Ian Primus

Yeah, clean the legs of the chips with alcohol - but primarily you need to clean the _sides_ of the pins. That's where the ZIF socket makes contact. The "wiggle room" in the ZIF socket is normal - as long as you have the chip oriented properly with the pins in the proper holes, it doesn't matter what side it's pushed to. The socket itself might not be in the best condition, or could be worn. When you put a chip in, close the lever, then slide it side to side a bit. That'll help it scrape off any cruds that might have accumulated on the pins in the socket. -Ian

Oh - yeah - you are _closing_ the socket after inserting the chip, right? -Ian

Can't you just take a knife and whittle down the rubbery-plastic connector housing on the cable a bit? -Ian

Does the "use with 32" have an extra chip stuck to the back of it? If so, use that with the EPROMs. The mask ROMs won't need any additional hardware or rewiring, so use those in a carrier board with just a socket soldered to the board, and no wire swapping or extra chips. You are plugging it into the Atari the right way, right? ROM chip goes towards the TV. -Ian

OK... I'm having a _real_ tough time understanding what you're trying to do... So, you have an EPROM programmer. Which programmer do you have? They're all quite different, and some need their data in Intel HEX format, and others accept binary data directly. You say you plugged one chip in backwards and knocked out the programmer? Did it 'recover' when you removed the chip, or did you blow the fuse? Also, if you have a chip that has been powered backwards, it may never work again - it could have been damaged. I did that once and the die on the chip lit up like a lightbulb... thing never would erase completely after that. 33 minutes is a bit long, but might be OK depending on your eraser. You don't want to erase chips for too long, you can damage them. -Ian

Because I need the boards too. For my one-off homemade stuff, I re-use the existing boards. I know, new boards are available, but they're much more expensive, and if I can do it myself, I will. But, I'll definitely keep you in mind if I ever make a large quantity of games. What do your cases look like, anyway? -Ian

See what I mean? I figured that Microsoft just updated their consoles so that instead of going to the red ring of death, the whole thing just turns red and frowns at you. :D :D -Ian

Hehe. It's probably a combination of the worn-out picture tube in my monitor here at work, and the small thumbnail picture, but when I first looked at it, it looked for all the world like a red Xbox with a big frowny face on it. Then I looked closer, and realized it was the controller. Happy birthday! -Ian

Replace the hex inverter? I mean, what else were you hoping for? That inverter is a standard part, shouldn't be too hard to find. They used the CMOS version in the Nintendo, so it would be best to replace with the same. I would imagine that the common 74HCT04 should work fine. Since only one inverter in that chip is used for audio (dunno about the other five), you can check and see if perhaps one of the other gates isn't being used, and jump over to that one. Looks like pins 10 and 11 are the inverter for the audio. -Ian

Nice find! I've never seen Cannon Man either. It's great to find something new in the wild. I remember how excited I was when I found Swordquest Waterworld at a used game store for $1.95. -Ian

I never understood the point of using a stock photo of an item. I know what the item is, if I didn't, I wouldn't be searching for it. What I want to know is what this particular item looks like. A stock photo adds nothing to an auction other than an air of dishonesty on the part of the seller. I also typically ignore auctions that use stock photos. The _only_ conceivable reason I can see for using a stock photo is for some piece of new, sealed electronics - like a camera or a cell phone. You want to show what the device looks like, out of it's package - without opening it. But you should also include a picture of the real item, as you're selling it - if that means a photo of a sealed box, then so be it. And I could do without the three screenfulls of garbage on half the "power seller" aucitons about policies and junk - none of which actually tells you information you need. You need to know 1) What you're bidding on 2) what it's condition is 3) How much it's going to cost to ship it. Ebay has devolved, if you ask me. I've been on eBay since like 1998 - and it's gotten worse every year. Fortunately, now there's Chase The Chuckwagon. I love buying games from there. -Ian

Ceramic capacitors have no polarity. They can be installed any direction. Electrolytic capacitors have polarity, and must be installed in the proper orientation. Reversing them is a Bad Thing. -Ian

The PSU that shipped with the Atari was 500ma. Meethinks you were using the wrong supply Welcome to AtariAge! -Ian

Curt's a great guy - he's not out to cheat anyone. He's just been having health problems. And when you're out of comission for that long, things pile up. Remember missing school for a week because you had the flu? Now imagine missing life for a month. Just don't sweat it. Forget you spent some money on joysticks. Then, one day, you'll open your mailbox, and there will be USB joysticks! It'll be just like Christmas! I ordered a pair of them back in October as well. When they come, they'll come. I have full faith in Curt. -Ian

As long as they got the buttons in the right place, fixed the sound, and made is so you don't have to RIP the cartridge out of the thing, I'm sold. -Ian

Yeah, I have one of those Gyromite cartridges with an adapter in it. I just don't have any Famicom games, so I've never been able to try it -Ian

I've been doing a fair amount of hardware hacking lately, playing with homemade cartridges. Unfortunately, I don't have much in the way of 'donor cartridges' for Atari 5200 or ColecoVision. I'm looking for junky commons, preferably with bad or missing labels, as long as the cartridge itself isn't badly damaged, it'll be fine. Thanks! -Ian

Please explain how you do this to someone who has no idea how to program computer chips. I'm assuming that you have a way of putting a .bin file on a single-use chip (how does it get there?), and the insert it onto a cartridge board? I'm intrigued! You need special hardware - a device called an EPROM programmer. It needs to be able to support the old 4k 2732 chips. The one I use is an ISA card that fits into the computer. You also need an EPROM eraser to erase the chip with UV light. The chip in the cartridge is a mask ROM, and cannot be erased, so you need to obtain EPROM chips, which can. Erase the EPROM, fit it into the programmer, and use the programmer's software to write the .bin file to the chip. Then take apart a common game (like Pac-Man), desolder the existing ROM chip, modify the circuit board slightly, install the new ROM chip as well as an inverter IC (EPROM's have an active low enable, the mask ROM used an active high enable). For permanent cartridge, you just solder the new EPROM directly to the board. I made up a test cartridge with a socket, and cut a hole in the cartridge casing. So, I just have a blank cart with a socket. I can download a ROM image and program it onto a chip in a couple of minutes, and plug it into this cartridge. So, making a 4k cart is pretty simple. For larger carts, you need more logic: The above is my homemade copy of Beamrider, since I couldn't find a copy - I made my own. Also, you can now buy blank boards from the AtariAge store, with the requisite logic already on them. But it's more fun to build it yourself. -Ian

Good, honest seller, quick shipping. Thanks!

But the casual gamer probably has a modern TV, and will want the convenience of being able to connect it to the composite video inputs. The difference is amazing on a large set. Even on my small CRT set, the difference is noticable. Also, a refurbished toaster isn't that expensive. My friend runs a used game store. He sells refurbished toasters (refurbished by yours truly - totally cleaned with new connector) at his store for fifty bucks. Comes complete with two controllers, zapper and Mario/Duck Hunt. You can't get a toploader for that. And the casual gamer remembers what he had growing up, and wants to play those games again. And that wonderful grey box is a big part of that reliving of memories. The AV Famicom is going to be much more complicated than the toploader to use. You'd need to use a converter every time you play a game. Of course, compatibility with Famicom games is a plus - but I don't own a single famicom game, and something tells me the OP doesn't either. If you really want to play famicom games, then the question of which machine to get is signifigantly different. Not only that, but aside from buying online, I have no idea where to find an AV Famicom, or a Famicom in general. I've never even seen one in all my years of video game collecting. But, I have seen hundreds of toaster NES's. And, besides, with a simple modification, you can get rid of the 10NES lockout chip (hint - clip pin 4). Another argument a lot of people make is that the toaster takes up too much space. This is technically true, but it doesn't get in the way like the toploader does. You can stack things on top of the toaster, or put it on a shelf with very low clearance - only enough for the door to flip up. The toploader demands much more space to use, since you need to acommodate the cartridge and enough room to insert and remove the cartridge. Admit it - how many of you that have the original NES have games piled on top of it.... -Ian

Did you try adjusting the control? The TIA was the second thing to try Shouldn't matter what kind of cap you use there. And the old ones shouldn't go bad. There's all of five volts on them... According to the schematic, yes, they're 820pf. 50v is a very standard rating for this kind of part. The only cap I'd maybe avoid using there is ceramic - but even then, the Atari's audio is anything but "hi-fi". If adjusting the sound tuning didn't help, and swapping the TIA didn't help, I'd try swapping that transistor before I started replacing caps. -Ian

I don't know for sure if the TIA can cause the white noise problem, I've had it cause no audio or weak audio though. The TIA is what generates the audio in the 2600. Components drift over time, stuff oxidizes, etc. Hard to tell what happens to things sometimes. I've had the reverse - things that were broken and left to sit for years suddenly worked when plugged in... at least for a little while. It's like they get lonely. If the sound tuning is off, you can sometimes get the sound to come in more clearly if you adjust the fine tuning on the TV - that ring behind the tuning knob. Although, if you do get the sound to clear up, you'll probably lose the picture... Of course, with those new-fangled modern TV's, the tuning is automatic, and you can't mistune it. I'll bet that adjusting the control in the Atari will clear it up, and it probably won't take much adjusting either. If that doesn't fix it, try swapping the TIA with a known good one (because it's fast and easy to swap). If that doesn't clear it up, then replace the transistor (MPS3563). -Ian

Nope - those caps don't have polarity. Your problem could either be a bad TIA, or simply the audio tuning. The tall red coil looking part is the audio adjustment. Carefully adjust it with a plastic tool (not a metal tool, you will break the slug). See if this improves your sound. -Ian

Gee, that's funny. I've done it a lot myself with no problems at all. Never blown one up from it. Me too. Err, except for that 'never blown one up' part. That was true until the other day... Yeah, this one was definitely my own fault. I got frustrated and just kept heating it rather than taking a break and letting it cool down. They do, but you have to order it. http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.js...oductId=3307341 And ordering something through Radio Shack defeats the _entire_ purpose of shopping at Radio Shack I'll probably just order some from Digikey next time I place an order. Or, just do like I've always done, and solder more quickly. I thought about that. I even picked up a battery holder when I was in Radio Shack checking for solder tab batteries. (But after I blew up the first battery...) I might try it on this cart, then save a game, and subject the cartridge to lots of vibration, and see if that's enough to dislodge the battery temporarily (enough to lose the save). That would be my main concern with using a battery holder in a game cartridge. -Ian

It's special to only the 7800. Carefully inspect the connector on the back of the console for damage. I've only owned two 7800's, and both of mine had badly damaged power connectors (it's a crummy design). I modified the consoles with a different plug, so I could use a Sega Genesis power supply. Electrically, the power supply is common - nine volts at one amp. It just uses a funny connector. It's possible to find other sorts of connectors you can solder onto a standard supply that will plug into the 7800 directly, but most of these will fit in either direction, opening yourself up to the possibility of plugging it in wrong. But, if you're not comfortable with a soldering iron, and your console's connector is in good shape, then just buy the proper supply from Best. -Ian