Ansiterm

I have a 400 that powers up to blue screen. When I mothballed it ~15 years ago, it worked but had no sound (bad pokey). So I'll take it apart and reseat any socketed chips when I get some time. Have you tried that? My 410 also has some problems. It needs a new belt, and one of the rubber drive-shaft wheels has a flat from having sat in a closet for those same 15 years. So if I used a rubberband in place of the belt, it'll rewind but not advance past the flat. Probably not worth the money needed to fix it

Ok, I abridged the link and found the figures. I also found my Atari memory upgrade folder. The version I have of the 400 48K upgrade is different, but I'll compare the two when I get home tonight. Is this it? If so, I have all the parts laying around.

The instructions I used came from a local Atari users group, but they might have been based on what you linked because that looks very familiar. If you have the figures that go with it, I'd take that as a sign from the Atari gods that I don't have to rummage through my Atari boxes Is this it? If so, I have all the parts laying around.

I upgraded the 16K board of a 400 to 48K (>15 years ago). It should be in one of the two 400s I still have. It's not for the faint hearted, but if you're handy with a soldering iron, it's doable. I probably still have the step-by-step instructions...but not sure where they are right now. If you want them, I'll rumage around in the storage boxes that contain most of my Atari stuff and see what I can find.

Maybe I had/have an older copy. I recently unpacked some of my Atari collection but haven't had time to play with it much. I can look for my copy of VT10SQ, but unfortunately, I don't have a way to transfer it to my PC at the moment. Still, I could try it on my 800 and verify that it works. IIRC, there was a similar program called Ansiterm that was also a dumb terminal but supported the ANSI character set. That also ran on my 800. I don't see how... It didn't run on the 800, so I swapped the 800 with the XEGS (unplugged SIO cable from the 800, plugged into the XEGS). If it didn't like my SIO2PC or something, well, it was still attached when it worked on the XEGS. I used the same DOS 2.0 boot disk image for both, too... Maybe it was a different version you had, that worked on the 800?

I remember that as VT100SQ ("VT100 squared"), but yeah, it emulates a dumb terminal. I ran it on an unmodified 48K 800 as that was all I had 15-20 years ago. Could the program be having a problem with some of your other hardware?

Kewl. Does it work?

Glad you got it working. Mine just has a DC adapter jack. How many batteries does your Pong unit hold? I have a brown Super Pong kicking around. It is memorable to me because it has room for these big C or D cell batteries. This thing had the worst case of battery rot I'd ever seen. Twenty+ years of some old cardboard type batteries in this disgusting oozing mess.....so bad I had to use gloves to remove the batteries. Still works even after the "ooze".

Someone asked how the power supply could fail. If for example the transformer shorts out (melts), that could send line voltage into your Atari. I suspect that would be bad news.

How'd you fix them?

Pengwin, I can sympathize. I had a similar experience when I dusted off and plugged in my Atari 8-bit equipment a few months ago. Is the DD set to D1:? Have you tried a different SIO cable? Also, have you tried the channel 2/3 switch on the 800XL in both positions and tried adjusting the TV tuning for each?

lol. I haven't had mine running long enough to see if this happens.

Thanks! That's a great resource and helps a lot.

Yeah, I have two 400s that I bought years ago. One works, though, so I would canabalize the other one if I needed parts. Heh, actually, I had three of them. I gave one to a neighbor kid. It broke after a month. So I just gave him a working one in exchange.

Does anyone have a circuit diagram or a service manual for the Atari 410 Recorder or a link to one? The circuit has only 3 active components, but I thought I would ask here before I draw out the circuit myself. Why reinvent the wheel if I don't have to, right?