Good Asking Price for MVS Cabs?

Hey guys. I've got a bit of a situation, and I think I need the help of the Neo community.

Through a strange twist of luck, I learned that my boss' neighbor owns an arcade machine distributor in the Pittsburgh, PA area. Just for the hell of it, I asked if I could talk to the guy. I ended up BS'ing with him for almost an hour, talking about arcade history. It was really wild to talk to someone else who knew of the local arcades, and knew when the got specific machines...15 years ago. Plus, I found out his shop is actually only 2 miles from my house.

Anyway, I told him that I had been looking for an MVS cabinet for the past couple of years. He immediately said that they still had a lot of them in service, and he'd call me next time any rolled back into their warehouse.

Well, I got a call from him. They currently have 3 25" MVS Cabinets. There's a 1-slot, a 2-slot, and a 4-slot. He's also got a Street Fighter 2: CE cabinet that he's willing to sell (it's my other all-time-favorite arcade machine.) I'm supposed to be going to his shop this Friday, or early next week, to check them out.

Now, here's the kicker. We haven't talked prices yet. We've danced around numbers, and I think I'm at least in the right order of magnitude. But I'd like to know what to expect. How much should I offer for these? How much is too much? Also, are there any things I should look for? Any common problems that I should watch out for and avoid?

I'm really psyched about this. I'm even more psyched that my wife is extremely cool about it. She even told me to NOT sell my AES system to finance the whole thing! (Absolute. Friggin'. Saint.)

Thanks in advance guys. I'll share pictures of them if people want to see them.

Sigmund

I would also like to know, my friend has a 4slot 25' candy cab, and he's selling it with the board for somewhere between 500-600. It seems reasonable, if you add the price of the cab, and the board, thats about what it comes out to.

I hope you get this mvs cabinet, and i hope i get mine.

It would be good to see some pictures and get some information about what kind of shape the outsides and the guts are in before guessing on a price range.

Some stuff you can look for when considering a price, there's probably more suggestions others can give you:

How does the wiring look? Is it a tangled mess with cuts covered with electrical tape?

Are there quick disconnects for the switches or has someone done a hack job with a soldering iron? See if all the buttons and sticks work properly, it's easy to replace a switch and every little defect that you can fix yourself drops the price a bit.

Can you remove a cart from the motherboard, put it back in, turn the machine on and have it run fine without having to jiggle or adjust the cart? Does the sound come out of both speakers at the same levels?

If there's a memory card reader and headphone jacks, do they work?

How does the screen look? Is there burn in or any kind of degaussing problems? Take a look at the back of the monitor and make sure there's no damage to the yoke or its mountings.

If it's possible, take a look in the test mode and check the book keeping to see what kind of business the machine was doing. If it has had a good long profit life and is just starting to peter out, maybe the owner won't be expecting a king's ransom for it(okay that might not be so likely but it's worth a shot.) I'd guess if they're coming off a route they might not have been doing to well.

I think if after you go take a look at the machines and you come back with some detailed information for the folks here, they should be able to give you a pretty solid value on the machine.

If you see a machine that looks good and the guy is looking for you to make a decision quick, just lowball him a number like $300. I doubt if he wants more he'll tell you to get lost, start the bargaining.

Those are definitely good suggestions for things to check out. From how he's been talking, I'm welcome to come in and play the machines, check 'em out, etc.

How do you get a cabinet into service mode to check those statistics? Is it a jumper setting?

I don't think I can lowball him at like $300 or something. The guy is a good friend of my boss', so...um...that wouldn't be too cool. I'm honestly willing to pay a decent amount more than an eBay deal, just 'cause the thing is literally right down the street from me.

I guess I'm just trying to get an idea of how much is just "WAY WAY TOO MUCH" and how much is too low...

Sigmund

Here's another quick thought...while I wait for possible asking price suggestions... (*hint hint*)

What should I look for to tell if these cabinets are conversions, or original MVS cabinets? And, how much would that impact value?

Sigmund

Quite a bit. Check out <a href="http://www.hardmvs.com" target="_blank">http://www.hardmvs.com</a> for pictures and such.

Just to give you an idea: I payed about $250 for a converted cab with a 2-slot and 2 games (KOF '97 and WW7). The monitor had slight burn in, but everything else was fine.