e5frog

Boxes and instruction booklets have now been sent out to all Channel F Pac-Man cartridge buyers (and those who got one by trading for it). I decided to have them all done before my vacation starts. My right thumb is a bit sore from making all the fold creases for 24 boxes... The first US resident who get's his box (there were no female buyers afaik ), shout something in this thread so the others now that their wait is over in at least a couple of days. I started sending them two days ago and it usually takes at least seven work days to get anything over the Atlantic Ocean. If you manage to f*ck up your instruction booklet I can provide a new one in exchange for a small fee, if you do the same with the box - too bad I don't have any extras as far as I know yet. I'm probably setting a limit at 50 Pac-Man carts, that's the amount of boxes I had made.

I got an extra Democart that I'm selling on eBay. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...em=230351356601 It didn't want to start, just freezes the unit, labels are in very good condition for it's age - maybe it's good for a parts-swap if you have a worse looking cart that works.

I'm trying my luck on eBay with a complete set, cart, box and instuctions. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...em=230349775284 I'll start shipping boxes and instructions to previous buyers next week and plan to have all sent within 14-21 days.

Got the second test print, looks astonishing! I had to cut it out immediately... However, the folding had to wait until I got home... I needed to get the right sort of fold, I made long groove a in a glass plate and then used a broken bent screwdriver to get the right crease: Folded up but not yet glued: Looks nice there in the shelf - a little too white perhaps, almost too perfect. I thought I should mark it as Pac-Man #1 on one of the small flaps, but the pen chosen didn't stick, so I got an ugly pink spot there, I'm keeping this one my self - renamed with a good pen to Pac-Man #0...

Manuals done for all sold carts, #23 manual parallel for comparance: I got the first test print of the box today - looks promising, I just need to correct some colors that didn't turn out as they where supposed to - the maze was purple. I'm correcting that problem tonight and then I'm hoping to get a new test print and perhaps delivery by the end of next week, it's not a very large job so I don't think it's priority... ... and then I just need to cut them out - with scissors - 22 of them... Having a jig built to cut them out automatically was really expensive - about $180-200.

Sorry... http://www.atariage.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=137441

Check here: http://www.atariage.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=13744 There's also a video recording from playing on a real unit.

I noticed an error in the picture, it says 100 but is supposed to be 200 as it marks the points for the first monster in a Power Pellet frenzy... Now corrected, I hope the boxes haven't been printed yet... Here's the current version of the manual (Thanks Godzilla for helping with the text): You can read it better in these two pictures, any comments are welcome (required): Edit: Changed the pictures a third time:

Thanks. ... and thanks to Godzilla for helping with the manual. I think I'll finish the box this week and start on the instruction booklet, but as things nowadays seem to take about double the expected time I guess the box will be ready in a month and the booklet in two months... If I just take the time the actual work doesn't take that long.

I have gotten an example of text to put on the back side of the box, I'll try and get some of it done this weekend. All Fairchild Channel F Pac-Man cartridge owners will get the box and instructions. However I might ask for a small donation to cover postage, printing costs are on me. If anyone like to help writing the text for the instruction booklet it would be most appreciated.

I'd sell them for $50 if I could get the parts for about half the price...

I was given eproms and sram:s from a friend of mine which made it possible for me to charge $85 for some of the carts for those with patience enough to wait. People paying the $120 was first in line for the next cartridge made. If you can get a donor-cartridge, two logic circuits, an eprom, an sram circuit, the special necessary memory interface circuit, a couple of resistors and capacitors and circuitboard, box and instructions for less - including postage for everything back and forth and materials to assemble everything (photopaper, ink and plastic for labels, solder tin etc etc) and maybe even not having to work about 4-8 hours per cartridge entirely for free, please tell me how? I'm sorry, but if I could offer them for free I would, I'm sure I'd make double the amount of cartridges. When you count everything in it is a lot of money. People on the waiting list have been offered the best possible price, I have been making 3 or four at the time. Currently I have five professionally made PCB:s left which probably be Pac-Man carts 20-24 if anyone is interested, if not they will probably be Karate carts starting with #1 - when I have time to finish it - I plan to finish the Pac-Man box and instructions first. All in all - I haven't made any money, I've used all income from this project to pay for parts and made improvements where improvements were possible. I'm not even working for free, not breaking even - I have acrually paid money to be able to get these carts out, because it's fun and because I'm proud of what I and Tim have achieved. Maybe if I sell 50 of them at $100 I will break even, counting shipping prices and materials, and by then - no extra money for all the time programming the game and building the carts. Finally, I have two kids (and a wife...) and work full time, I do this at my spare time... anyone who is in the same situation will know how difficult it can be to find the time. PingvinBlueJeans: You can get #20 for $85, that's the last one I already have circuits for - more is ordered, I used all the money from my last sale to buy memory circuits for another 15 carts, however the other parts won't last for more than two or three carts, I'll buy more parts as money comes in from sales. PayPal: [email protected]

Box almost done - backside just needs some more text. If you have any suggestions about the backside text let me know. about 35 characters per row and ten rows. Click my signature to see what the other box backsides say. All buyers will get a box and instructions as soon as they're done.

I updated the list in the first message.

You can always ask around, many collectors have a few extras and some people that don't collect them have a few just to swap with. There has been quite a few on eBay lately - put a "Saved Search" on eBay and have e-mails sent to you when there are Channel F games available...

Chips are often measured in bits, and it's correct that it has 4 x 4 kbits ram circuits - it may have been just a misunderstanding between the two of them.

He remembers wrong or he means 16 kbits of RAM - the Video RAM is 2048 bytes (4 x 512 byte circuits) and the CPU has 64 bytes of RAM. The Video RAM is "write only" (you can't read back what you wrote) and only about 72% of it's area is usable since that's all that is displayed on screen. One Pac-Man cartridge takes about 5-7 hours to make, as there's little interest it's not affordable to have the pcb:s made professionally, I'm expecting to sell at most 30 of them... I do the PCB:s myself, photoresist lighting, etching, drilling, cutting the shape, test circuits before soldering, all soldering, rinsing used cartridge shell from labels and markings, print labels, put plastic on them and cut them with a pair of scissors (and do it all over if I get a crease), personalized back label and extensive testing before I send it along to its new owner... I could probably not afford to buy one of them myself without saving up for it - I actually don't have one myself - yet, maybe I could afford one if I sell enough... The System I units have really poor sound when playing music - there's a continous background beep. In the game (Football, Pac-Man and others) however it's OK since very little sound effects are used, short bleeps and clicks mostly. I'd say get a cheap system (I or II), try some games, some people like it and the others lack the imagination needed to have fun with these old games. I'll start making Multi-Carts as well eventually, but the Pac-Man version included in the Multi-Cart will lack some features. This is perhaps more affordable as you get all Channel F games for something around $100-150. I'll perhaps try and patch "Hangman" as well as the original version of it lacks the ability to add your own words when it is placed into the Multi-Cart (it originally has extra RAM connected to a port that aren't available on the Multi-Cart).

I was only able to order a small amount of parts and now I can use this money to buy more parts so I can build more carts, perhaps at a lower price.

$103.67, pretty good. Swedish winner, Videopac from vintagegames.se

Winner for 120$ was "PressPlayOnTape" on vintagegames.se The one on eBay gave $103.67 - so $223.67 to build more carts!

It could have been returned and still never opened, an unwanted Christmas gift or something like that.

I'll give this auction a week more, ends on Sunday next week. Last bid needs to be in before Sunday 25th 11.59 PM Greenwich Mean Time. http://wwp.greenwichmeantime.com/info/current-time.htm

Now two pre-payments made, parts are ordered.

I guess the one on eBay is more interesting right now at $86 - a Swedish guy in the lead actually. I got a good bid from someone that wanted one of those already done and didn't want to wait for cart #7... So as you can see, bid is up to $120.

If they knock it off, please try it on the Chuckwagon. Stuff like this which is bascially collector based sells pretty well there. Will do.