CommodoreDecker

I bought a s-video to HDMI convert off of Amazon for $40. Does a good job... it also does composite, but s-video is a lot sharper. I'm amazed composite lasted longer for new sets (though many models require an adapter cable going from 3.5mm 3-lead male connector to the individual composite/l-audio/r-audio female RCA jacks rather than direct connections... )

The XL computers existed, but apart from 2x the color shades available it didn't have much more to offer. Marketshare was definitely an issue, so how did Atari respond to the C64 with the new XE line? Well, the high-end 130XE model had 2x the RAM of the 800XL, and an exciting case design that made you think you were in Ten-Forward on the USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D... there were lots of re-released recycled games, but no other actual hardware improvements - such as graphics modes - to really one-up against the C64... Seems a bit of a misfire... Pokey was still, okay but by 1985 they could have increased octave range... or even be a trendsetter for stereo... But even just adding in some higher resolution modes to complement the additional RAM and they could have had the C64's same higher resolution with far more colors than what it had and C64 would be smoked... "Masters of Time" showed the strengths and weaknesses of both A8 and C64 - A8 had a far richer color palette, which helped, but the C64's resolution made the A8 look too blocky and ancient by comparison. Other games like "Panther" made use of C64's graphics modes far better and looking more lively throughout, with A8 looking sufficiently inferior (though these newer games were probably built natively on the C64 then ported to A8 and not making as much use of the custom features...) But by 1985, Atari and Commodore were working to push the new 16-bit technologies to the customer market. A shame, as Atari was the trendsetter and Lucasfilm's earliest games definitely show the A8 in a superior light.

^^this The 2600's are adequate... The C64's are over the top in trying to pretend to be "real"... the green is off and the screen looks too busy with extra dotty dotted detail. The 5200/8-bit edition gets it perfectly with the best of both worlds. Texture and surreal color that make for a more enjoyable experience. IMHO, anyway.

I think it adds to the challenge, but it does reappear later on.

My latest list-but is a top-19, and in no order: Yar's Revenge - so simple in gameplay yet so addicting. Carnival - while not quite the arcade, it does the job, Towering Inferno - A breath of fresh air as it's not a conventional shooter Fast Food - it turns "Kaboom!" on its side, and has that warped sense of humor that you might find in The Simpsons Defender - blocky or not, this looks better than the arcade as it's an actual city and with people almost to scale, instead of across a wireframe mountainscape. Perfect sound effects too. HERO - all-time classic, even if I play it more on the 5200 Space Invaders - I prefer the 5200's version but have played it often on the 2600 Adventure - timeless classic, where the gameplay makes the square, --> arrow, and cute ducks immaterial no matter what they looked like. Jr Pac-Man - nice innovation to do vertical scrolling. Monsters are brutal-difficult, though! Frostbite - build your igloo before the temperature drops too far, or before Fuzzy Bear eats you. Perfect risk/reward arcade strategy Oink - repetitive, but a nice take on The Three Little Pigs Ghost Manor - too quick, but has a decent plot and is one of the few Xonox games that's as playable as it is enjoyable Spike's Peak - too difficult, but keep returning to it anyway BASIC Programming, just so I can gawk at the wonderful cover art. Atari really defined cover art back then. I otherwise stick to the 800XL for BASIC, however... Solaris - Star Raiders on Steroids. Turmoil - rabid but fun Revenge of the Beefsteak Tomatoes - games with unique ideas I tend to gravitate toward MASH - 20th Century Fox is a bit unsung when it comes to decent 2600 titles... Porky's - ditto, oddly...

Woohoo, congrats!! I felt just like that in 1990 too, though I bought one used from the local Atari club (which still exists in MN, cool!) as eBay didn't exist yet... I later sold it to pay for new equipment to stay current with computer technology, and fast forward what feels like a few centuries and I bought one recently with modification to allow hookup to composite TV (I really should try to augment it for S-Video, like my 5200 has, as it's got a much cleaner signal...) Lots of good games exist, though thanks to Nintendo's contracts the 7800 ended up not getting as many games at the time... plenty of solid homebrews exist that take advantage of the hardware... I still remember back then why Atari was re-releasing the arcade classics and not having as many new titles out... Robotron 2084 never looked better, save for the original arcade itself. Asteroids was very nicely done indeed. Great conversion... Ms Pac-Man is always a go-to. Dig Dug looks fantastic, but the carryover of the 2600's sound clobbers it. Ditto for Donkey Kong. I use a composite->HDMI converter to a LCD set. I'm not keen on the lack of deinterlacing, but the display isn't ugly. Looks worse for 2600 titles like Yar's Revenge and Defender, but not so much as to be unplayable...

Very exciting! When it does get released, I'd be interested in one, maybe two if there's a large enough batch available...

Thanks much! The 4013's I ordered came in today. I swapped the unit and... same problem, though I thought I heard a different noise for the third party psu - like a jacob's ladder, though to be fair I may have had the volume turned up. I also held in the power button for a few seconds then pressed my finger atop each chip. None felt appreciably warm, so I don't think any of the ICs are defective... well, hopefully not... will have to look up schematics... I will look up that post, simmer, then try out some of the ideas there by this weekend...

Thanks for the info and link! One other thing about the constant hum from the CO18187, the hum was coming from the speakers - not the power brick. After swapping back to the third party brick and powering on, on/off worked - just no LED light, but the constant hum was no longer present. The video mod is just a hot-glued 2x3" barebones card with a transistor, a couple resistors, wires soldered between those and to the wires neatly laid out to the rear for the composite cables. It looks nothing like the UAV I saw online with the small microchips and screw-in tabs for the wire . The 4013 is on order. Looking forward to testing it when it arrives and will report back. Console5 is out of PSUs (won't let me add one to the cart, despite "80 on hand" being mentioned), but I suspect the current (third party) one is just fine. I'll keep the Atari branded 5200 PSU on the side and worry about that later, since I am sure it's okay despite it all as well. If nothing else, I have another 5200 board that stays stuck "on" - it'll probably work like new and the video mod can be moved over to it, too... if need be. Not sure if my 1/2-second "on" problem is due to insufficient amperage as it was working for months, but will keep a lookout for 2A PSUs anyway. It won't need all of the 2A, but it'll be less strain on the transformer. Is it possible that both PSUs are so old they no longer can handle the power requirement (750ma)? Maybe a VRM went out, I should check into ordering a replacement just in case...

So yesterday I went to turn on the 4-port 5200. Has been working just fine for months. I bought it off eBay with composite and power mods, as well as capacitor replacements. I turned it on, and the LED stayed on for 1/2 second then turned off. It had a 1A, 9VDC generic power supply (+-top polarioty). I suspected it's the 4013 IC. I cleaned the socket and pins. I also found a genuine 5200 power supply (11.5VDC, +-tip polarity) and swapped it. The power started up, turned off after 1/2 second, but with the different power supply there was a low-pitched loud hum permeating regardless if the power button was depressed or not. Swapping back to the third party PSU, the unit now makes a noise when the power button is pressed but quickly stops making the noise. I am scavenging for another 4013 - during the interim, what's the chance I fried something? Or could the 4013 been partly defective until after all the power button presses I made, which then worsened the effect? And could the genuine Atari 5200 PSU have a defect, explaining why only it made such a weird hum noise? (The fact the unit still acts like it's trying to do something when powering on has me hopeful it's just a worn-out chip...) Thanks!

After the 1983 crash, anything - in naming or design - to make it seem like a completely different paradigm was important... Some, but not the latest ones. Another post definitely mentions the legal issues for Nintendo's anticompetitive actions back then. (Not to mention Tengen (Atarti) doing its own dirtywork to get around the issues so they could put games in the NES too... In terms of simultaneous color output and raster graphics, no. This is why "Summer Games" on the NES has that entire flock of poop machines juttering while the 7800's version has all the birds flying away smooth and detailed. In terms of tile graphics, yes. Even then, Zelda and other games would get sluggish if too many sprites had to be drawn on the screen at the same time. But that wasn't often and it didn't detract customers, who found the new style of gameplay to be more of and adventure than "Adventure" was. New styles of gameplay were still the biggest thing. You're beginning to sound like me circa 1988. ? The lack of wires would make gamplay even more unwieldy. Yeah, but that took a while and those ports often don't look or play as good. The initial NES in America had a more lively design, mixing gray and black, and with a front-loading system that made it compact. The 7800 is sleek, but the usual bulky bulge popping out of its top would have been seen as "old hat" back then. Heck, I'd rather find a blinking light win and modify a NES than to get the NES Jr, which looks like a 7800 on heroin (complete with RF-only output, blech!! And that was another failing; by 1984 composite video was increasingly used, enough for any console maker daring enough to be forward-thinking enough to use it. At least the XEGS got it.) Doesn't the Famicom original unit also have an extra sound channel? That explains Castlevania and other games sounding much richer. Even then, after Atari's dominance, even the stilted limitations of the NES had their strengths, including a channel for sampled audio . Nintendo didn't want sprawl, especially when marketing to a country that had this big video game collapse. Had the initial release of games not work when it was released... And the system was designed because the lack of it allowed the market to be flooded with crappy games, causing the crash in the first place. This didn't stop companies from getting around it; Tengen had some robust output... but for other companies, not so much... Moon Patrol was from 1982... by 1985, game styles had been more advanced - or longer versions of the same styles ("Zelda" is pretty much Atari's "Adventure" but with enough RAM and RAM to make an entire universe, the likes never seen before.) The 6502 was a robust little processor; and by the mid-1980s was a lot less expensive than in ~1975 when it first came out. How well it's used was still important. The gameplay was still the big thing. Zelda, SMB, Metroid, Excitebike... similar tile-based processing like what "real arcade" cabinets used. Not to mention programming trickery; how Frontier got ported to the NES and sold ersatz vector graphics was ingenious (add RAM to the cartridge and re-draw designs there instead of taking istatic tems from the character ROM chip...)

For "Gremlins" on the 2600, no question... But on the 5200? It's a lot more cohesive in its gameplay. Clever too, with weapons such as "camera flash cube". A friend had it in 1986 and it was surprisingly fun... had no clue until recently that the game was finished, sent to production, and at the same time Jack Tramiel buys Atari and orders the 5200 put down - all remaining stock to be put in a warehouse... all that produced stock languished in a warehouse for 2 years and when they were looking at stuff to clear out they found the games and sold them without fanfare. Impressive that there were sales for a game for a discontinued system where the joysticks stopped working after a handful of months...

Guilt by association is likely what ET really suffers from. A lot of games in 1983 were churned out more rapidly then the local gnat population. I still play the 2600 - it's forward-thinking at the time with the quest trope, multiple screens, varied adversaries, extra life flower and neat easter egg turning into Yar and buzzing off, and so on... that alone makes me want to re-play this, just to find them all... and a monumental task given how difficult it was to code for the thing, especially with the limited development time and insanely small cartridge size (not unlike the Pac-Man debacle.) ET is surprisingly enjoyable despite its simplicity; and despite homebrew hacks fixing the edge detecting and changing his color from puke green to regular brown, the other tweaks involving removing of energy dwindling ruin the challenge. I tried the 800 version once... once... maybe one needed the manual even more than for the 2600 version's, but there's a distinct lack of charm, despite the more expansive world ET waddles around in.

I think some of the hate is overblown, but still rather justified - borne out of disappointment over the odd lack of quality, especially considering the cost of the unit. If the controllers don't work, it's not going to be a fun experience - no matter how great the games actually are. Which is a shame as, in 1983, salesman at department store electronics' sections told people outright to avoid the console because of the controllers. A big shame, as the games I had seen in the store and at friends' houses were really great. Even in 1986, listening to my friend Elizabeth describe the nature of the sticks and the horrid RF interface - the other forehead-slappingly bad botched design. Not even a user-accessible fuse for when Mittens the kitten traipses by, barely brushes up against that cable, and causing sparks to fly as a result. Literally. On paper, its sounds innovative (as much of the system was). In practice, it was a cheap, fragile, and potentially dangerous design. The sparks were cool to look at, though. But it's not as fun as chucking a CD into a microwave and powering that up for 47 seconds and watch it fry... cheaper than fireworks, too... just don't breathe in any fumes... ? Third party controllers existed, but those should never have been needed - that said, kudos to those who built and sold them to try to keep the 5200 in any semblance of a good light. Even then, not all games worked properly with those, so one would have to go back and forth un/re-plugging in sticks. Considering the trakball didn't have any of those problems, except playing Pac-Man with it was nigh on impossible and there's more to life than Centipede and Space Invaders, odd but true... Note: I'd eventually get a 5200, but it took a mere thirty eight years, with AV and power modifications to bypass those OOTB nightmares, and replacement gold flexcircuits for the controllers to get around those blasted joystick problems. Since then, the console has been a genuine treat and the retro-gaming community seems to be perking up in spots. But the renaissance and appreciation shouldn't have needed nigh on four decades, however!

and, eventually, the real hardware will stop functioning - remaining operational units that have been pampered for longevity (replaced capacitors, heatsinks on chips, acceleration, etc) will cost more, even more for those in near-pristine condition. The chip-based cartridges should still hold up a lot longer than disks or tape ever would. Well, hopefully... If nothing else, buy the original titles - they're kinda cool as artwork too - and play the games on the emulator. Emulators have some occasional accuracy and lag issues but have come a long way - which is terrific. But the original equipment and experience are as irreplaceable as they are wonderful.

Apart from cleaning the contacts, I recall the 2600 adapter is essentially the innards of an 2600 that just piggybacks on the 5200's video circuitry to send the video generated by the 2600 module to the TV, as well as taking power from the Supersystem. If all 5200 games are working on their own without static, then the 5200 is probably fine - or is being overloaded by the additional power requirement needed by the 2600 module. Could the power supply be waning, unable to handle the power load? Is your 5200 modified to send video directly to composite or is it using the RF Modulator? Otherwise, there could be a capacitor (or more) on the 5200 (and/or on the 2600 adapter too) that's going bad.

^^this I installed four and then repainted my A800 chassis with gold sparkly paint they work marvelously. Surprisingly easy to do... I also kept a couple of potentiometers from defective sticks in case the current ones wear out as well... Also, most of the "defective" joysticks on eBay are due to the flexcircuit's contacts having oxidized and otherwise work great. Apart from the few that have crinkled start/pause/reset strips due to someone botching a repair, but with the new gold kits it's a moot point.

Does this happen to any other games? If so, chances are it's a hardware problem in the SNES. If not, then does that cartridge get warm to the touch? (Even then, chances at this point are that the issue is with the ROM chips in the game cartridge...) Is the SNES connected directly to the TV or is a receiver doing the audio amplification? (Depending on which notes and sequences, if they're the same ones, maybe there's a filter that's stripping out that frequency?)

The front-loader has the better appearance, and another mechanism to deal with the card-edge securing than just cheap pins would have saved a lot of problems... true, it would have cost a lot more and introducing the thing to America was risky venture... My NES has Blinking Light Win - it's a bit tight so game removal is a bit rough at times, especially for Tengen or other 3rd party cartridges that don't have the indent for easier grabbing, but the toaster makes for a more compact unit when placed in a shelf, unlike the top loader that requires tons of wasted vertical space. Wish the 5200, 7800, and others had a 90 degree adapter too...

In no order since trying to do an ordered list via random number generator didn't work: SimCity SimCity 2000 StarFox (not "FireFox", my bad ?) Super Tetris 3 Super Metroid Super Star Wars (all three from the original trilogy - they're not the 1983 arcade game but they're pretty cool nonetheless) WordTris Road Runner (feels like the cartoons except it's interactive and is worth playing just to see Wile E Coyote's facial expressions alone) Bugs Bunny (not the greatest but robust enough) Super Pitfall (the last halfway decent incarnation of the venerable Atari 2600 game that became legendary)... there are probably lots of others, but the nerd in me recommends that list the most.

Current is always running through it when plugged into a live outlet, regardless if the device attached is powered on or not. All the PSU does is ensure power is converted into something the device attached to it can use. Most of my PSUs run cool, but one does warm up after a while regardless if the 800XL powered on or not. When not in use the power strip goes off and the PSU doesn't have to do any work to convert 120VAC to what the device needs. Some components age faster - especially if there are manufacturing quality issues above and beyond general usage. If you can find a replacement (original or compatible), it's worth doing at some point. The effects of time and entropy, it's simply wearing out. At least it's not the Atari ingot adapter. ? Those things fry computers like fish after reaching a certain point...

None at the time. Was enamored with the Amiga. While looking up Tengen Tetris videos, saw one for the SNES Tetris 3, promptly drooled, and promptly bought a recapped SNES Jr. Simcity and SimCity 2k were nice to get... Starfox is said to run faster on the Jr, and that's back when 3D was in its infancy and every CPU cycle counted... Super Metroid is arguably the best sequel of all time; the first was "okay", later ones "meh", but SNES Super Metroid floored me. (I generally prefer sci-fi over fantasy, yet for the original NES Zelda seemed more of a fun quest than Metroid (which was decent but Zelda just seemed more solid...) On the SNES however, it's by far the other way around - Super Metroid was far superior. )

What about the ambidextrous? I resemble that remark. ?

MULE, Ninja, Alley Cat, Rescue on Fractalus, World Karate Championship, Panther, Alien Garden (despite still sucking at it), Hard Hat Mack, Bandits, Shamus, Pac-Man (though the 5200 has the more iconic edition)...

Probably a few dozen online being auctioned somewhere, complete with fuzzy and non-distinct images of the label and lots of proclamations of "It's an original, pinky-swear!" Except it's not the pinky being waved in your face... ? A shame, since LucasFilm Games was one of, if not the best trendsetters of the day with gameplay originality and hardware-pushing. Fractal-generated landscapes in real time, antialiasing, etc... a shame the 8-bit stereo sound chip never got released for the 65 XEM...