ParanoidLittleMan

What is PAL in some Falcon from Germany (well, actually from Taiwan 🙂 ) is PAL encoder circuit. What means that composite video signal on it's output is PAL. Same stays for RF output. But nobody should use those signals today, but RGB signals. There are NTSC versions - with NTSC color encoder. To make your Falcon running at 60 Hz in non-VGA mode + to have US keyboard layout (what will be little different than what stays on key caps) need to run CMOS setup program, and set it to US region. Like QWERTY instead QWERTZ ... You can play PAL games - and if they really work only at 50 Hz refresh rate, you need monitor what can display that. As I know all factory Falcons have same graphic and sound capabilities. And I think that storage is where you may encounter some problems, questions about what to use with Falcon ...

After short googling here's list: https://gamesx.com/controldata/ejp_faq.htm And much more 🙂 What reminded me that actually there was one game what used analog inputs - Moonspeeder. But only left-right, so 1 axe. All this with STE and it's barely used extra HW is known sad story. SW houses, programmers somehow did not care to invest little money and effort in it.

Why is it that every time I see exclamation mark, there is something wrong written ? 😆 There are multiple games which can use STE extended joystick ports. Some originals, some are updated/patched. And they are for Jagpads, which are digital controls, or in other word - no analog controller on them, like movable stick for left-right and up-down gradual control (present on most of newer USB sticks). But there is HW for sensing analog inputs (2 axes) in STE and Falcon, only that Atari never made controller using them. So, I decided to play little with those inputs on my STE, and concluded that game OIDS is ideal candidate for that. Used some older analogue joystick for PC - surely much easier to adapt for STE than some USB one. And it was really easy - I mean HW adapter - just some soldering and couple connectors. Was little more with SW, and additionally I made modded Steem too, because original Steem has no analog input support - surely not to blame it's authors to not supporting something for what was no SW and HW - games and analog stick good for those ports.

Yes, most likely ST is faulty. FDC chip, PSG chip or something around.

Non working mouse can be mouse, it's cable/connector error or 'keyboard' error (it's mouse input part). You need Atari compatible mouse. There are diverse solutions to attach modern optical mouse to Atari ST, TT, Mega STE via special adapter (PS2 to 9 pin, or USB to 9 pin). That will be probably easier and cheaper than find good original Atari mouse. Shutting down will not damage hard disk. In very unlucky case data damage can happen, but more likely your hard disk will break before it because of it's age. You just don't turn off it while disk access happens - and that's the case when you close running SW and are in Desktop. Btw. if some SW error happens and computer becomes unresponsive how Mac user can click on that Shut down ? Don't forget: Atari ST was Mac 128 killer 😀

Another 'rare' facts: it works with electric power ! Has text on with latin characters. People can make it working with power switch ! Yeah folks, let's just use exclamation mark for everything ! Today is Sunday !

Because format performs test for every sector on disk - and if it is bad, it will be marked as such (practically as used one, not free for data) - and free capacity will be less. Depending on count of problematic sectors detected. Btw. same happens with modern Flash cards after manufacturing memory chip(s) - they go under test, and bad sectors will be marked, and capacity lower. Look just real capacity of some Flash card - writes 8 GB for instance, while free space is in range 7.5 GB - better by good brands. And will hardly find 2 cards with exact same capacity. Longevity ? Would not use that word when talking about floppies now. Today needed to write again some short files on floppy, before it to format it, after only about 1 month. And it was DD, not HD floppy. Did 2 - for case - really not fun to dig out old PC with floppy drive because couple files ... Surely, manufactured some 25-30 years ago - so it may be considered as long lifetime, only that now is in grave with 1 leg 😀

Yeah, they must'v been some super Atari experts ... And I'm stupid 33 years old Atari ST owner, who was wrong all those years and thought that DMA is 8 MHz ... Actually - what happens when you put chip marked 10 MHz in computer which feeds it with 8 MHz clock ? Will it work at 10 MHz ? Question of the day: what clock gets DMA in 32 MHz TT ?

Losing RED color most likely happens after shifter chip - on it's way to color encoder/video out connector. Probably dry soldering. Maybe transistor for amplifying it is what breaks. Revision of board is really not relevant. Video circuit is same in all STs. Just get schematic and look section around RF modulator - there will be 3 transistors for 3 colors, video connector. Btw. feeding shifter (those LS chips) would not cause error like this. To fix soldering problem need to have access to bottom of mainboard. Same for replacing transistor or something else. And that's ideal to get rid of some dust 🙂

Agree with Dark. Floppies are really obsolete and problematic now. I have here at least 100 DD disks, about 80 HD, so no problem with it. And no so fast wearing. HD floppies are just little less good for DD drives, but it may work fine if all is in good condition and not too old - heh - latest is not fulfilled anymore. And stays for DD disks too. Flash cards are the present. In the beginning I paid about 2 DEM for 1 DD SS (360 K) floppy disks (1987) - because I bought 520 with SF354 (SS). I got little later DS drive - for less money than price diff between 354 and 314, just to add. What want to say is that look this: 360, OK, calculate with 400 KB for 2 DEM, what is about 2 Euros now, taking inflation in it. For 20 Euros now can get 32 GB SD card - that's about 70000 x more capacity . Faster, more reliable .

More about transferwise - after some experience with : All went pretty smooth and fast. For instance they told: up to 5 days to verify ID - was less than 5 hours. My master card arrived today - was said that will come at Febr. 12. And actually, payment/transfer with cards work. But you need first to register there. Then can send money to your account for free - with debit card like Master, Visa. And from your account can transfer like it is at PayPal - e-mail address based to other people registered there. Fees are low. Borderless debit card is what will get for free too - only condition is to need to send first some money on account (20 Eu for instance, if Eu account). After verification, that money stays on account, for user. And best way to send there money is with card - then no bank charge, plus it arrives instantly. I even added their logo to my homepage. As see, they want to expand, to take it over from .. Will show always fees, before user starts transaction. My transfer of 20 Euros went slow, because in local bank they gave me first some wrong info about card usage, there was pretty messy sometimes at counter. But did not forget to raise diverse fees 😞 https://transferwise.com

That talk about " convert the RF output from a modulated signal (requiring a TV with an NTSC tuner on channel 3 or 4) to a composite (unmodulated) video signal " (sorry for size, really does not deserve more 🙂 ) is typical for sellers - complete rubbish - while could look for what outputs are on STs. If there is RF, then there is composite output too (look ST video connector pins and functions). And converting from RF to composite would be low quality at high price. Only once I saw composite to RGB converter in one C64 - which has no RGB out - was from France, and since was no Secam C64 manufactured it was necessary for those (I guess minority) which TV was not multi norm, so were no colors with PAL (Eu market) C64 . Basically, they added to C64 circuit what is normally in PAL TV-s . Really can not say about that mod - only 1 wire to modulator is visible on photos.

That's not correct - or in other words, you trying now to trash me 😀 What EmuTOS team admittedly do is to make it 100% according to TOS documentation. And that's simply bad idea - because same reason what I talk about here - TOS docs are incomplete, with some errors. They even do not support famous program Spectrum 512 - which (as many other) work not under EmuTOS - because it uses some 'dirty' trick to override some TOS problem, surely as result of poor documentation. What I explained here is that programmers were sometimes forced to do like that. And I wrote about concrete cases at AF, what they did not like. The things are that when docs are incomplete you need self to examine function and judge how it works, what are return parameters, and even sometimes how to use it at all - probably best example is joystick read via TOS - no complete guide for usage, not even in newest, updated (not by Atari) TOS docs. I could write some other examples, but who is interested can find them - even in this forum. What is more important today ? To be able to run good old SW on Atari, emulators, or have some 'perfect' TOS (actually perfect only on paper) under which some 30% of SW works not properly or at all.

I agree that STE is what is worth to keep - because STE enhanced features using games - there are originals and some which are enhanced later (like Giana) . Mega STE is best indeed, and can work faster (16 MHz). But since gaming is target it is not actually good idea - TOS 2.06 is really not for gaming. Unless using some older TOS version in it (patched for MSTE) . And something to consider: you stay at one Atari by choice. And it stops working 3 days later . You have 0 Ataris then. Repair may be problematic and expensive. This is not joking, messing - machines are very old and break more and more often. So, maybe keep it all, and fate will decide which one will be the one ... Plus, you have sources for components. This is how my Mega ST still works - took components from other, broken STs .

RCA is not mandatory for external speaker. You can use whatever connector you want on cable. Of course that is big - 320x200 px on 1920x1080 res monitor - that's 6x bigger pixel size at Atari. Adding analog audio to HDMI converter would increase price. And: are now some monitors with internal speakers equipped only with HDMI, without analog audio in ?