you're talking about, I don't believe there is a Rainbow hurry up at all much less on the left (because the rainbow targets are all on the right).

Edit: I went and looked at my game and the Rainbow Hurry-Up is above the left sling and inlane, not the pop bumper. Regardless I don't really see how that and the Munchkinland arrow would be related to each other or your problem. I don't think you have a problem with your YBR lights at all though. In game they are all dim except for the ones that show how far you've progressed, they only cycle when you advance, during a different light show, etc. I believe you have the game setup to spot you 3 levels of YBR at startup (YBR Spots in Settings-Game-Yellow Brick Road). I'd guess you have at least one and probably two bad boards (hurry-up and Munchkinland arrow). The individual ones like the Hurry-up and Munchkinland you can swap with another single board like the other hurryup or the under-sling GI to make sure it's the board and not wiring or something else.

As others have pointed out the biggest flaw in this plan is that if any of the boards in the new kit are defective and you wait a year to install it they very well may not believe you and cover it under warranty.

I had a defective board in the kit. I was glad I didn’t wait. It does happen.

Another good point, thanks! JJP responded this morning and said more 2.0 light boards will be avail in about a month. I will order a complete set and convert my WOZ when I have them.

Awesome. Thank you!

what exactly is required to change these? Any soldering or just unplug and replug? Is it the same thing over and over which is time consuming or is it different things we need to do throughout the 2 days?

No soldering. Some cutting and routing wires. Drilling a little. It's very basic work, and the instructions are pretty refined now, so it shouldn't be that bad. I split it up over a few hours a day. 100% recommended conversion.

Here's the current instructions (click on pictures to load PDF). Pretty basic stuff. A lot OF it, but basic.
WOZ 2_0 Lighting Upgrade Kit Cat5 Wiring Diagram.PDFWOZ 2_0 Lighting Upgrade Kit Instructions - Apr 2019.pdfWOZ 2_0 Lighting Upgrade Kit Packing List.pdf

Yep. I had two boards that needed to be replaced. Better to do the swap sooner rather than later.

Wow! Those look a lot nicer and more refined than the original ones. Well done, Butch and JJP!

Are there pictures of the finished installation when the wires are tied together ? I'm of no help when it comes to putting wires together in a clean/smart way, so some guidance for that would help a lot. A quick glance of the back of my hifi system will get you a good idea of my skills !

Here is a picture before I cable tied a few of the last of them. Installed, got it working, made sure cables had enough room. Then final cable ties.

LTG : )

wozfield (resized).JPG

That reminds me, I need to call my optometrist...

Yeah, Butch really did a great job integrating all the initial feedback and adding more pictures. The instructions now are really great.

Two posters above state they received bad 2.0 boards right out of the gate. That doesn't really bode well for an $800 FIX to a defective design in the first place.

Also worth noting, one of the issues with the old designs is EMI causing breakdown of serial comms between the LEDs/boards. You can mitigate it by moving the effected communication wires away from the source of EMI (coil power wires, etc). Identifying the source of EMI can involve a lot of trial and error, but you can tell it's your issue if your lighting works correct after power cycling the game but then goes out during play. If they don't work at any time, it's much more likely a loose/damaged cable or failed component on a light board.

It's a stable, well-designed fix. The 2.0 system is running on thousands of Hobbits, Dialed Ins, PotCs, and Wonkas (in aggregate) with nothing like the mess of problems the 1.0 system had in WoZ.

It seems a bit puzzling to me that JJP acknowledged they built and shipped pins (mine was built Nov, 2015) with a faulty light system, corrected the problem with a new 2.0 system, but requires $800 from the buyers to fix it. Wouldn’t offering the fix kit to original buyers at JJP’s cost be fair? Especially since we still have to invest the labor? Just a thought.

They are selling it at cost and put a lot of time into developing the kit in the first place. If they gave everyone the kit for free, everyone would take one. Why not? Lets say there are 2,000 WOZs with the old system. That would be a $1.6 million cost for JJP. Let’s say there are 3,000. That would be $2.4 million. I’m not sure what the actual numbers are, but the out of pocket expense adds up quickly. JJP is not Apple. Smaller companies can’t always afford to do what larger companies can. I think it is amazing that JJP took the time in putting together the kit in the first place and offering support for those who need to do it. When you see the kit, you will realize it was no trivial task putting it all together.

Thanks LTG, any chance you have one not blurry ?

You are not the first or the last who will post this, this thread has many who share the opinion. The outcome remains the same: sell it off or upgrade it. I chose to upgrade.

Now, I also waited months to install and the 'what if there is something faulty, in the kit' or just with me installing it. I then decided to install everything. In my case, the small hub board, with all of the Ethernet ports had a hair sized (width of) solder bead shorting two pins. They were going to replace the board until I saw this under a magnifying glass. I looked at it as Butch told me that this board is literally all RJ45 connectors with traces, zero components on it.

2.0, and don't look back!

My old original boards are working fine so I see no reason to upgrade. I imagine there are people who upgraded that would be willing to sell their old boards for $!00 or so. I see no need to just upgrade for the heck of it @ $800 per game. If you've had problems the upgrade is understandable but it's not for me.

Same here, my 7,5V boards work like a charme so I see no reason to upgrade. I will consider it once/if one of my main board dies, at that point the 800 will sound much more justified versus replacing a dead board.

So in between I'm gathering knowledge on switching to 2.0, because it looks quite daunting, especially with my limited skills.

There is no "if" to it. ALL 1.0 systems will fail because it's a bad design where failure is inherent.

And if you wait too long, the $800 price will likely be gone (Jack has said the price will go up) and the resale market for 1.0 boards will have dried up, so a much more expensive proposition. Right now a completely stable 2.0 system proven on 4 machines costs a little more than a ColorDMD upgrade (after you sell the 1.0 boards) and you end up knowing it will last, unlike the 1.0 system that will absolutely 100% fail prematurely.

Since it has been mentioned a couple times about the 100% chance of failure, does anyone know the technical reasons why? Especially from an official source? I feel like I've never seen it.

I'm not saying the problem isn't there at all but I'd like to know the actual reasons.

This assumption is sitting on very little evidence, at least to say ALL will die. Some people with the 5v board never had any issues, same with the 7,5v and both versions of it, some others had a few and others way too many.

There is no such thing as a "1.0 system", there is a 1.1 and a 1.2, each of them brought more reliability until 2.0 was released.

I feel like this is just getting to the point of beating a horse to death on the subject of light boards, failure modes and if you should or not replace the system. All the points have been covered at least a dozen time in this and other threads but I'll try to keep it short.

1) The driver chip on the pre 2.0 LED boards is obsolete and has been for some time now, JJP says they have stock to support owners but who knows for how long.
2) The problem with the pre-2.0 systems are that a bad LED board can really f@#&-up the rest of the game by disabling or causing severe color-cycling, flashing etc. on other boards down the string (this was my main reason to do the upgrade).
3) Anecdotally (we have no hard numbers) the 2.0 system has been much more reliable in all the games following WOZ as well as in late build or converted WOZs.
4) The $800 price is supposed to go up to $1200 but we don't know when.

You will never see it officially stated publicly. Liability.

But people involved have talked about the core design of the 1.x (all flavors, none of the band-aid 1.1, 1.2, etc fixes actually work long-term because the core DESIGN is bad) system being flawed and broken. Hence the reason JJP moved on with the 2.0 system from RR WoZ onward without lighting issues.

Only because some people continue to believe that it's an "IF" as to whether their currently rock-solid 1.x system will fail when there's no "IF" about it. It WILL fail prematurely, but people whose WoZ 1.x is currently fully working are just not believing that's possible, when in fact, it's inevitible based on the flawed design.

The 2.0 system is far better than the previous versions, there is no discussion on that, what I'm discussing is the assumption that all of them will die, I do not believe that, I have not seen it happening and put led boards changing as a part of once in a while maintenance, in a very while in my case.

With my natural tendency to procrastinate, I actually find it beneficial that one failure impacts what's after in the chain, it forces me to change the board right away. I've stayed with a dead throne room led light for a month since I didn't miss it much, and got the pleasure to see a month later that it was perfectly working again.

Exhibit A.

They WILL all die prematurely. The design is flawed. People involved in it have said it. It will never be said publicly. But this is the last time I will say it. It's enough.

But if you don't have a replacement board you've got to take the game out of service, mine flaked out during league twice and the second time was the final straw for me.

The throne room green LED strip is not in the LED board chain.

I know, that is exactly why I let it dead for a month !

JJP was kind enough to send me a bunch of replacement boards, the small ones. And if a big one dies I’ll switch to 2.0 since a replacement is close to 200$.

I have no doubt it was no trivial task. I understand they developed that system to use in The Hobbit, Dialed In, POTC, etc. If that’s true, they didn’t simply produce a 2.0 system only for WOZ. But even if they had, what was their alternative? Leave hundreds or possibly thousands without functioning lights on their first ever pinball machine? That may not have been a realistic option. I’m certainly glad they offer kits at all, and leaving thousands of WOZ owners in the dark to find their own solution would not bode well for their success.

I personally didn’t believe my version 1.1 was “rock solid,” I simply wondered how common the failure rate was, because I’ve put 700 plays on mine without a problem. That doesn’t convince me that all is well, I just hadn’t read anything until now that helped me understand my pre-2.0 system is virtually certain to fail at some point. That’s all. I’m not speaking for anyone else, of course, I’m just explaining why I asked how likely I would need a 2.0 upgrade. Thanks for the discussion about why the design is faulty and can’t sustain normal function forever. Makes sense to me now. I’m going to get the new kit ASAP and not wait.

This is a small snippet of the functional 5v buffered (single RGB LED) boards that I removed.

Look at these, way too much crap on each of those and it looks as though the buffer/filter PCB has been soldered on by hand. That along with an in and out data and a power connector, the poor data connector style along with those patch cables and their male connectors. If you start having issues, having to cycle the power each time to troubleshoot which board or cable is at fault, trying to carefully wiggle out the patch cables, jumper and change software setting to disable the board(s). Be gone!

The simplicity of the 2.0 is key here, just looking for any photos that I might have of a close up of even the single RGB LED PCB, simple design. I'll post something.
IMG_20190209_1330595 (resized).jpgIMG_20190209_1350161 (resized).jpgIMG_20190209_1345390 (resized).jpg

Profile pic of 2.0 single RGB LED PCB. Single robust connector for power and data and an SMD LED. Simple design

The interconnect for the main PCBs uses standard, off the shelf Ethernet path cables.

IMG_20190208_1637360 (resized).jpg

What about the brightness difference people have reported.

The game as it is, is pretty dark.
Less light might be an issue.

My 2.0 is bright! I can't recall if I turned it down in the software.

Sorry, just re-read your post, I haven't suggested that there is any less light (LED) on the PCBs. The kit is brighter than the old system.

WoZ is still a darker pin. I actually play with the room light down

These are the issues I know of with WoZ 1.x lighting, if you know of others, please enlighten me:

1. EMI on the comm wires cause lighting disruptions
2. Cold solder/damaged connection on inter-board connection headers
3. Physical wire faults, damaged in some way
4. Failed LED SMD package (when they fail, the serial comm downstream is also typically non-functional, although sometimes just one color r/g/b will fail but it'll still work)
5. Power delivery circuit failure, probable cause from an over-voltage/over-heating situation blowing an IC or failed traces in the PCBs

If I'm not mistaken #5 is the one that can't easily be negated or repaired and prompted the redesign. Failures 1-4 are all repairable, with varying levels of skill required.

If anyone wants to mail me some failed WoZ lighting boards, I'd actually be interested in playing around attempting to diagnose and repair them....or destroy them further. PM me and let me know what you've got!

You think it's "amazing" jjp took the time to put the kit together? Are you serious? The company releases what appears to be a broken design and instead of fixing it they put the responsibility on the consumer to not only make the change themselves but pay for it too.

Isn't it amazing too that jjp will increase the price!..... What a company

Seriously only in pinball would this even stand. I'm part of the problem too. I'm still buying from jjp and have a WoZ bc it's a great machine (light issue free this far) but I would never say anything positive about how this was handled. They should be offering it for free. 800 is not their cost....regardless of what the "insiders" say.

I definitely see where you're coming from, and perhaps my language was too strong. I've been thinking about this a lot lately with all of the threads that have been popping up legitimately complaining about one issue or another. And, I just wonder if pinball would be a sustainable business if it was operated any other way. My main point is that while I agree with everyone that in an ideal world a manufacturer would offer a fix like this for free, pinball is not an ideal world. You have much smaller companies, and when something goes wrong, it costs a huge amount to fix. Paying for the cost of supplying 2000-3000 user kits could perhaps sink a company. I have no idea what the exact cost is, but I just don't see them making a profit off of these kits. And, I have no idea what their financial statements look like. But, if you add the light board issues up with everything else they have to deal with, I just wonder if it is a choice between putting some expense on the user or staying in business. Again, I have no idea, and I don't want to make assumptions. But, I want JJP to stay in business. I feel like they have been more than fair to me as a company. They replaced my old light boards for free well after the warranty ran out. They probably would still be doing it. I chose to upgrade to have a more reliable system. Again, I would have different expectations of Apple than I do JJP. I guess that is my only point.

3405E8F2-3B5C-4DCE-AF4F-CCD5F0BE8764 (resized).jpeg

My lights have been out for 6 months. Because of a faulty light design, why do I HAVE TO PAY 800 to fix JJP’s problem?

Is it still under warranty?

Do you get free repair on cars etc when not under warranty?

All the lights or certain ones? Totally out?

Is there a reason that WOZ is separated between Yellow Brick Road and all other WOZ models on this site? Would be very helpful in my market searches if I could differentiate between Ruby Red, Emerald, and 75th.