STIC chip troubleshooting/sourcing

[frdarryl]

Greetings, everyone! This has been a fantastic forum as I try to troubleshoot a couple of consoles (a Sears Super Video Arcade and an INTV System III).

 

Unfortunately both are exhibiting strange graphical glitches. The Sears unit has both duplicate and missing sprites, while the INTV system will have random glitches rolling through the display once the unit has gotten up to temperature (usually after about 15 minutes).

 

As a troubleshooting step I tried switching the STIC chips from one console to the other and... sure enough, the same behaviour followed the chips. So I'm in need of at least one - preferably, two - working AY-3-8900-1 ICs. I see some threads on this forum from several years ago about sources for these chips but I'm curious if anyone has found more recent suppliers of old stock or junked consoles with working chips, etc. I see several parts consoles on eBay but those are a bit of a risk as to whether they'd have a working IC. I've also seen some Chinese suppliers willing to sell them for cheap... but who knows how legit those are.

 

Thanks for your help! It'd be awesome to get these systems operational again. I have many fond memories of playing them with family. And also nightmares from Night Stalker. ?