Elysiom

How are the latest revision gold “tactile feel” fire buttons compared to the mushy single carbon dot or triple carbon dot fire buttons - could anyone compare?

This fellow on YouTube seems to have a very similar screen - He did a cap replacement and still ended up replacing the screen, maybe it’s a compound issue.

Are the caps that bad on these Lynx IIs - like Sega GameGear bad? I just received a refurb one from Best; I was hoping I wouldn't need to tear it apart and replace the caps. I know the flex PCBs and the DC power jacks are generally pain points on these consoles. The display looks pretty trashed - does it change at all to what is playing on the screen? Since it has sound and power - try cleaning the brightness wheel with some contact cleaner, move it around a bunch - use a multimeter and move the wheel to see if the pot is good.

It ended up being the ANTIC - I found a 'as is, not tested' 2 port 5200 on eBay that ended up working just fine. My bad ANTIC is C012296D-01 - made in Korea Once I get a working part to make the parts system functional again I'll put it up for sale with a fair price here or trade.

I just did one of these, You will need to clean all the metal parts, including the idler bearing with #0000 steel wool - you can then attempt to oil the bearings with something like 3-In-One oil / machine or gun oil. In the first controller it sounds like you need an Optocoupler or maybe one of the ICs have gone bad - it’s odd it works in every direction except for down. Console5 / Best Electronics sell rebuild parts for the CX-53 - at minimum you should expect to replace the bearings and be really careful with black encoder wheels at the end of the roller shafts, they are fragile.

I'm not a huge fan of stranded core just due to how fragile it can be but I think you are right, 22 might be a little large now that I think about it - somewhere around 24 seems perfect.

My two port is socketed and like most of the Atari hardware of that age it has it quirks and if I remember there is a bodge fix. I've cleaned and reseated both ICs - figured it wouldn't help and it didn't so I'll look at sourcing replacements.

Most of these mods are setup for 22 gauge and don't skimp - you want solid core wire (pre tinned is nice too).

I'm in the US - could I please be added to the list? Thank you

I would suggest recapping the audio and power boards first - to see if it will produce sound; if you have success then continue on with recapping the main board. I've recapped a few where there is a snowy screen and they are a lost cause, usually have no audio and the board is beyond repair. Unfortunately they are turning into a fools errand - many are in bad shape due to capacitors leaking, you might need 2 or 3 parts systems just to get 1 working.

I recently purchased an Atarimax cart, so I now have the ability to run the diagnostic ROMs. PAM Diagnostics Version 2.3 - it passes CPU, RAM, ROM but GTIA and ANTIC have soft errors 24 01 - I'm guessing this could be a result from running it from a flash cart. Seems like the ANTIC could be at fault - it doesn't seem to match any of the test patterns I've seen, there is a block / character out of place.

This is a great video and guide - takes much of the guess work out of the install, only wish I had it a few weeks ago. I don’t know if mine had a mistake but my pre-built UAV board came with the terminal block installed under the board rather than on top, which wont fit since its against an IC that is just north of the 4050, I ended up desoldering the terminal block and just soldering the wires through-hole style.

Yes - I left RF intact and just disconnected the coax cable, I'm about 90% sure it had this issue beforehand, I remember I was hoping it would go away with the UAV mod. I've tested a few other games and oddly it doesn't have this issue on the title screen in some games but its then visible on the play screen, I'm thinking its something involved with processing and when the system is under load - bad ram, GTIA, ANTIC. I've uploaded some other images - Joust at boot, Joust title screen and finally Joust play screen. Thank you.

This is a 2 port 5200 that I acquired recently, it seems to be pretty clean - the motherboard doesn’t have any noticeable corrosion, leaky capacitors etc. Originally I thought this was some weird overscan or incompatibility issue with a LCD TV, I connected it to a CRT set and it has the same issue. When modding the system I left the 4050 in place and soldered the UAV on top, I didn’t remove the shielded RF module as you probably would with a 7800. If you take a peek at the few uploaded images there is a solid vertical white line down the right side of the screen at boot and if you look at Pole Position that line seems to shift to the left a bit and its almost a clone of the red and white center line, not shown but it does this in other games like Super Breakout. Thinking the basics - could this be some bad ram or week power supply? Thank you for your time in advance!

How are these? I recently repaired my original controllers with triple carbon dot fire buttons and rev 9 flex circuits and now I'm wondering if the gold parts are worth the premium price. I've also been interested in what changed in the flex circuit from version to version, if there is a change list out there, my originals were rev 7 and the controllers were made in Mexico.