09:28 AM PDT on Monday, September 1, 2003

Associated Press

The software glitch that caused retail lottery terminals and video poker machines across Oregon to shut down over the past two days has largely been fixed, lottery officials said.

Lottery Director Brenda Rocklin said the terminals had problems Friday morning, after officials started installing software for a new sports betting game. At one point, she said, the lottery had to shut down its 2,700 retail terminals and 9,500 video poker games and restart the entire system.

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Rocklin said it is difficult to tell whether the problems affected the lottery's business, including sales for Saturday's $140 million Powerball jackpot.

"People were able to play and buy tickets, even though there were some delays," she said. "It's obviously something we try to avoid, but it is not unusual to have some issues when we launch a new game."