SS Posted November 10, 2002 Share Posted November 10, 2002 Are these carts on EPROMS? Will I have to bid a sad farewell to my "Berzerk VE" twenty years from now? Should I store them in zip-locks in the freezer? Inquiring minds want to know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ubersaurus Posted November 10, 2002 Share Posted November 10, 2002 Indeed, they are on EPROMS...though admittingly, 20 years from now when it dies I'm sure you could find someone to rezap the chip and revitalize that cart ;p Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chuck Gill Posted November 10, 2002 Share Posted November 10, 2002 SS, A lot of the commercial releases for the 2600 were eproms too, you probably already have some 20 year old eproms in your collection. Ubersaurus is right, if they do eventually succumb to bit rot you can reprogram them with a fresh rom image. The tough part is getting the cart apart without damaging the labels. -Chuck Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted November 10, 2002 Share Posted November 10, 2002 Yes, all the games we produce are done so with EPROMs. I wouldn't worry about them dying too much. ..Al Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Slocum Posted November 10, 2002 Share Posted November 10, 2002 I looked into a way to make carts that wouldn't be subject to bit rot, and I couldn't find any way to do it without the cartridges costing $1000 a piece. -Paul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LinkoVitch Posted November 10, 2002 Share Posted November 10, 2002 I have a flash chip produced by SST and it's tech ref states data integrity for 100 Yrs. I'd guess EPROM's would be along similar lines with modern advancements? Perhaps if you played it constantly for 20 yrs it would suffer bit rot.? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Slocum Posted November 10, 2002 Share Posted November 10, 2002 Cool! I assumed flash chips were the same as EPROMs. I was looking into non-windowed EPROMs (which turn out to make no difference) and actual ROMs. Which chip is it? -paul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
broncoman Posted November 10, 2002 Share Posted November 10, 2002 so what's the average lifespan of a 2600 game any ideas ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LinkoVitch Posted November 10, 2002 Share Posted November 10, 2002 You'd have to find a suitable chip this one is only 64K (spose that is sufficient for 2600), it requires 12V programming voltage but is designed to replace equivalent 27xxx EPROM.. the number is: 27SF512 made by SST http://www.sst.com/ more expensive than EPROM's I think as they are Flash chips Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EricBall Posted November 11, 2002 Share Posted November 11, 2002 From back when was programming PROMs and PALs: PROMs come in two flavours: electrically erasable (aka EEPROMs) and UV erasable. At that time (10+ years ago) EEPROMs were more expensive, so I used mostly UV-EPROMs. UV-EPROMs naturally have a window (which usually got covered with an information sticker), though there are OTP (one-time-programmable) versions which lack the window, but were otherwise the same. EEPROMs don't have a window either, so you had to be careful or you might grab an OTP accidentally. IIRC I did have a couple of older UV-EPROMs which failed to program. That's where you may get bit-rot problems. But I suspect that a EPROM (especially one in a cartridge) will last for a good long while. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
AtariAge on Instagram
Watch us on YouTube
Chat on Discord
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.