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Bucket Brigadier

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Posts posted by Bucket Brigadier

  1. Posted

    Currently functional/connected (not counting my PC):

     

    Atari VCS (w/ backup)

    Nintendo NES

    Sega Genesis

    Nintendo SNES

    Nintendo N64

    Sega Dreamcast

    Sony Playstation 2 (PS1 is with my brother)

    Microsoft XBOX 360

    Microsoft XBOX One

  2. Posted

    I would normally have been outside of the age bracket that grew up with Atari (I'm 31), but our family had an Atari until around 1990 as our game system (it was a four-switch woodgrain VCS). My earliest memories of playing video games were from Atari (specifically, Kaboom!, Space Invaders and Combat). I sucked at all of them because I was so young, but the memories always stuck out as good ones because I was participating in something heretofore only my older brother and mom did (I was becoming a big kid!). Around the time I was four, I remember playing some games our next-door neighbor had and being completely mind-blown by Defender because the screen scrolled and you had a radar atop the play field. He also had Basketball and Pac Man, which I had no other reference to compare to, so I didn't think it was bad. Shortly after (Christmas 1989), we got an NES, and our Atari actually broke just after that - good timing!

     

    I got back into Atari when I was 14. I remembered the games being fun, if simple, and picked up a Vader 2600 which was pretty cheap in 1999. I cannot tell you how many hours me and my friends played that thing over the various summers during High School. Heck, the start of what became my collection today really took off when one of my friends told his mom I picked an Atari up, and she donated about 40 games to me that were just sitting in storage.

     

    The thing is, I don't play Atari for the nostalgia - I started my collection because of the memories from my early childhood, but I kept at it because the games are easy to learn, difficult to master, and a lot of fun. Homebrews have expanded the horizon even further, but I'm still working on my Kaboom! score and have recently been trying to beat 100K on Millipede (just over 95K at the moment). Emulators never get the paddles right, and there's just something about playing the original system on a CRT that can't be beat. Hence, I continue to collect and play Atari to this day, and everyone I have introduced the system to who didn't have it as a kid has had a blast with it.

    • Like 3

  4. Posted · Edited by Bucket Brigadier

    Picked up a second heavy sixer as a backup to my primary. Also have some amplifying info for 55274G (which was added to the list years ago):

     

    (stole the format from mikey.shake :) )

     

    Atari “Heavy Sixer”

    Model – Video Computer System CX-2600

    Serial – 55274G

    Sticker Type – White, single

    Mfg – Sunnyvale, CA

    Channel Select Opening – None

    Channel Select Switch – None

    Motherboard QC Date – “99 14400107 . #”

    Lower RF Shielding Stamp – C010315-2

    Upper RF Shielding Stamp – CO10313-5X

    RF Shield Sticker – 99 33900025

    Motherboard Rev – Rev 8 (CO10433)

    Switchboard Rev – Rev 5 (CO10462)

    Case Molding Number – C010306 7 E

     

    Sticker:

    55274G%20Sticker_zpsqrrayowa.jpg

     

    Bottom of system; note no channel select opening:

    55274G%20Bottom_zpsoclyvn1c.jpg

     

    Close-up of mobo, showing copyright 1977 (bit blurry)

    55274G%20MOBO%20Copyright_zpsejrqg2fu.jp

     

    55274G

    55274G%20Front_zpsdhqo2iwt.jpg

     

    93822J is the new addition. Casing is excellent, but internally, the system was pretty haggard. I cleaned it up a bit, worked on removing oxidation that had formed on the RF shielding and signal box housing. The game select and game reset switches are still a bit rough in operation, but functional.

     

    Atari “Heavy Sixer”

    Model – Video Computer System CX-2600

    Serial – 93822J

    Sticker Type – White, single

    Mfg – Sunnyvale, CA

    Channel Select Opening – Yes

    Channel Select Switch – None

    Motherboard QC Date – Not attached

    Lower RF Shielding Stamp – CO10315-3

    Upper RF Shielding Stamp – CO10313-5X

    RF Shield Sticker – 03300680 66

    Motherboard Rev – Rev 8 (CO10438)

    Switchboard Rev – Rev 5

     

    Sticker:

    93822J%20Sticker_zpss1eewp6g.jpg

     

    Bottom of system; note opening for the channel select switch was added by this point, but the system itself has no actual channel select switch (system was disassembled when I took this pic):

    93822J%20Bottom_zpsvp8y7heg.jpg

     

    93822J

    93822J%20Front_zpsjmb2lox5.jpg

    • Like 1

  6. Posted

    OK, got it fixed! In this case, however, it wasn't either the port or the chips, though I did re-flow the solder to pin #9 and ensured proper seating of the chips first. After neither of these worked, I took a closer look at all of the components within the "primary" motherboard, and as I was moving the board in my hand, I noticed a green capacitor right beneath the cartridge reader was loose. With how the labeling is printed on the board, it didn't look like it was part of pin #9's path (C228), but I suck at reading schematics and it was the only component loose on the board and needed to be re-soldered anyhow. So, with that capacitor soldered back into place and nothing else appearing out of place, I re-assembled the Atari, tested Warlords and whatho! It works! The only part that kind of sucks is that I couldn't get much of the "foot" of the capacitor through the opening on the board, so I don't know how well it'll hold, and based on where that capacitor is (right beneath the right-hand plastic mount of the cart reader), it has to deal with some flex every time a cart is inserted. If Player 3 suddenly stops working again, I know my primary culprit.

     

    Thanks again for the help.

    • Like 1

  8. Posted

    Hello all,

     

    I'm writing to ask if anyone has any guidance on troubleshooting player 3 (first paddle on the right player port). I'm running a heavy six which has been functioning flawlessly, but about two days ago I had some friends over and we tried playing a few four-player games. Players 1, 2, and 4 worked fine, but player 3 wouldn't budge (we tried Medieval Mayhem and Warlords). I tried swapping paddle sets with the same result, and also tried swapping the paddles that were working for 1 & 2 (left player) with 3 & 4, and 3 came up dead every time. To continue troubleshooting, earlier today I tested the paddles again, and player 3 read for a brief moment (maybe a half a second), then stopped. I also tried the second player joystick to see if there were any issues that had arisen with the system's ability to read a joystick vice paddles. After testing Space Invaders, Defender, Defender II and Combat, the right player joystick is fully functional.

     

    This was a little strange to me, since the system has apparently stopped reading paddle 3, but has no issues otherwise. Do the paddles use a different circuit within the motherboard? Is there a way to fix this? Has anyone else run into a similar problem?

     

    Thank you very much for any replies.

     

    Cheers,

    BB

  18. Posted

    Hey, all,

     

    Just to let you know, I got a 13" CRT TV and lo and behold, the four games with the vertical hold problem work fine! Looks like the problem was most likely with the modern TV's ability to deal with the vertical timing. I will say this, my LCD does a surprisingly good job countering lag (Kaboom! is quite playable on it), but I doubt anything will match the CRT with the Atari hooked up to it. All of my high scores were done on CRT TV's, and I'm glad I dropped a few bucks on one.

     

    Cheers,

    -"BB"

  20. Posted

    Good Evening,

     

    It's been a while since I've posted, glad to see the place still going strong! I had a few questions about signal strength with different games for the Atari VCS, but first, here's a bit of the background:

     

    I'm running a heavy six connected to a modern LCD TV through a set of coaxial splitters (I've got four systems running across three A/B splitters through the coax input). Almost all of my games run absolutely fine even travelling through two (VCS to splitter to splitter to TV), however, four games in my inventory (Midnight Magic, Dodge 'Em, Circus Atari and Demons to Diamonds) will not produce a signal strong enough for the TV to "lock on." Even if I unplug the other game consoles & splitters, and run the VCS directly to the TV, the image of the game runs grayed-out in the background, slowly and constantly cycling up, as if the vertical hold were broken (and modern TV's don't have a vertical hold knob on them, so I can't adjust that). Over this, the TV displays its "No Signal" box. If I could talk TV, I'd tell it "You've got the picture right there, work harder!" but sadly, that isn't an option. I have tried multiple cartridges, but none of the aforementioned games will work with my TV, regardless of which cart I use.

     

    I did check for solutions here using the search function, but those that I've tried (such as powering on the Atari, then the TV, adjusting TV settings, and plugging the Atari directly into the TV) have not worked. If memory serves, early on with this TV, Dodge 'Em worked. Of note, my VCS was built before the channel selector switch was added, so I can't go to channel 2, either.

     

    So, my questions are:

     

    1. Do certain games "tell" the Atari to produce a weaker signal?

     

    2. If not, is there potentially a problem with my VCS? (I'm not thinking so, given that the other 90 some games I have don't have this problem)

     

    3. If anyone has experienced this before, is there a workaround? If it involves buying a CRT TV, I might just do that...

     

    4. I saw something about an RF Amplifier. Has anyone tried/had success with one of these?

     

    Thanks for any replies!

     

    Cheers,

    "BB"

  21. Posted

    I'm actually surprised that I've had high success with my VCS on HDTVs without modding them. When I'm home from school, it works well with our new widescreen, and at school in the AFROTC lounge, we have a big screen HDTV and it works fine on that one too; so long as the lights are off/the room is dark. It took me a while to figure out 'cause the thing has so many features, trying to figure out how to just go directly thru the cable-in line was a pain, but I did get it to work eventually.

  24. Posted

    When I first got MCTB I had a similar problems due to a mis-labeled Trakball. I had a CX-22 internally which externally was built like a CX-80 and was labeled as such. My MCTB cart wasn't working, and I was baffled as it was labeled For use with CX-80. Eventually, with some help, I got it figured out and got a CX-22 version of the game for my CX-22 in disguise. Game's worked fine ever since; I like it a lot better than the original Missile Command on the Joystick or the TrakBall in Joystick mode; score a lot higher and the gameplay is a lot better in my opinion.

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