-^CrossBow^-

Going to give a try here in a bit as I've got a few 7800s out from service requests I can use it with. Will update this post with some results a bit later. Yes! I just tested mine with this new FW load and it ran each and every power on on no less than 4 different 7800s (all NTSC) just now. So I'd say you got this working quite well! Now to study up on how to re-encode some other movies onto this.

I believe this is what you are looking for? https://console5.com/store/atari-2600-total-refresh-tune-up-cap-kit-new-capacitors-and-more.html

Wanted to update this thread as the issue has been resolved. It was in fact the Maria IC causing the issue. Once I removed the original, installed two 24pin sockets (as I don't have any 48pins on hand), and then popped on another Maria I pulled from a parts 7800. Good to go and Ballblazer once again looks like I would expect. Also, the squished look is actually how I have my monitor currently setup that causes that and it wasn't the Maria. But the extra graphics on the side was the Maria for sure. So yeah, if you have a similar looking issue from your 7800 when doing an AV upgrade, then the Maria is the first place in this instance to place the blame. I'm guessing this Maria has always had these issues in the past and the owner never noticed since they mainly use a CRT to play.

Excellent to hear! Now go play some games!

yes

Not that I'm aware of... one of the parts of the mod is to feed the input voltage off the PSU before it gets to the regulators to an unsued redundant ground pin that you have to separate from the traces on the board and that becomes the input voltage for the VCS adapter.

Assuming the seller was using a 2port 5200 when they tested it? Because if they used a 4port model and it hasn't been internally modified for the VCS adapter, then you get nothing from the adapter when trying to use it.

Yeah I've never understood why that is? I mean, I'm used to it but it is very odd. The Free Wheeling diagnostics corrects this as well.

This is very cool! But you know since you have the BBpro and the Intellivision adapter, it comes with v4.1 of the MTE test on it already? Just hold down the button while powering on the Intellivision and you will be at the controller test screen first thing on that test and it shows all buttons and control directions as well. It is what I mainly use for testing quickly or my actual MTE-201 test cart if my BBPro isn't handy.

I've done... a lot of 7800s over the years and most of them with UAVs installed. But I've never encountered a 7800 doing what this one is doing that I'm working on right now. This is what BallBlazer via s-video from a UAV would normally look like from a 7800 like this one below I did back in November. However, the 7800 I have right now is showing extra graphic info on the far left and right side of the screens that I've never seen from a 7800 before with a UAV installed.. Here is what the same BB cartridge looks like running on the current 7800 I have on the bench right now. As you can see the black masking on the left and right doesn't seem to be working on this console? I know I see this same effect on the 5200 as the UAV doesn't feature any v-gate masking on it and that is normal on the 5200. But the 7800 doesn't normally show this and I'm wondering if there is some section of this 7800 that isn't working properly to cause this? It doesn't effect the game play area at all and only games using colored backgrounds show this. So games like Food Fight, Donkey Kong...look normal. Even the color squares display on the 7800 Utility cart looks correct on this 7800. But stuff like BB above show an odd checkerboard pattern of graphics that will change a little as the screen graphics change and it more distracting than usual since I'm not used to seeing this. I've ruled out the UAV as the cause since again, the UAVs don't feature anything to mask that info anyway, and I tried a different UAV with the same results. I also bypassed my mount board with the chroma timing just to rule that out and no dice, same exact thing. Only think I can suspect is the Maria itself, or possible odd brand of RAM I've found in this console that I can't recall what it is off the top of my head right now. I will look through the schemes to see if I can find anything related to handle this, but yeah...this is an odd one. Anyone else encountered this on a 7800?

Thanks I guess I missed that or forgot. I will take a lot a bit later, thanks for the info!

Is there a link to the suite test rom? Your initial link is only to a short vid showing the lag test selection.

No worries! I was just surprised to see that it looked like it was enabled since most people I know, aren't a fan of that rounded smoothed look on their the retro games. There are some cases where it might improve the image quality but it looks way too artificial to me on vintage/retro consoles. But again only my opinion.

@Crash7 Looks like you have the smoothing option turned on through your Rad2x. I'm not personally a fan of that look and prefer the sharp corner pixels myself hehe.

@paulwgraber The audio hum could be a ground issue as was mentioned, but it could also be due to two other things or a combo therein. It could be that the audio in addition to your RF modulator might require a little tuning on its own. And I've seen the humming also come from the poly caps for the audio starting to go bad. The power conversion kits from Console5 actually come with replacement poly caps for the audio but you stated our purchased yours from Ebay so I don't know what would come included in that case. The audio tuning is done in the same manner as the RF. Using a plastic hex adjustment tool, to audio tuning coil is right there just off center right of the system board standing straight up.

The UAV is sold by The Brewing Academy. For the 5200 you want the 5200 prebuilt kit but with the output connector on the top not the bottom. Since you have a 4 port, the 4050 IC will be in a socket. As long as you don't care about the RF output anymore, you can remove that IC chip from the socket and then just stick the premade UAV right into it. From there you just need to install the AV jacks that you want to use. Although, it would be worth looking into doing a power conversion on it so you don't need the swtich box anymore and can have a standard DC jack to plug the 5200 PSU into on the console itself. https://thebrewingacademy.com/collections/atari-5200/products/tba-ultimate-atari-video-uav-board-for-atari-5200

I hadn't used it myself although I've removed quite a few from other 2600s and 7800s over the past few years where the owners wanted to replace them with UAVs. But as I send everything back that I remove, I never kept on on hand to mess around with.

It can be made to work...but I've heard mixed results regarding the output. I would advise going with a UAV for composite/s-video output that will look much better. Or... you can get the Sophia and have that routed for DVI, Component, or RGB output for the best from the system.

I've seen the spring in those switches come loose enough to make contact in addition to making the switches feel 'crunchy' to use. So was just curious if he had tried that to at least know if the switch is the cause or still something with the logic.

@WicoKid Have you removed the switch completely to see if it still happens or not?

Yes. There is a small hole on the side of the box and that is where you insert the adjustment hex tool.

And they look pretty snazzy I must say!!!

So glad I bought my copy of this game like 20 years ago before the current price hikes we see now. Crazy...but it is a fun game. I'm actually not that great at the combat side of it so I've never managed to get all that far but enjoyed what I have played of it.

While it doesn't seem to really be available anywhere anymore, I basically used the Monoprice branded version of this exact converter for several years before I moved over to my current Extron+OSSC setup I use now. And it worked really well on s-video sources. But it did introduce some lag that I only picked up on once I upgraded my setup and it can be annoying to see the initial message on the screen for a few second each time you power on the system where it is trying to lock in. I also recall that is had issues with different resolution outputs so it might blank out sometimes when the signal changed on it abruptly as might happen with some 2600 games for instance. So if you can find something that looks like this... it should work pretty well. https://www.amazon.com/Aemyo-Composite-S-Video-Converter-converter/dp/B01M4N48JZ/ref=sr_1_157?crid=21YBCZKOTS62X&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.3i_crtzXsbb5mOF_xScO8zwaw78s80RVqGaTqJTZIVGBy84X0R8b0xerqQaVVOcxsVSBpqetnbeslp9kW6tfEpZAzw0casYiUF-0Lq5We2jLSxExrVK1KKSw0eVaajYSFU_ha_LIKLuvOqHK5LTvuasQsfNAM3Y2098OfYxTTzEQ83gsF419WYUJkYkAA0V6.hEGpSNJlqWHGlUkj_-SL31DZXFNwMoR9zS1JeZs3j50&dib_tag=se&keywords=s-video+to+hdmi&qid=1710710298&sprefix=s-video+to+hdmi%2Caps%2C115&sr=8-157

Yes, I don't recall where but somewhere in these forums I think I mentioned this coming up when I was testing remote pause functionality on the 7800 and again, I was originally using a Left+Right combo to trigger this. But if I happen to press my pause button on a Harmony menu for instance, it would go crazy at that point and was later identified that the combo was apparently triggering the Harmony to think a Paddle controller was plugged in and thus using that mode for navigation. So I've now switched to using an up+dwn combo for both the 7800 and SMS systems. I noticed that a pause kit you can buy for the SMS from Consoles Unleashed also has you using the Up+Down combo too. So perhaps there were also issues with some games when using the Left+right method on the SMS?