Colleton

haha, I saw the same video. I guess that some things you just have to live with.

FWIW, I tried "light brighting" an 800 keyboard with badly yellowed lettering on the keys this afternoon. Nothing. No lightning at all. I don't think that brown keys are something I'd want to put peroxide on, but if I want to brighten the lettering on these keys I'll probably need to use peroxide.

Great idea on the upscaler, thanks! My 4K TV doesn't have an S-Video input, so hopefully this is a good solution.

Thank you!

I meant to ask him what that was. Is that the connector on the motherboard? I'm sure I'll be ordering more from him, will add it to the list. Thanks!

Well, as a backup, I'd ordered a keyboard with new mylar from Best while I was waiting on the keys. Ended up not needing it, but it's nice to have a spare.

A big thanks to shoestring, as the replacement chips from Digikey arrived today and fixed the problem. Thank you so much for the help!

I tried the sun only "light brighting" last weekend on a newly purchased 1050. It had a bit of yellow on the top and a bit more on the back and along one side. Over the course of a semi-cloudy Florida summer afternoon all of the yellowing was eliminated. It worked very, very well for me.

A 400, an 800, an 800XL, a 1200XL, two 1050 drives, another 800XL. A supposedly "NIB" wico joystick from an ebayer with plausible looking photos, and a handful of carts just because. A few programming/reference books. Still waiting on the 400, the 1200XL the 2nd 800XL, and the wico joystick to arrive. Non-ebay: An SIO2PC, a UAV, the Sophia rev C video mod, along with 800XL and 1200XL keyboard mylars from Best. I think I'm losing my mind. I bought an 800 with an 810 FDD in early 1983, and used them until 21987, when I switched to an IBM PC for a year before switching again to an Atari 520ST (w/2MB memory upgrade). I used the ST until 1992 when I switched back to PC for good. Over the late 90's I would break the 800 out periodically for my kids to play with, and ended up throwing the system out when we moved in 2000. I really regret that... At this point the 8 bit machines are just toys, and I'm having a bit of nostalgic fun. I think I'm looking at a Side2 cart next.

Thanks, xbrevin. I tried it, no real change though. It's either the chips or the ribbon cable. I have the chips on order and have ordered a conductive silver paint pen from amazon. I'll try the chips 1st. Thanks everyone.

Thanks, just ordered a couple. Hopefully that will be the fix. I appreciate the help.

So, I just tried it. Swapped the two chips and used a little contact cleaner on the sockets. Now I'm only failing keys L ; Ctrl and C V Shft. Before it was J K L ; + * Ctrl and Z X C V B Shft. So it did help. I'll try again tomorrow. Maybe a bit more contact cleaner and try re-seating the ribbon cable again.

Thanks, I'll try that tomorrow.

Nice, thank you! If I'm reading the chart right I need to look at pins 5 (J K L ; + * Ctrl) and 8 (Z X C V B Shft)? That corresponds exactly to what I'm seeing. I have no idea how I could bend those contacts.

Picked up a nice 800XL today. Overall pretty pleased with it, but naturally there are a few flies in the ointment... 1. Video looks a bit fuzzy even when using composite video (I'm using a monitor cable), and I can see "waves" running through the blue background when I boot into basic. Replace capacitors? Every online resto video seems to recommend this. FWIW, I have both a UAV and a Sophia on order. Either of these should fix the video fuzziness, right? Also, using S-Video just gives me a b/w image so I'm guessing one of the necessary signals is missing at the monitor jack? 2. Some of the keys just absolutely do not work. I've re-seated the ribbon cable, cleaned the end of the cable and the connector with contact cleaner. No joy. I took the keyboard apart and cleaned the mylar with alcohol, no help. Failing keys: Shift, Ctrl, J, K, L, ;, *, Z, X, C, V, B I've been getting the same key fails since the first time I powered up the machine. The traces on the end of the cable look pretty brown and nasty from the edge and back a few inches. I knew that the keyboard was possibly going to be problematic from searches I've made here, but I am at a loss at this point. Any help and advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

I just want to say thank you for this, I had no idea Altirra existed. I was using a different emulator and the results weren't that great. I have it set up with Launchbox right now and full screen Atari gaming goodness is available with a few mouse clicks. Using an xbox360 controller for input. This is awesome!

I ordered a keyboard just to see what will happen. I've received a confirmation e-mail, but I don't really believe the order will be fulfilled.

This looks fantastic, can't wait to play it. Nice work!

Thank you both for the replies, I feel a lot better now. I'll try again after I receive the other drive and disks. I ordered an SIO2SD as well, and am about to order an Ultimate Cart, so I probably won't even need the disk drives other than for nostalgia.

Hi all, I took a chance on a cheap ebay auction for an untested 1050 disk drive. I'm not sure if I'm doing something wrong or if there's something wrong with the drive, so please bear with me. It's been a lot of years since I've used an Atari FDD. Steps I took to test the drive: 1. Ensured the Drive select switches were both set to the left (black switch only visible). 2. Connected the drive to my 800 via the SIO cable. 3. Powered on the FDD. Both lights illuminate, the head seeks, then the drive light goes out. This should be normal, I think? 3. Powered on the 800. Immediately got an unending stream of "Boot Error" messages. I did not have a disk in the drive, I don't even have a disk at this point in time. I am assuming that this is the cause of the unending boot errors? I searched a bit for 1050 boot error and found that this error could be a bad park sensor on the drive, but after watching a video about this, the park sensor is fine. The head moves fwd and back as the video says it should. I have a 2nd 1050 on its way to me that is supposedly tested and functional. It's coming with a bunch of disks as well, so I'll be able to at least compare this drive to another drive sometime next week. Thanks for any suggestions and advice, even if it is some variant of "yes, you actually do need to have a disk inserted, dummy."