nickle241

fixed, one bad ram chip. rf ad av video are still mangled but i can use monitor video and av audio to get a functionally perfect result

i dont actually have a good av signal from it, ive been using the monitor port because rf is swamped wiht screaming interference. i tried making my own av cable but its just as bad and connecting up the audio line from the av harness still got me nothing

found it, u12 in the upper ram is cooked, i swapped it with u13 and the fault code moved, ive ordered some replacements and hopefully i dont have another chip at fault

incidentally ive also never gotten audio out of it, this didnt seem odd but this card is apparently supposed to have beep codes

looks like a ram issue yup, it actually didnt want to boot the card right away and i had to reset into the coleco side first before it would initialize

atarimax ultimate, and as far making tapes, i did pick up an old duplicator so i should only need to do the manual version once if it comes down to it. i tend to go for the internal methods with these old computers over the accessory options so ive been more focused on the tape and cartridge support, and with the boot issues i havent even been able to do anything with that much yet, almost certainly gonna have to replace those two controller chips but that can wait till i have a proper diagnostic option

is there a program to format blank tapes? if possible i would like to use the original tape drive, i ordered the sd cartridge, at worst i can still use it with my base model colecovision, so it would be nice if i could run a rom on there that formats tapes or possibly lets you write images to tapes

im interested in the expansion cards anyway so the cost isnt the biggest issue anyway and ive got desoldering equipment on hand. im a bit more inclined to think its ram given similarities to other ram faults ive seen online for other computers, plus the menu does still seem to be in there just getting garbled attempting to read it out im also debating picking up the flash cart for an easier time with software.

some screenshots, note that these are relatively rare and it generally only throws up nothing or a few lines of garbage that it may or may not keep cycling endlessly other bits of the wp menu also show up sometimes but i havent taken any pics of those occurrences it seems like the issue should be relatively minor given how close it comes to booting on a sporadic basis

cleaned up the chips and sockets again and didnt put the flat pack caps back in yet and still blue, symptoms remain unchanged edit: perhaps those two are actually important on this revision and could have failed, the one doesnt look like it was sealed all that well

would removing the ic capacitors be advisable? if they arent actually necessary then they could be causing issues

and i was just guessing at them maybe being capacitors due to their plate construction, but i dont have either of those or anything in the ballpark, it might be best if i can find someone who is more familiar with these machines and actually has the test accessories

already tried reseating the sockets and blasted them with contact cleaner, incidentally whats up with the wierd plate looking things underneath the chips in two of the sockets? as for the cable, reseated and cleaned multiple times with no change to behavior from any of this, unless im expected to do something with the attachment between the ribbon and the solder pins, im not touching that unfortunately i have no means to troubleshoot further if we are considering a chip issue as i dont have the right sort of equipment. the flakey behavior made me think capacitors so i recapped the adam board but again no changes

i checked the voltage at the internal side of the connector and they all seem okay, but it usually halts at a blank blue screen, occasionally spitting up random garbage, sometimes static sometimes cycling more mess over and over and sometimes it does this after being powered on for a bit and sometimes keeps resetting the printer repeatedly with no other feedback, on one occasion it was crashing hard enough to stop the printer from initializing the weirdest part of this whole mess is that its so inconsistent and if i hit the game reset switch it swaps over to the game mode with no such issues, controller input difficulties but those are most likely unrelated, its only the adam half of the system with boot problems, it does occasionally come close to booting and puts most of the word processor display up but this tends to be when it is in its most unstable states and it accepts no inputs i have tested with and without keyboard and/or tape drive, which both seem to be functioning properly, with the tape drive even attempting to seek on my modified audio tape, not yet formatted correctly so it wouldn't find anything regardless, no point risking a real tape even if i did have one made up

just double checking, how are those pins arranged? my research points to aquarius having a 14253 pin numbering pattern but i cant find any info at all regarding how the x10 is pinned and i cant be sure if you are actually using the aquarius pin numbers or the universal standard numbering for 5 pin din connectors edit: correction on my part, i was misreading the midi din pinout and mistook it for a sequential pattern so you are probably using the interleaved numbering