MagnaFarce

Do you think it would be a good idea to have a link to the 'learn' page in the sidebar so that you can click on it directly instead of having to go to the site homepage before being able to get to it?

Earlier today I decided to look on Craigslist for some Sega stuff, just for the fun of it. There was a posting on there (which had been up for three days already) for a non-working Saturn in box with all the manuals and plastic, two power cables, AV cable, two controllers (one Sega, one aftermarket), one Mad Catz light gun with Saturn adapter, and an official Sega Saturn Backup cartridge. All for $20. I just got back from picking it up. The Saturn won't spin any discs, but I already have a working Saturn, so I don't care too much about that. I mostly wanted to get a couple more controllers and try my hand at repairing a Saturn.

I've been looking for one of these at the flea market for years. I remember using this monitor when I was a kid and my dad had the whole Commodore 64 setup. It's really too bad he got rid of everything in the late '90s. Does that price sticker on top say you got it for $3.99?

I got some stuff last Thursday from the flea market. Since I'm home sick today I figured I'd take the pictures and finally get around to posting my finds. Tamagotchi and the Mary-Kate and Ashley games were 2-for-$5. My friend got the Chex Quest disc for a dollar (I think, it might have been two dollars) and gave it to me because I actually have an old PC which can play it, and he only has newer Mac computers. The Dreamcast magazine disc was $1. There's this one guy at the flea market who always has piles of stuff selling for $1 (same guy I bought the 5200 from, actually), and every once in a while there's something which is worth it. This Game Gear was in those piles on this day. There were some slightly corroded batteries in the battery compartment and the 2 button gets a bit stuck, but it had the battery covers, and for $1 it's worth a shot. I cleaned out the battery compartment and tested it out, and it actually works very well. The speaker works, the screen doesn't look washed out, and the 2 button still works to some capacity. I'll probably still open it up and try to bring the button up to 100%. This is one of the more odd finds I've had. I was doing a kitchen demolition job at an old house in a gated community that apparently was built in 1971/1972, and this house still had a bunch of the original decorations from back then. Orange countertops, orange drapes, and this old garbage disposal unit. I just had to take it home. It would be a shame to throw it away.

Ah, okay. I searched for 'video pinball' and it didn't come up. Does the basic search function only search the game title, and not the console?

Is there going to be the option to submit scores for dedicated consoles in the future? I have an Atari Video Pinball which I've been thinking of pulling out again.

Goddammit. I can't believe I got that wrong, even after using Google as a calculator. I guess I got too hasty when I was inputting my figures and performed one of those 'human errors' which are always making rockets explode.

I got this lot of Odyssey 2 games off of Ebay a couple weeks ago for $21.75 shipped. When the package arrived it had $9.95 postage due which I had to pay, but the seller refunded me $16 because of it, so I only really paid $15.65 for the lot. I still don't have an Odyssey 2, but Mike over at collectorscardsandgames is in the process of testing one (and a TI-99/4a) for me to purchase.

Of course this would exist.

Last night my friend texted me and asked me if I wanted to go to the flea market this morning. It had been a while since my last excursion, so I was all for it. Had some really exciting finds! Listed in the order I bought them. Children's Discovery System in a really ratty box with three cartridges and some paperwork. The battery compartment is fused shut from corrosion, so I'll have to go at it and see if I can't fix it up. Got it all for $5. Two N64 rumble packs and two memory cards, all in this box for $5. I've been thinking about getting a rumble pack for a while, so this is pretty nice. The transparent one has a bit of corrosion in the battery compartment, but it looks like an easy fix. Burnable Laserdisc. Exciting stuff for a Laserdisc collector like myself since I don't see them very often. Unfortunately, it's not a blank disc, as it has a recording of some first grade classroom on it. Commodore power supply from same vendor. $4 for both, talked down from $6. These are all from the same vendor, but I put them in two separate pictures because the 5200 is so freakin' huge. The Atari 5200 console had no controllers, power supply, or switch box. I bought it for $5 after I talked them down from $15. The disc cam is something I've wanted for a while because I consider it an interesting part of consumer camera history, and the Dreamcast controller was picked up on a whim, both for $1 each. Three boxes of double density floppy disks, perfect for my Atari 520STfm. All three for $4, talked down from $6. There were fourteen more boxes, all sealed, but I was getting low on cash and didn't feel like I really needed many more than three boxes. A bunch of memory and cards I got in a package deal. My friend was buying a couple hard drives and cables for $10, but the seller said he'd throw in a few more hard drives and all this if we'd give him $15. I threw in the other $5 and got all these out of it. I'm probably only going to keep the pile on the right, so if anything on the left looks like something you'd want let me know and you can have it for the cost of shipping. Another good find my friend had was an M-Audio MIDI controller for $15. We're going to custom paint it for when his band does live shows.

I still need to test it. I don't think I have the right power adapter, and I sure as hell don't have five D batteries lying around. I'll probably head over to Frys tomorrow and buy some batteries.

Been a while since I've been to Savers. I popped in today and found some really exciting stuff. First time I've ever been there and had to go get a cart to hold all the finds. Grabbed some reel to reel tapes for future recording, the Warcraft II expansion, and Magix Music Maker (I don't even have a PS2, but it looked interesting) and thought I was doing quite good. Then I came across the Beta cleaning cassette, the projector, and the Casio keyboard. I was in heaven. There was also a boxed Commodore datasette for $10, but I passed on it because I already have one and the box was really janky and taped to hell and back again. Everything came out to be about $36.

That Talking Computron looks wicked awesome.

This is actually a really great opportunity for me to test out my new capture device. I'll see if I can't get a bunch of scores submitted this week.

I think finding any NEC console for $25 is a steal.

I still need to get screws for my Atari 520STfm I bought at the flea market several months ago. What's with all these Atari's with their screws removed? One of these days I'll get around to buying screws for all these wayward computers, but knowing myself it probably won't happen for a while.

After I test them all I'm going to decide on whether or not I want to keep all of them. I want to try out Retrobrite on the yellowed one to give it a try, and there's one which doesn't have any screws holding it together, so I'll probably keep it around for parts and whatnot. That's all I have planned at the moment.

Here's an unexpected find! Last night I got drunk with my best mate. I woke up this morning much, much earlier than he did, so I hopped on the computer to kill time. I hadn't been on Craigslist in a while, so I went on and searched for 'Atari'. Bingo. What came up was this lot of three 800XLs, 1050 floppy drive, 1030 modem, cables, a few carts, and a small selection of floppy disks with boring stuff like 'dad' and 'home filing program' written on them. It had been listed the night before, so I knew I still had a chance. I quickly composed an email, and waited. Long story short: I was the only person to have emailed her at that point and I got everything for $25.