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manterola

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Posts posted by manterola

  2. Posted

    Check for other sources of the problem (the schematics are you fiends), it might be a non working pin in the keyword connector, a dirty mylar edge, etc. 

    Now, if a new double layer Mylar is needed, I got mine from the brewing academy and it has been working great. @MacRorie is the contact you need here in Atariage forums.

  3. Posted

    23 minutes ago, JagChris said:

    I'm going to buy a new Mylar from sell my retro just to have it.

     

    I'm a little worried about shipping delicate unfoldable Mylar all the way from Europe. 

     

    It's odd that Brad(or was it Bruce, I get those two confused) went through all that trouble to get those Mylars manufactured and spends paragraphs bragging about them, then won't sell them. 

    But sellmyretro.com is located in UK right?

     

  4. Posted

    11 hours ago, JagChris said:

    Ok there are keyboards for the XLs that aren't Mylar? I put this on watch. This little 600XL is costing me but I hate waste.

     

    @Stephen

    I actually prefer the type 4 keyboard you most likely have, I really like the feeling, I can type quickly in those keys. Type 2 keyboards with switches are also great. 

    Anyway, I think you are very close to get this problem nailed down and you might not need a new mylar. maybe is the keyboard connector, or even the 4051 socket pin 14.

     

    • Like 1

  5. Posted

    One quick check you can do, to test the connectivity of pin1 of both the mylar and connector is to put your multitester in continuity test mode, and than pin 1 should go to pin 14 of U23 if I am reading the correct schematics. 

    So you put one multitester lead in the pin14 of the 4051 (U23) and the other in a point of the trace of mylar that goes to pin 1. Do it carefully because yiu don't want to cut the mylar trace by removing the conductive paint with the multitester lead. 

    If the multitester beeps, you know that the connection mylar/connector/pcb if working correctly and you can narrow down the source of the problem. 

     

     

  6. Posted · Edited by manterola

    7 hours ago, Mclaneinc said:

    Great community spirit going with this connector shortage..

     

    I've still got a couple left if needed..

    Totally agree! I got mine from the community (and the firmware update is also from the "community")... And the result it is just amazing,  I mean, looking an old 600XL with the AVGCart loading and old game in cassette, is great. 

    • Like 2

  7. Posted

    Just to confirm... What was the result of interchanging the 4051 chips? if still the same behavior, then the problem is "upstream".  So it might be the connector itself (the small metallic contacts) or some point in the mylar.

    If metallic contacts, you can try the experiment of a very gently push of the metallic contact involved (check the schematics, again assuming you have a consistent row of characters not working associated to an specific pin) against the mylar, and try typing. If the experiment works, then you might try cutting 1cm or half centimeter, and then , last resort, new keyboard connector.

    If you DON'T have a whole row or column of characters not working then you have to explore what's going on with that particular key which is failing, like maybe the little spring missing, or cleaning the contact with a pen eraser or something similar.

  8. Posted

    Thanks for the suggestions so far. Yesterday I opened the case of this 1050 again. The noisy and uneven squeak comes from the top clamping, and it stops if I gently put a bit pressure on the axis,  and the noise is the same no matter the diskette I use.

    So I took it apart , it has a spring. I added a bit of lithium lubricant with a cotton swab. It did not work, but maybe I did not apply enough lubricant. 

    The thing that I noticed through, but I am not sure, is that this top clamp did not always started at top speed (so I suspect neither the disk, and the bottom part was moving correctly). So now I am starting to believe that there is a belt slipping problem. I re measured the speed and it is actually going a bit slower (more milliseconds than specs). Maybe I am just in the limit and that's why it kind of  unstable operation.

    So I guess I will get a new belt, recheck the rotational speed and then adjust it if necessary. And then report back to you guys. 

     

  9. Posted

    This is a Tandom 1050 that looks great outside. But it makes squeaky noises when the motor is engaged. I cleaned best I could, but it still squeaks lot, and the noises keep changing every 30 seconds or more. 

    The problem is that I get one boot error, and then it keeps rotating the diskette. If I turn it off and on, change the diskette, or flip it, and keep trying, suddenly it start working.. And it works the whole session. I first though it need to "warm up" so I also tried to leave it alone spinning the disk, and wait for it to start reading, but it did not happen. 

    The drive pass all the 1050 diagnostic test of the 1050 atr I load first using respeqt. 

    So where I should start?  Capacitors?, zero track sensor?, cleaning/lubricating the motor? 

     

  11. Posted

    A cheap option is to get an old lcd tv with svideo input. The quality depends a lot on the particular TV. 

    That Funai TV mentioned by Mathy is pretty popular among fellow Atarians in Europe, because of the good quality. 

    As Venkman mentioned a lot of us use svideo to hdmi or svideo to vga converters plus some kind of modern lcd monitor. Again, the quality and pricetag is highly variable, but I am sure somone here can recommend you one or two brands/models which won't be top of the line (and won't cost you a kidney) but good enough managing the Atari video signals for less than usd$50.

     

     

  12. Posted

    I was thinking the same... When searching external floppy drives 99% or more are slim. There the options are plenty and prices very good. I would try to go with one that has a relatively large case, so you'll have more room for doing the "surgery" and any conversion for the ribbon and power cables to this small kind of mylar connector with data and power integrated.

    I made one of those slim drives to work in my XF551 once and it worked great, so quiet and fast. I already had the cable adapter, as I stole that slim drive from a COMPAQ desktop computer, the only trick needed was to twist the twist in the ribbon cable to make it work as DS0 (I don't think yo will have that problem because the 5.25 probably is DS0 and the new 3.5 will be DS1).

    • Like 1

  14. Posted · Edited by manterola

    1 hour ago, _The Doctor__ said:

    looking good, who else want to show theirs?

    Thanks! I just order a couple 3d printed of SIO connectors and I was lucky enough to have those small plastic cases I ordered long ago, that were useless for years,  to make the connections there. I need to do it since I need to extend the cable to make it long enough for 600XL and 800XL. The yellow cable was part of a Radio Shack midi cable I got to use the connector for Atari A/V cable.

    So basically everything were leftovers.

    I just got lucky, and I originally was making the connections "by hand" and using electric tape as always, until I found the little plastic boxes.

     

    I have to say, that I am very very proud of the work done in the Chelco 600XL in the picture, though. I polished the acrylic, change the function keys, redid the "brushed" aluminum effect of the parts which are not buttons, did retrobright to the off-white part of the case and clean/wash  everything, including the keys one by one. I also did the hole in the case for missing the A/V connector, soldered a DIN5 , did the classic 64KB upgrade, change a cd4051 which has a line not working (some keys not working) and finally installed U1M and UAV. 

    It is my new toy...  I really like it.

     

     

    • Like 3

  20. Posted

    39 minutes ago, Wilheim said:

    I'm not sure if RespeQT supports FSK signals yet. Maybe @ebiguy can give us some light about it.

    You are right.. respeqt does not work. I converted to WAV and loaded thru my XC11 real program recorder and it worked..so the CAS itself is working.

    What is interesting is that I have not been able to get a .cas starting from a WAV.. Maybe wave quality is not great as it is coming from and old cassette from the early 90s.

     

     

     

  24. Posted · Edited by manterola

    17 minutes ago, _The Doctor__ said:

    Boot your favorite DOS capable of Duplicating, or Your favorite Sector copier capable of formatting, set up a real disk drive, pick your your favorite ATR, make sure the sio2sd has one drive ID and the real drive has another...

    Put a blank in the real drive... set your source and destination and have at it.

    Just to complement with one example.

    Real drive set to D2: with a blank diskette   then sector copier in sio2sd as D1: and disktoduplicate.atr as V1:

    Check that D2: is not assigned to anything in the sio2sd  

    Boot (press X to boot from sio2sd config also press option if you want to disable Basic)

    The A8 will load the sector copier, then press button 5 and 3 in the sio2sd to change D1:sectorcopiers.atr to D1>disktoduplicate.atr

    Start the duplication process..  (Source D1: to Destination D2:) . That's it

     

    That is just an example as it can be done from D2: to D1: obviously by setting the real drive to D1: and the sio2sd as D2: 

  25. Posted · Edited by manterola

    For your first question: The "virtual" drives are very handy for those situations, actually also handy for your 2nd question.  but let me ask you first, have you managed to boot to the SIO2SD configuration menu (I don't remember the exact name)  in which you can go thru the SD card content in the Atari Screen?

    If yes, then you can do Ctrl-T twice to get to the virtual drives, you set there the second side of the disk image (using the number keys of your A8).

    Another Ctrl-T will put you in the original screen (with D1: D2:, etc).

    Then using the 5th and 3th button, you can assign those images to D1: (or D2: or any other drive number).

     

    The way I do it , most of the time, is that I have the most frequently used images I use loaded in those virtual drives, like V1:dos25.atr  , V2:mydos.atr, V3:sectorcopiers.atr, V4:atariplanetarium_S1.atr  V5:atariplanetarium_S2.atr  , etc

    then using SIO2SD buttons 5 and 3 I keep rotating all those images to D1: .

     

    For example: lets say you have D1:basicprogs.atr , I press and hold button 5 and then press button 3 once. So I got D1>dos25.atr. Then I boot the computer (without option pressed to enable basic), then I hold button 5 and press button 3 , 5 or more times until to get to D1:basicprogs.atr again in the sio2sd display.

    so now you can do Run "D1:CASTLE.BAS".

     

    Later, I want to use the Atari Planetarium, which consists in two sides. So I press and hold button 5 and press button 3 , 4 times to get D1>atariplanetarium_S1.atr , and then reboot the computer (in this case with option pressed). Later when prompted by the program I press button 5 and 3 in the sio2sd one more time to get to D1>atariplanetarium_S2.atr 

     

    I guess you get the idea. Once I learned how to make use of this feature, the device make a lot more sense, and it is really enjoyable.

    You can assign disk images (atrs) to V1: , V2: , etc using the buttons and display in the SIO2SD, it a bit more confusing, but you will get use to that after a while, that way you won't need to enter the SIO2SD conf tool, when you want to assign images "on the fly" without rebooting your computer

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