I'm fairly new to the world of darts (other than cheap dart sets as a kid that had some sort of baseball game on the back of a steel tip board). I have played soft tip on a cougar machine (coin operated) 3 times at a bar and it worked very well. I don't currently have space for a coin-op game so I wanted to get a smaller home version for now. I bought a bristle board steel tip and have been using that for the past few months.
I looked into multiple units before deciding on the Dartslive 100s. Basically it was between the Archanid 800 or 750, the Viper extreme, or the Dartslive. After reading what reviews I could find it seemed like the Dartslive was the one to get. I've heard of the boards in this price range (150 to 200 US dollars) not lasting very long...and that concerned me. There isn't a lot of data out on the Dartslive but it seems to be sturdy.
The unit comes in a nice box which has an AC adapter packed in. It also takes 4 AA batteries which is a nice feature that most other ones do not seem to have. The batteries seem to be lasting fine. I've played probably about 70-100 games and it's working fine still. The manual is nice and in many languages. They also provided a template for the screws which it mounts to. That worked out very nice for mounting.
I have not tried out the darts that came with the board yet, but they look to be semi-ok darts. Probably better than most that come with these types of boards. A-Zdarts.com is where I got it and they provided me 6 free tungsten darts which actually turned out to be pretty nice. Certainly not high end but I would say mid-range darts. That freebie also made the purchase price of $200 feel better. Though I think it's worth it even without the free darts.
One thing that was immediately obvious to me is the holes in the board are smaller than the arcade machines I was using. In fact the tips I used on the arcade board do not fit in this machine and bounced out 100% of the time. I had read about tips not working before I got it so I was prepared with some Lippoints which work great. The Lippoint tips are super strong and seem to last for a very long time.
I'm using both 16 gram and 18 gram darts (manual says 20 gram is the heaviest you should use on it). So far there are not too many bounce outs. Mostly I bounce out if I throw it poorly, or if it hits exactly on another dart. In general I'd say bounce outs should be minimal for a good player. I found the short Lippoints appeared to work the best on the board (made in Japan).
Scoring has been %100 accurate so far. No miss-reads on any targets.
The only issue I had so far I was able to fix. I am using the 4 batteries vice plugging it in. At first the battery cover seemed a bit touchy. Meaning, the system would turn off and on just nudging the battery cover...like it was losing connection. In fact, at first it would do this reset during a game as I threw the dart onto the board. I looked inside at the battery cover and moved the metal which is housed in a plastic. After adjusting this it wasn't a problem again. I would guess if someone was using the AC adapter this wouldn't be an issue...but I have not tested the AC adapter yet.
The sound is pretty cool and is completely adjustable. That's a nice feature. I don't find the dart hitting the board to be very loud (some people claim it was loud and they claim it's not). My wife didn't hear it much in the other room, so it may not be too bad. Seems pretty normal to me, but of course much louder than steel tip.
Setting up a game is very easy and the menu is good. The manual gives you all the info you need for this. The display is really nice and easy to read. It's well thought out and executed. I understand this can be an issue on some of these machines. So far I find it's easy to read and provides you with the data you need. It would have been nice to get a marks per round after the game, but it's not a big deal for me.
It has a artificial intelligence player which has 5 levels. I being new at darts can barely beat the first level...so it seems to be set a little high. Such as, if I play cricket, the computer is a point b*tch and racks up points quite a bit. Sometimes the computer with hit 7 or 8 marks to rack up points. On 301 and 501 the computer seems be a pretty good finisher. I'm sure a fairly good player would beat the first level OK, but I found it to be about as good as the guy I play from work who is a pretty good player (something like a 24 handicap).
Overall I am really happy with it. It's set up next to my steel tip board and looks nice. Hoping it continues to work as good as it is right now.
I looked into multiple units before deciding on the Dartslive 100s. Basically it was between the Archanid 800 or 750, the Viper extreme, or the Dartslive. After reading what reviews I could find it seemed like the Dartslive was the one to get. I've heard of the boards in this price range (150 to 200 US dollars) not lasting very long...and that concerned me. There isn't a lot of data out on the Dartslive but it seems to be sturdy.
The unit comes in a nice box which has an AC adapter packed in. It also takes 4 AA batteries which is a nice feature that most other ones do not seem to have. The batteries seem to be lasting fine. I've played probably about 70-100 games and it's working fine still. The manual is nice and in many languages. They also provided a template for the screws which it mounts to. That worked out very nice for mounting.
I have not tried out the darts that came with the board yet, but they look to be semi-ok darts. Probably better than most that come with these types of boards. A-Zdarts.com is where I got it and they provided me 6 free tungsten darts which actually turned out to be pretty nice. Certainly not high end but I would say mid-range darts. That freebie also made the purchase price of $200 feel better. Though I think it's worth it even without the free darts.
One thing that was immediately obvious to me is the holes in the board are smaller than the arcade machines I was using. In fact the tips I used on the arcade board do not fit in this machine and bounced out 100% of the time. I had read about tips not working before I got it so I was prepared with some Lippoints which work great. The Lippoint tips are super strong and seem to last for a very long time.
I'm using both 16 gram and 18 gram darts (manual says 20 gram is the heaviest you should use on it). So far there are not too many bounce outs. Mostly I bounce out if I throw it poorly, or if it hits exactly on another dart. In general I'd say bounce outs should be minimal for a good player. I found the short Lippoints appeared to work the best on the board (made in Japan).
Scoring has been %100 accurate so far. No miss-reads on any targets.
The only issue I had so far I was able to fix. I am using the 4 batteries vice plugging it in. At first the battery cover seemed a bit touchy. Meaning, the system would turn off and on just nudging the battery cover...like it was losing connection. In fact, at first it would do this reset during a game as I threw the dart onto the board. I looked inside at the battery cover and moved the metal which is housed in a plastic. After adjusting this it wasn't a problem again. I would guess if someone was using the AC adapter this wouldn't be an issue...but I have not tested the AC adapter yet.
The sound is pretty cool and is completely adjustable. That's a nice feature. I don't find the dart hitting the board to be very loud (some people claim it was loud and they claim it's not). My wife didn't hear it much in the other room, so it may not be too bad. Seems pretty normal to me, but of course much louder than steel tip.
Setting up a game is very easy and the menu is good. The manual gives you all the info you need for this. The display is really nice and easy to read. It's well thought out and executed. I understand this can be an issue on some of these machines. So far I find it's easy to read and provides you with the data you need. It would have been nice to get a marks per round after the game, but it's not a big deal for me.
It has a artificial intelligence player which has 5 levels. I being new at darts can barely beat the first level...so it seems to be set a little high. Such as, if I play cricket, the computer is a point b*tch and racks up points quite a bit. Sometimes the computer with hit 7 or 8 marks to rack up points. On 301 and 501 the computer seems be a pretty good finisher. I'm sure a fairly good player would beat the first level OK, but I found it to be about as good as the guy I play from work who is a pretty good player (something like a 24 handicap).
Overall I am really happy with it. It's set up next to my steel tip board and looks nice. Hoping it continues to work as good as it is right now.
