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Mitkraft

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Posts posted by Mitkraft

  5. Posted

    I've been previously trying to calibrate my 2600 using various carts and comparing them to Stella or eyeballing them. I'd much rather have some test patterns to do it from. The color bar generator cartridge is the only way I know of. Is that the only way to get test patterns on a real console? If not, what other methods are there. If so, then whats my best bet for getting color bar cartridge functionality? The two methods I know of are using the AtariAge cart building service for $25 or buying a Harmony cart and using the ROM file for $60/$85 depending on which version I buy. I want a Harmony eventually but not sure if I'm ready to spend the money yet, but I also hesitate to spend $25 for a single cartridge when I could put that money towards the Harmony. Are there any cheaper ways just to get a single rom put on a cartridge? Or other ways to duplicate the functionality of the color bar generator?

     

    Thanks!

  6. Posted

    I was hoping it might be the RIOT chip since its easiest to swap and the only chip without anything soldered to it from the a/v and pause mods. If nobody replied before I got to it that was going to be my first thing to try. Thanks for the response after seeing it I decided to go ahead and swap them and see. It seems to have fixed the problem but I'll keep an eye on it. I'm usually playing only one player so I'm not using that port that often. I didn't notice it till the first time I played Raiders of the lost ark after modding the Atari. Thanks again for the response and for the time being looks like problem solved (on my primary unit at least). When I get around to fixing the port on my other unit I'll report back on if the problem followed the chip. Are RIOT chips easy to get replacements for?

  8. Posted

    I'm only recently getting back into the 2600 so I've not been watching the forums long so forgive me if this is a know/easy issue. I did some searching and couldn't find anything but also had trouble thinking of good phrases to use to search with.

     

    Here is the issue: On my recently modded light sixer (AV and pause mod) the player two joystick (any stick) will move several increments when I bump the joystick just once and only in the down direction. All other directions and fire button seem fine. Any ideas? I honestly can't say whether it did this prior to the upgrades.

     

    One note, while doing the upgrades accidentally bridged an adjacent pin on the CPU chip and as a temporary solution till I fix it I'm using the CPU out of my 4 switch woody since I was under the impression they were interchangeable.

  9. Posted

    Ok, strangest thing. I decided to hook up an old video corector I had laying around that was used for making VHS dubs. It has a full compliment of video adjustments and figured I could use it to get the signal as close to perfect as possible. When I first started I was still unable to see the gray border in Super Breakout so I was adjusting all the levels as best as I could get them. Then I decided to pop in regular Breakout to see how it looked and low and behold I could see the gray border! For a minute I thought I'd managed to find the settings to overcome the issue, but when I put Super Breakout back in I could now see the gray bars there to. So I eliminated the video corrector and sure enough everything was not looking proper. I have no idea what happened but it must have been something with my unit. I don't know if a bad connection corrected itself, if the mod board needed some burn in time or what, but suddenly everything was looking as it was supposed to. I didn't open the unit back up to try and adjust the pots on the Atari or mod board because the colors were so close I decided to live with it for now. I have no idea why they were clipping so severely to begin with. But for the moment I'm happy and everything looks awesome!

     

    Oh, and the pause mod from the Atariage store is the bomb!

  10. Posted

    I just got a speech synthesizer that I bought off eBay and the seller did a terrible job of packaging it and it suffered some cosmetic damage in shipping. I'd like to verify that it's still functional but I don't have my XB 2.7 cart yet. All I have is a PEB with the standard cards, console, Donkey Kong cart and Pacman cart. Any way to test it?

     

    If not I'll just wait for my XB cart. Thanks!

  11. Posted

    Just this weekend I finally modded my 2600 (light sixer) using the svideo mod from electronicsentimentalities.com and I'm disappointed to find that its severely clipping the black signals. I noticed it when I went to calibrate and found that when playing Super Breakout I could not see the gray borders at all (I was using Stella as a comparison). Now I'm looking on the electronicsentimentalities website at the examples and see that the behavior is clearly shown in their examples. I was just going off everyone's suggestion that they were the best place to buy the sivdeo mod from and that it was basically the same as the Cybertech mod. If you look here you can see it clearly in the gray-scale bars:

     

    In Stella you can clearly see 8 shaded bars with the 8th being solid black.

     

    On the electronicsentimentalities site here is the same pattern and you can see that only 6 bars are distinguishable (with 7&8 appearing solid black) and even the 6th bar just barely so. http://electronicsentimentalities.com/Images/GREYBAR.JPG

     

    On the Cheeptech website you can see that how only the RF adapter shows similar clipping (although you can still barely make out the 7th bar). Both the Ben Heck and Cybertech mods show all 8 bars:

     

    RF: http://www.cheeptech.com/2600mods/captures/rfadapt/ra_tc_3.jpg

    Ben Heck: http://www.cheeptech.com/2600mods/captures/benheck/bh_tc_3.jpg

    CyberTech: http://www.cheeptech.com/2600mods/captures/cyadjst/ca_tc_3.jpg

     

    My questions are these:

     

    1 Is this really an issue? Were we supposed to see the gray bars in Super breakout? No seriously, I can't remember, are they visible on a non-modded system?

     

    2. Can this be caused by anything I did (although I suspect not since the ES site clearly shows this behavior)?

     

    3. Can it be improved upon at all?

     

    4. As a side note, my color adjustment (the pot with the big clear adjustment knob) seems to have no effect after the mod, is that normal behavior?

     

    I have to say I'm a little bit disappointed by this since in regular video I'm particularly sensitive to black levels and can't stand when they are too high or clipped. However this is only an issue on the Atari if there are parts of games in the shade of grey that are meant to be seen but will be clipped on my system. Btw, I've tried cranking all my settings up to see if I can force the visibility of that 7th bar and it seems to be clipped before leaving the Atari because I can't see it no matter how much I bump up the brightness or where I set the contrast either on the TV or the mod board.

  12. Posted

    Ok, so when I got home this evening I did some tinkering. I checked the calibration of the TV using the same Svideo incput/cable I was running to the Atari by connecting it to my DVD player and running the DVE calibration DVD. My Atari however seems to be severely clipping blacks and I don't seem to have any color adjustment. As I understand it the large clear adjustment pot on a non-modded Atari is for color adjustment. On mine with the Svideo mod it doesn't to anything. The only other adjustments I seem to have are the two pots on the mod board which are marked Brightness and Contrast. They both have some level of adjustment but not a ton. I was using Super breakout to check black level and colors and comparing it to Stella and I can't see the gray border around the playing area no matter what I do. No matter how I adjust my Atari all I see is a black background, the paddle, ball, and the bricks. Does anyone else have this problem or have any idea if there is something I might have done to cause it (or something I can do to fix it)? Thanks!

  13. Posted

    On the subject of soldering:it sounds like you might just need an iron with a finer tip.

     

    I don't doubt that is true. My soldering skills are weak to say the least but they've improved to the point that I was at least able to do this mod successfully. I would very much like to get a temp adjustable soldering station. I'll have to look into a finer tip for my current iron. This was my first time using Flux as well which seemed to help.

  14. Posted

    I recently decided to finally pull out my old Atari (My original 4 switch woody) and get it all working. Fortunately before I modded it I found a great deal on a light sixer and grabbed that. This weekend I installed the pause mod from AtariAge and the Svideo mod from electronicsentimentalities. Both work FANTASTIC btw! I was so excited to get it all hooked up and see a clean video with no RF interference. One place I deviated from the instructions a little though: The AtariAge pause mod instructions have you connecting 3 wires to adjacent legs on the CPU chip. My soldering skills are weak and I was concerned about being able to make solders that close together so I used the locations from these instructions instead. As it turns out that was a good decision because even making only one solder at the CPU resulted in bridging an adjacent leg and had to be fixed.

     

    So now I have a fully modded sixer and need to get the settings dialed in. I know there are a couple of adjustments on the Atari itself (are they still active?) but I can't find the page I read a while back that told me which ones did what) as well as the two adjustments on the mod board. I know I'm asking to be spoon fed here but I figure someone knows this off the top of their head. Which adjustments do what? And any particular advice for successful calibration?

     

    Thanks!

  15. Posted

    So I did finally get a chance to open up the PEB and see what I had. Looks like I got the standard setup: 32k mem, RS232, and TI FDC. I like the sound of the HDX upgrade. Now that I kinda get what that is and what it does I'm going to have to go learn what's involved, the best way to mod mine or buy one and see if that might be an answer. I've already ordered the XB 2.7 and snagged a Speech Module off eBay for a good price so I'm rolling along nicely!

    • Like 1

  17. Posted

    Thanks for the replies. I'm might have given the wrong impression though. I was going to use the 12V to feed a set of powered speakers. I was going to feed them with the 12V line from the video out in place of their own power adapter. I'm pretty sure I have a set that was originally intended to mount below the monitor and got their power from particular monitors that had a special power connector. I believe it was 12v but don't remember the amperage requirements. I need to dig them out and check. I also have a similar set that was meant to be powered from a USB port. That might be an option as well and could tap into the 5V instead. But I also hear you guys saying "don't risk it" I was concerned as well to begin with.

  18. Posted

    I've installed the F18A mod and had already cut the RF modulator off of my video cable and added connectors for video and audio. One of my next projects will be to make an imitation TI brand monitor from the guts of a computer monitor placed inside the shell of a TV that bears a decent resemblance to the TI monitor. What I'm thinking about doing is putting speakers inside the TV and I'm wondering if I can't power them from the 12V power that originally powered the RF modulator. Does anybody know what the safe power handling capacity of that would be? Or would I be risking needless stress on the TI and should maybe just power the speakers separately?

     

    Thanks!

  19. Posted · Edited by Mitkraft

    Ok, I said I'd post my intro after I finished my taxes so hear goes (If you don't want to read my long winded TI story my questions are separated below) . I started in computers when I was in 3rd or 4th grade and we began using the school computer lab. The computers back then were Commodore 64's with tape drives. We started learning basic and I LOVED it. I would get on a computer every chance I got at friends houses, school or whatever. I begged my parents to get me a computer (I wanted a Commodore). My parents were divorced and my dad was the go-to parent for big gifts and I had the impression he would be buying me one for Christmas. Well imagine my disappointment when I opened this:

     

    http://www.digibarn.com/collections/games/science-fair-digital-computer/

     

    I was like WTF??? This isn't a computer! (No, I didn't say that, I was a good kid and kept my disappointment to myself) So a year or two later I was very excited when my mom got me a TI 99/4A - my first real computer! My uncle worked for TI here in Houston so he was able get it at the employee store at a considerable discount. The drawback was that since we didn't have much money all I had was the console and a tape interface cable. I did get two games and a pair of joysticks at some point but the joysticks didn't last long. I did however use the system for learning and playing around in Basic which at the time was a lot of fun for me. My uncle however had the full system: Fully loaded PEB, tons of games (both floppy and command module), printer, TI monitor. My cousin and I were best friends so I spent quite a bit if time over at their house and played on their computer quite a bit.

    Fast forward many years and I still have my old TI console in the box with all the accessories I ever had for it (few as they were) but I hadn't even taken it out since I was a kid. A few years ago my uncle sent out an email to me and my cousins asking if any of us wanted all the old TI stuff since he'd had it in storage all this time. None of them did and I liked the idea of playing with it again so I took it. I finally got around to tinkering with it a few weeks ago and found out I didn't have his complete system. I just had the PEB, printer, and monitor. So I pulled out my console and connected it up only to find that my console wasn't working :( That's when I stumbled across the TI forum here (I'd recently joined because I also recently started tinkering with my old Atari 2600). After reading I began to figure that my problem was likely to be the video chip and/or video memory. I grabbed another console from a local game shop for $20 to have as a backup but I went ahead and ordered the F18A upgrade and sure enough it fixed my console! I have to say this is the dead simplest upgrade I've ever done that makes such a HUGE impact on an old system. Going from RF modulated output to VGA is awesome!
    So now I've got a working system, possibly working PEB (it powers up and seems to register when the console is turned on) and I just need to start learning how to use it again and acquiring some software. I also need to open up the PEB and see what all is in there. I want to thank everyone on this forum for the TONS of useful information I've already gathered just by browsing the threads on here!
    So on to my questions (first off I'm not looking to be a "colector" I just want to find a happy medium between cost, versatility, convenience, and duplicating the original experience):
    1. I'd like to put together a system to play all the old games I remember. I'd like to play games like Parsec, Star Trek, Adventure, Hunt the wumpus etc. What's the best way to go about it? Right now I have the original floppy drive in the PEB, I've probably got several PC floppy drives around both 5.25 and 3.5 but I'm still learning what is and isn't compatible and have a hunch I might need to upgrade the drive controller to use them.
    2. Would I be able to do something simple (using equipment I have) like load games from a floppy? Or maybe a cassette/mp3 player?
    3. I see nearly everything is available for download but much of it is in compilations, made for nanopeb/cf7 or emulators. How do I tell what files are for which and can they be converted for loading via floppy or CS1? Or is a there a particularly complete repository?
    4. Will I need to get one of the utility cartridges like Extended basic, E/A or possibly one of the enhanced carts like the "XB v2.7" in order to use any particular software or games? I'm not going to learn assembly language or anything so I don't need a developer setup or anything.
    5. Should I maybe get a drive replacement/emulator device like the NanoPeB/CF7 or a lotharek floppy emulator? If so, can something like this be had without spending too much money and/or are any of them still being sold? I do like the convenience of solutions like that so I wouldn't have to fool with floppies and tons of cartridges.
    Any and all help is appreciated and I will continue to keep plugging along and reading old threads to seek out this information on my own as well. I'll be sure and post a pic of my setup as well as make a thread for the monitor I'm planing to customize to look like it really belongs with this system. I hope to take a 19" CRT PC monitor, marry it with a TV housing that closely resembles the original 10" TI monitor and then paint and/or modify it to complete the look. Should be fun!
    • Like 1

  20. Posted

     

    Ooooooh yeah! I'm looking forward to that! It would be cool to get the proper stencils to put the

     

    30px-TI-logo-black.pngTEXAS INSTRUMENTS and color monitor on the front.

     

    Stencils would be cool but since its just black and might be tough to cut, I might just cheat and scan/print it on a clear decal.

     

    If all else fails buy a TI monitor remove guts and fit a flat screen into casing, then upgrade TI with a F18A and you can have a sweet video modded system that still looks stock :P

     

    I have an original TI monitor which I'll be using as a guide, but 10" is just way to small and I'd also prefer to stick with a CRT. Some of these old systems loose something when you display them on an LCD and I have a great donor 19" CRT monitor that I'd already de-cased for another project.

     

    The closest match I could find was a 15" Proview...

     

     

    Yeah, If I come across a really close match I might consider just using it but currently my plan is to use the casing from a TV that has a similar Bezel style to the TI monitor. I actually have one that's pretty close and another maybe even better one went up on craigslist last weekend (for $3 lol) that I'll go snag if he still has it after I get finished dealing with taxes.

  21. Posted

    I'm new here and haven't even introduced myself yet (I will as soon as I'm done with my taxes :D ) but I was taking a break and reading the TI threads and came across this one. I have a monitor that sounds similar to the one described. I'm familiar with "cap kits" for arcade monitors and even have one myself but I haven't gotten around to installing it yet. I figured that might be the answer for my old TI monitor as well and am glad to hear others confirm it. So I echo the question above, has anybody made a list of the caps/pots needed and/or sourced the parts? My F18A kit arrived yesterday and it looks GORGEOUS so my TI is destined to be running on my 19" CRT monitor (which I plan to customize to resemble the old 10" TI monitor, will be starting a thread on that when I get to it) but I would love to get the original TI monitor working to either sell it to a collector or keep it for posterity.

     

    Thanks!

    • Like 2
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