Nateo

No worries whatsoever! With the care you put into it, you deserve a fair price.

Oh yeah. Plus, that original model Spectrum just looks so dang cool. And loading computer programs from cassette tape never ceases to fascinate me.

Ahh, gotcha. That makes a lot of sense. Maybe if I save up a little more I can add to the quarantine fun and get one of those Harlequin kits?

I'm kind of surprised it goes for that much, considering how popular it was and how many were made. But I guess the prices on old computers have been skyrocketing in recent years...

I don't know if I could afford what that whole setup would be worth - $100 is about the most I can swing at the moment. But I really appreciate you offering! As for it being PAL, I already have a solution in place for that as I have a monitor that accepts both NTSC and PAL composite signals, and performing a composite mod looks really easy.

Anyone know what a decent price would be to buy a rubber key 48k ZX Spectrum? I'd like to pick one up for some quarantine fun, but eBay's prices are all over the place.

Is there a schematic anywhere of specifically the Super Action Controller?

Damn. That's gonna be a real pain in the ass to desolder those diodes.

A while ago I built my own Coleco stick out of some arcade parts and a wooden project box from Michael's. It works great, but it lacks a keypad, but it given that its rarely needed (and the player 2 keypad works the same way for most titles) I didn't worry about it too much, But now that I'm home a lot more often and with considerably less plans, I decided to try to hand wire one with some switching diodes and some tact switches. The keypad doesn't work. I followed the attached schematic I found through Google. I decided to open up one of my original ColecoVision controllers to see if there was something I may have neglected, and it appears to my eye that the schematic I used is wrong. The diodes on the actual circuit board appear to be facing the opposite direction. Is this in fact my problem? I just want to make sure I'm not replacing 22 or so diodes for nothing.

I concur, the audio sounds nice and clean with that filter cap.

Just looking for a bare bones copy of Super Mario 64 for the N64. I was gonna try my luck with ebay, but there's a ton of fakes and reproductions on there, and I'd like to make sure I'm getting the genuine article. Thanks!

Welp, I figured out my problem. IT WAS THE FRIGGING AV CABLE I WAS USING! I noticed that I broke the ground connection from 1/8in jack, and when it was disconnected, I got the same kind of fun, gray scrolling picture. That immediately led me to the conclusion that the reason I was getting that wonky picture was due to a poor ground connection. I tried another 1/8in to RCA cable, and lo and behold, a perfect signal. Come to think of it, I had tried to use that faulty cable with a cassette deck I was repairing, and thought that something was wrong with it due to extra buzzing noise I heard. I'll bet that was all due to a poor ground connection. Thanks to everyone who helped out. And @Ruggers Customs, I'll probably just grab that new PSU anyways, since I don't want any further harm to come to my Coleco.

No worries, I trust the build quality of the board I fully believe the problem lies either with something on the main circuit board or the power supply itself, and the power supply seems to me to be the most plausible culprit. I'll still try seeing how good the ground connections are on the board and try a different TV before making a purchase.

I'm just using an 1/8in stereo connector. The right channel is video, the left is the audio. I'm connecting using an 1/8in stereo to RCA cable. EDIT: @R.Cade, do you think it might be worth a try to tie the ground connections to another ground spot on the board?

Thanks! I'll look into that. Hoping that this'll solve the issue. I REALLY don't want to have to replace a chip if I can avoid it!

I took the multimeter readings directly from the back of the power socket. Just checked the points on the RF board, and that also reads 11.61v. They way the screen dims and then just turns into a gray scrolling mess sure seems like power is fading. Probably time to pick up a COLUSB then eh? But I still gotta know... why does it work like a charm when the RF is plugged in too? Is it getting extra juice from the TV somehow?

Here's the pictures of my install. The multimeter readings for the pinouts are: +12v - 11.6v +5v - 4.66v -5v - (-)5.18v

I recently bought and installed a ColecoVision AV mod kit from Console5. It's a pretty easy solder job, everything on my end soldering has been hunky dory. No accidental bridgings, no cold solder joints, pretty as a picture. Turn it on, looks fine to start, but then slowly the picture dims until a scrolling, dim, fuzzy image. I suspect something to be wrong with maybe my power supply, but just to be sure, I hook it up using the normal RF and turn it on. I still had it on the composite input, and lo and behold, I get a beautiful, stable image! I unplugged the RF cable and immediately the picture turned to a dim mess. Plugged it back in, composite video looked great. What the hell is going on here? (Below is the wiring diagram for this mod)

Wow, that's gonna be GORGEOUS when it's all done. Having the cartridge end label double as an arcade marquee is genius.

I just fixed up my Video Pinball machine yesterday, and I think Rebound might be the best game on it! The mechanic of dribbling the ball a little bit before aiming and taking your shot adds a lot of suspense to the game, and making all three baskets is very rewarding. I'm not that good at it though, my high score is only 34.

So I thought it might be a fun quarantine project to build a pong machine using one of my spare AY-3-8500 chips, but I've run into some snags. I decided to wire up the bare minimum of parts just to see if I could get a picture on the screen, but so far, bupkis. I think my 2MHZ clock might be part of the problem, I just don't think I can use three inductors in series to add up to 90uH. Or maybe something else needs to be wired up before a picture will generate? I dunno, I'm just spitballing at this point. I've attached a picture showing my (not so) handiwork.

Just updated the interview for some clarifications and some corrections suggested by Steve Maine. Pro tip: when transcribing an interview done over the phone, it's OKAY to go back to the interviewee and ask questions of clarification!

I recently had the privilege to interview Steve Maine, who did a lot work with developing the Intellivision, notably with the STIC chip. Learned a lot of neat stuff about his time at General Instrument, and that he has a hand in the early history of Pixar! Link to interview

I mean, I'm glad they did the right thing, but still, this really, really sucks. It's absolutely my favorite event of the year.

They've been dwindling over the years, but usually you can find at least one table that has decent Atari-era stuff. I was able to pick up some CoCo stuff a couple years ago.