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Atari 2600 RGB mod


Yurkie

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I am pleased to announce that Tim Worthington the brilliant developer of the NESRGB mod board that has sold nearly 2000 units worldwide, will be releasing a 2600 RGB mod kit on the 30th of this month.

 

I will be the US distributor for this DIY kit and will also offer installation services.

 

The 2600 RGB will install in the 4 switch and 6 switch consoles, I am not sure about the Atari Jr. The 2600 RGB mod will also output S-Video and Composite video.

 

The tentative price will be $70 AUD + $5 AUD shipping. Which currently is $55.56 in US dollars.

 

The order procedure will be the same as ordering the NESRGB. You will go to Tim's site for US Distributor and purchase the kit. Tim's will forward me your order for shipment. I'll then ship your order same or next day and it will take about 3 business days to receive it.

 

If you are unfamiliar with RGB it is the purest analog video signal available and fantastic for use with RGB CRT monitor or RGB to HDMI converters so that you can ditch the CRT and play the classic consoles pixel perfect on a LED/LCD TV.

 

Here is Tim's home page.

 

http://etim.net.au/

 

Here is a fantastic resource for information about RGB on retro game consoles.

 

http://retrorgb.com/

 

 

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I'm really looking forward for this. Together with an Harmony cart and a CRT TV (almost all PAL TVs since the '80s have scart RGB input and correctly display 60Hz video) that would be my definitive 2600 gaming console.

 

Considering the existence of PAL60 games, is there a way to override that?

Yes, by a pushbutton installed on the console, which also controls the pause feature. If the button is installed on the joystick it's also possible to have remote select and reset switches.

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RGB, S-Video, and Composite Video output? For a product intended to make it easier to hook a 2600 to modern A/V equipment, the design seems about 10 years out of date.

 

There is actually still a good argument for including those options today. One of the best is that you can use your image processor of choice to then output to a modern display. In the example of RGB, an XRGB-mini is a superb choice and you can configure the final HDMI output to exactly your liking. On the other hand you can have something like a direct HDMI output solution that does its own flavor of image processing and it may not display quite the way you'd need or like, so arguably the former solution is better. Really though the biggest challenge with a direct HDMI solution is the greater technical difficulty (and expense) in pulling it off on most systems.

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RGB, S-Video, and Composite Video output? For a product intended to make it easier to hook a 2600 to modern A/V equipment, the design seems about 10 years out of date.

I bought my TV new in 2013. It has s-video and composite. This mod with multiple A/V options for the variety of modern A/V equipment that exists seems to fit the intended purpose of making it easier to hook a 2600 to modern A/V equipment.

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Hello everybody. I'm Tim Worthington, creator of this mod.

 

Considering the existence of PAL60 games, is there a way to override that?

You can disable the automatic PAL/NTSC palette switching.

 

Neat. I'm curious if this mod disables the stock RF. It appears to leave the Moboard components intact. Also will it enable stereo sound separation?

It's possible to use the original RF output. You need to hold how the palette button while switching on the console. This effectively disables the 2600RGB board operation and lets the Atari work as it did before.

 

There's no 'stereo' sound separation feature because it does not work on PAL consoles and I personally don't think it's much of an improvement.

 

 

I don't see why these things need to be shipped to you and then to the final end user. Why doesn't the seller just send them right to the end buyer?

Anybody is welcome to order from me directly, but be aware that I am in Australia. If you are in the US, I do recommend taking advantage of the US distributor section, fulfilled by Yurkie, as you will receive your order faster (and cheaper) this way.

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That reminds me of this discussion here, where cwilkson used the CyberTech VGA mod to output RGB on the VCS. He never got around to say how it was done however. I wouldn't have asked etim to work on it but considering his knowledge gained from the NESRGB mod, he clearly was in the best position to come up with it. And I'm glad he did! I'll be waiting for the inevitable adapter board for the 2600jr now.

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Hello everybody. I'm Tim Worthington, creator of this mod.

 

 

You can disable the automatic PAL/NTSC palette switching.

 

 

It's possible to use the original RF output. You need to hold how the palette button while switching on the console. This effectively disables the 2600RGB board operation and lets the Atari work as it did before.

 

There's no 'stereo' sound separation feature because it does not work on PAL consoles and I personally don't think it's much of an improvement.

 

 

 

Anybody is welcome to order from me directly, but be aware that I am in Australia. If you are in the US, I do recommend taking advantage of the US distributor section, fulfilled by Yurkie, as you will receive your order faster (and cheaper) this way.

 

Tim,

Any plans for Atari 7800 version?

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I am looking forward to getting this done by Yurkie. Quick question 1st.

 

If I buy a NTSC modded system to play in Australia (PAL), can I make it show the games in NTSC mode with the switch (as TV here display NTSC as well as PAL) or will it detect the TV as being PAL (default setting of TV)? And in the same way can I play PAL games on the NTSC system but have it display in PAL on the TV? So in other word, the system can ouput PAL or NTSC at the switch of a button, and therefore can play PAL and NTSC games on any TV.

 

What cable will be used for SCART RGB output?

 

As previously asked, any plans for an Atari 7800 version (and to a lesser extent a 5200 version)?

Thanks Tim (for creating) & Yurkie (for installing) these great mods.

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If I buy a NTSC modded system to play in Australia (PAL), can I make it show the games in NTSC mode with the switch (as TV here display NTSC as well as PAL) or will it detect the TV as being PAL (default setting of TV)? And in the same way can I play PAL games on the NTSC system but have it display in PAL on the TV? So in other word, the system can ouput PAL or NTSC at the switch of a button, and therefore can play PAL and NTSC games on any TV.

 

No need to buy an NTSC system, just get a PAL system with the mod and you'll be able to play both NTSC and PAL games with the correct colors because the mod itself will select the appropriate color palette based on the number of scan lines the game (not the console) generates.

 

Read this for more info on how the colors and scan line counts work on the Atari - http://spiceware.org/atari_ntsc_pal_secam.html

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The palette automatic switch is the unexpected bonus of this mod. It's not only an RGB mod, it's also literally a region mod for the 2600. With it you can play any NTSC/PAL cartridge with any NTSC/PAL console without restriction or limitation, with the correct speed and colour. Europeans don't need to import a console any more (except for the French and their shitty SECAM VCS).

 

You still need a good display though. I know American CRTs can have trouble displaying 50Hz. European CRTs have no problem with 60Hz however, and that's cool. Digital TVs and upscalers should have no problem with either frequency either.

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You still need a good display though. I know American CRTs can have trouble displaying 50Hz.

The Commodore monitors work great at 50 Hz. I play PAL 2600 and Amiga CD32 games on my C= 1084S quite often. When I had my Amiga 2000HD hooked up to it I defaulted it to PAL mode for the increase in vertical resolution.

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Hello everybody. I'm Tim Worthington, creator of this mod.

 

 

You can disable the automatic PAL/NTSC palette switching.

 

 

It's possible to use the original RF output. You need to hold how the palette button while switching on the console. This effectively disables the 2600RGB board operation and lets the Atari work as it did before.

 

There's no 'stereo' sound separation feature because it does not work on PAL consoles and I personally don't think it's much of an improvement.

 

 

 

Anybody is welcome to order from me directly, but be aware that I am in Australia. If you are in the US, I do recommend taking advantage of the US distributor section, fulfilled by Yurkie, as you will receive your order faster (and cheaper) this way.

Tim, Any plans to make this compatible with your NESRGB rgb to component converter?

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