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Atarius Maximus

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Posts posted by Atarius Maximus

  1. Posted

     

    Another favorite of mine is the Slik Stick from a company called Suncom.  

     

    That's my favorite joystick. I've had one since the early 80's and used it on my C64 and my 2600, and it's still working fine after 20 years. They're cheap and plentiful, I recently bought an extra one on Ebay for $3.

     

    slikstik.jpg

     

    AM

  2. Posted

    Were the instructions ever posted? If not, PLEASE post them  

     

    No, I never got around to posting any instructions, so I'll do it now. I'll do my best to explain how I did it.

     

    Please keep in mind that this joystick modification was created by a very non-technical person who just likes to take stuff apart and tinker with it. It may or may not work for you, so I take no responsibility for you turning your perfectly good joysticks into piles of useless plastic!

     

    If all goes well, after you finish this project your joystick should have 3 working buttons. The wiring was designed so that the original button on the CX40 will emulate pressing both 7800 buttons at the same time, and the two new buttons would emulate the left and right buttons on the 7800 Proline joystick. I haven't tested it with very many games yet, but it appears to be fully functional.

     

    Equipment I used for this project:

     

    1 Donor Atari 7800 Proline joystick (used main cable & resistors from it)

    1 Atari CX40

    2 Small Momentary-switch buttons from Radio Shack

     

    Tools I Used for this project:

     

    Soldering Iron

    Drill

    Wire cutters

    Electrical Tape

     

    Getting Started...Prepare the donor parts:

     

    1. Disassemble the Proline Joystick. Carefully remove all wiring from the circuit board, and remove the main cable. This cable will be used in the CX40.

    2. Remove the Resistors from the Proline circuit board. These will be re-used in the CX40. I simply clipped them off with wire snippers. You can also buy new resistors from Radio Shack if you prefer, they’re 520 Ohm.

     

    Prepare the CX40:

     

    1. Disassemble the CX40. Carefully put aside the fire button and the spring underneath the fire button, that spring is really easy to lose.

    2. Remove all the wiring from the circuit board (just slide the clips off).

    3. Remove the existing main cable from the CX40, you won’t be needing it anymore. After you remove it, install the main cable from the 7800 Proline in it’s place. The cable from the Proline joystick has the extra wiring we’ll need to install the 2 extra buttons.

    4. Remove the screw cylinder from the top left of the base (In this case, “remove” really means “break it off ”). This needs to be removed in order to make room for the new buttons. I removed it by latching on to it with a pair of locking pliers, and twisted it until it finally popped off. Nothing scientific there!

    5. Drill holes for the two switches. I positioned them based on the placement of my hand. The switch farthest to the right should rest comfortably under the tip of your left index finger.

    6. Cut the circuit board. Be VERY careful doing this! This step is necessary to make room for the buttons. See the picture at http://www.stevesfiles.com/joystick1.jpg (or just look at the bottom of this post) to get an idea of how I did this.

    7. Install the buttons. Place them in the holes you drilled and secure them in place.

    8. Based on the wiring diagram at http://www.stevesfiles.com/wiringdiagram.jpg (also posted below), connect all of the wires (using the main cable pirated from the 7800 stick) to the circuit board. You will need to solder in the resistors, as seen in the diagram.

     

    Putting it all back together:

     

    1. After you have installed all of the wiring, carefully place the circuit board back in to the base unit. In my joystick, it was a very tight fit along the top of the circuit board, where I had cut the board to make room for the back of the buttons. You may have to twist the buttons to position the wires just right.

    2. Put the firing button and the spring back in, and carefully place the top of the joystick back on.

    3. Hold it tight, flip it over, and put the screws back in. It will only take 3 instead of four now, as we removed one of the screw cylinders.

    4. Test it!

     

    Now, sit back, and enjoy all of your 7800 games the way they were meant to be played. With a CX40 Joystick!

     

     

    joystick4.jpg

    joystick1.jpg

    wiringdiagram.jpg

  3. Posted

    Could someone translate that? I don't speak German

     

    Well, I don't speak German, but I tried to translate it using AltaVista's translator. Here's what I got:

     

    "What are the girls called, if those of dirndls get?"

     

    Doesn't make much sense, I know. Oh well, I tried.

  6. Posted

    Atarius - That is a GREAT advancement in Atari joystick technology! I can't believe I never came up with that myself after all of these years, sitting around obsessing with the system. Let me know how your project turns out, I'd like to purchase a few of those from you. They look like they would work very well as opposed to the prolines.  

     

    Thank you, I appreciate the kind words! This was just an evening project, I don't really have the time (or spare joysticks) to make these and sell them. I'd be happy to provide you with more detailed instructions on how to make your own, though.

     

    I'll post again after I've had the time to test the joystick with all of the games. I am by no means an expert on things like this, but it looks like it will work OK. I left for vacation shortly after my original post ... I'm far from home, way up in the green mountains of Vermont right now, trying hard to enjoy my vacation! (no Atari up here :sad: )

     

    AM

  7. Posted

    I thought I'd share my latest project with everyone. I modified an Atari CX40 to use with my 7800, adding two additonal fire buttons. IMO, the Proline joysticks are terrible, they are painful for me to use. I had to come up with an alternative!

     

    The top button functions normally (it's the wired to be the same as pushing both buttons simultaneously), and I added two more buttons on the front of the base, which are both used with your index finger. Just as you'd expect, the left button functions as the 7800 Proline's left button, and the right button functions as the Proline's right button.

     

    I haven't done much testing with it yet, but it appears to work fine so far with One-on-One. This was a somewhat difficult mod to do, I had to cut the circuit board and remove one of the plastic screw cylinders inside the joystick base in order to make room for both additional buttons. I spent several hours working on this. I pirated a 7800 stick for the wiring and the resisitors, I had an extra broken one anyway.

     

    If you'd like to take a look at some pictures, go here:

     

    http://www.stevesfiles.com/Joystick2.jpg

    http://www.stevesfiles.com/Joystick4.jpg

    http://www.stevesfiles.com/WiringDiagram.jpg

     

    AM

  10. Posted

    Early 90's? Wow. My first experience was at a friend's house back in 1979, we played combat for hours! I begged my parents for the next year to by me one, and I got my first 2600 for Christmas in 1980. My first cart (besides the combat pack-in) was Activision's Fishing Derby, followed by Kaboom & Space Invaders.

  11. Posted

    Thank you for all of your suggestions. I didn't know about the Multi-Cart, I just contacted Sean about buying one. I'll probably still end up trying to find all of the original carts anyway, due to my obsession with collecting original carts! :)

     

    I'll probably take Cafeman's suggestion and build a dual-stick holder out of cardboard and duct tape. It's funny how a roll of duct tape can solve so many of life's problems!

     

    AM

  12. Posted

    I've been a long time 2600 fan, and finally decided to pick up a 2-port 5200, trackball, and 10 games from ebay (both joysticks that came with it actually work!). When I first unpacked it, my jaw dropped to the floor when I saw how BIG this beast really is! Sheesh! It looks really cool, though.

     

    I'm really impressed so far, the graphics on the games I've played are outstanding (compared to my favorite 2600 titles), and I actually thought the joysticks were kind of cool. I got the hang of using them to play Pac-Man & Galaxian pretty quickly, but man, Super Breakout is amost unplayable with a joystick. Centipede with the Trackball is just awesome!

     

    Since I'm a new 5200 owner, I was wondering if anyone could recommend a "definitive" 5200 title that I should look to buy first. I've already got Pac-man, Galaxian, Super Breakout, Popeye, Centipede, Defender, Kangaroo, Baseball, Football, and Soccer.

     

    AM

  13. Posted

    I remember many of the closeout sales after the crash, too, back in late '84 and '85. I bought lots of crappy games at Kay-bee toy stores for $1-$5, many of them U.S. Games, Mythicon, and Apollo titles, and ended up returning them, well, because they sucked. I guess it was easier to return opened games back then, huh?

  15. Posted

    Thank you all for welcoming me in! I've just got back into collecting in the past 6 months or so, and it's becoming an addiction! I can't stop buying 2600 games! Somebody help me!

     

    I've finally (just recently) finished my complete collection of Activision and Imagic titles, which IMO are the best (most fun to actually play) games. My favorite game to play most recently has been Commavid's Room of Doom. I actually own the cart, but I tend to play my hacked version where the player and enemies look like the ones from Berzerk :) I just can't seem to get enough of playing that dumb game.

     

    I thought I'd share another of my Atari stories....One of the few amusing stories I remember from my childhood about buying games was my purchase of Swordquest Earthworld when it first came out (I guess I was about 11). I took it home thinking it was going to be similar to Adventure, and was thoroughly disgusted within the first few minutes. I took it back to the toy store, and with my Mother's help (I think she lied and said that I had just received that same title as a gift from someone else), we were able to exchange it for a copy of Keystone Kapers, which turned out to be one of my all-time favorites.

     

    Thanks again to everyone for making me feel welcome here!

     

    AM

  16. Posted

    Hello Everyone! I thought I'd finally introduce myself, as I've been reading these forums for a while now, and haven't posted anything until now.

     

    I'm the proud original owner of a 2600 6-switch and a 7800 that I purchased new (well, my parents bought the 2600 for me) in '80 and '86, respectively. I'm up to 285 unique carts for the 2600 (70 original purchases, the rest from ebay), and my original 15 carts for the 7800 that I bought new. Somehow, my old Atari consoles and games survived all of my parent's garage sales and spring cleanings! :)

     

    So, for all you orignal Atari owners, what is the Rarest cart that you are the original owner of? I don't have anything really rare that I bought new, but I am the original owner of a Pengo Cart, which I think has a rarity rating of 6 on this site.

     

    Anyway, I'm going to attempt to contribute to this community a little more often, I'm very impressed with how active and knowledgeable the regulars on these forums seem to be. Looking forward to hanging out more often!

     

    Atarius M.

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