New Life Games Tech Forums

My Game King has an IGT / Acres Gaming player tracking module and I'd like to tinker with it, so I'm wondering if anyone has any documentation on the display or card reader? I'm guessing it uses SAS to talk to the machine but also talks to some back end system.

Any docs would be really appreciated.

Thanks
Peter

All I can say is that it exists.

Sadly, I don't have access to that area. Can you email or otherwise get it to me?

Thanks so much.

Peter

No,
I'm sorry but do you have any questions about the player tracking systems
that any of our members can help you with?

Many of our members have already "tinkered" with these PT systems in the past.

Specifically, I'm looking for the pinout of the 16 pin connector on the card module or the 6 pin connector between the card module and the card reader.

I want to snoop the card data as it is read from the card.

My understanding is that a back end server would need to verify
against both the card and remote player tracking unit to allow
the server to transmit any info to the PT display.
Without that back end server in place, a standalone PT such as yours -
would not be able to "sniff" the card inserted.

Therefore, as a security measure,  accidentally misplaced/lost cards cannot be "read".

Do you have a player tracking back end server?

No I don't but I was assuming that I could see the data as the card is inserted.

That's why it costs the big bucks for the back end server that controls these player tracking systems.
For security reasons, they don't want some one that
finds a player tracking card laying around - to be "read".
Without being connected to the back end server - the player tracking
Mastercom unit cannot "read" or "sniff" the card.
This security measure of course, is to thwart card thieves.

So, in the end, unless you have a Mastercom back end server hooked up to the Mastercom player tracking unit - a player tracking card is basically useless and
worthless to anyone trying to "read" it.
On top of this, the data stored onto the magnetic tape is encrypted
and utilizes a language unknown to you or I.
Should you be able to somehow "read" a lost/misplaced card through other means, you would still need to try decipher scrambled gobbledygook...good luck with that.

There are a couple of flaws in you thinking there. Nothing can stop someone reading the data from a "lost" card. It is what that data represents which is the key. Most likely on PT cards, it is just an ID that means something when looked up in the PT database but in isolation means nothing to the reader of the card. I hight doubt encryption is used as there is no need.

I'm going to 'scope the card reader and I bet I'll find the data coming off the card on the 6 pin connector. One pin also probably goes high ot low when a card is inserted.

Off to the lab....

I suspect he card contains the name and member number, and some sort of a system ID (bally, IGT, etc) and/or property ID (casino ID) so the card reader and the player tracking module in the machine can tell it is a card for that property then send the data to the player tracking servers if it is valid for that casino or group of casinos owned by the same company.
who cares if a player card has your name on the mag stripe
It already has it on the front of the card or least every one I ever had did.

i cant find my usb credit card swiper (aka keyword wedge) or i would just swipe it with notepad open and see what it reads off the card i believe there is something readable (probably encrypted) 

At least with the Bally Mastercom system, all that is on the mag stripe of the player cards is the player number (typically printed on the front of the card), unencrypted.

I cannot understand any valid reason why pshoey wants to read a player tracking card?  :103-
I hope he's not trying to read someone else's card?
That would be highly illegal and I would not want anything to do with that sort of business.  :60-

He's trying to find where the data is coming out of the reader, which would be usefull if making your own tracking system.


What would be illegal about reading data off a card, there is nothing useful, just a number.
You can't get any cash out of it.
You can't collect points with it unless you have ID showing you are the owner.
You could plug it in and rack up points for someone else, but why.

Whoosh, hear that fresh air. Thanks, edski.

stayouttadabunker, that's the problem with this whole forum, why the F would you think I want to do something illegal. I only want to read the card data and that's why I originaly asked if anyone had the documentation for this hardware.

Yes, I'm only interested in hacking the PT so that I can play with the unit I have.

Sorry...was there something you didn't like that I said?
Then take a number and stand in line.... :72-

Without knowing who you are or why you have intentions of trying to read player tracking cards -
what was I supposed to think?
These cards are proprietary storage devices and believe me - there are many very rich companies 
that do not want you to screw around with them. Here's a couple of reasons why:

1). The general public has no clue what kind of data is stored on these cards - people treat them like bank cards or credit cards.
2). If a bank/credit card is stolen - there are many ways to drain the cash out of that account before anyone gets any wiser
identification is NOT even needed to use them.
3). I agree with edski in the fact that it's just piddly, useless sh** that's stored on these cards -
but, these companies really don't want us learning everything about them and precisely how they work.

The whole forum does not think the way I do - I am an individual human being and
what I wrote and posted to you, are in my own words that I typed in here and no one else's.

I have several player tracking units and I am willing to help you "tinker" with them in any way you wish -
in the hopes of helping you.
My thoughts that I posted earlier,  on the way the player tracking cards interact with the Mastercom unit
and a back end server, are my own thoughts - I could be totally wrong...

So....have you had any success so far, in "snooping" your card? 

Someone once said "no information is better than bad information".

Many systems providors use third party companies that specialize in card readers ( The last 2 systems I have worked on use Haupt and Schuller). I cant recall if this is the case with IGT / Acres maybe somebody with a unit can confirm this. I know neuron is also used in the industry as I have seen their ads in slot tech mag - there seems to be some good info on their website - http://www.neuron-usa.com/Software/Software.htm#anchor1.

TZtech, thanks for the info. I'm sure it will be useful at some point.

Reading the card is no problem at all and I have scoped the card reader connections and found the serial data/clock. Looks like logic level I2C but I might be wrong on that. I just purchased a I2C PC adapter and will hook it up when it arrives. Assuming I'm close on the serial data, it should be a piece o' cake to decode the data and voila.

Thanks all.

pshoey