General Colecovision Questions

[Deadbolt613]

I recently bought my first colecovision, I had a few questions I was hoping to get answers to.

 

I noticed that when i turn the system on, sometimes the colecovision text is different colors from time to time, does this have any meaning?

 

A lot of times i turn the system on, select my difficulty level, then the game has some graphical errors. I turn the system off, take the game out, put it back in, sometimes that fixes it, sometimes i have to do it multiple times. I already cleaned the cartridges and the cartridge port on the colecovision. Is this common or is there something else wrong with it?

 

Both of the controllers were not functioning correctly, i tore them apart and cleaned the contacts with contact cleaner, one works percectly, the other doesn't do anything at all anymore. Any suggestions?

[cOLeCoHiTMan]

1. did you rebuild the power button? corrosion on it is the #1 cause of video issues..

2. de-oxit on the cartridge slot?

3. clean the cart itself with q-tip and 98% rubbing alcohol?

4. make sure the power supply in well.. I had video glitches because of power supply.

5. does the working controller work in both player 1 and player 2? if its not working in one of them its probably a chip that needs replacing. If not.. when you took controller apart to clean it are all the wire still connected at the bottom of the board in the controller?

[+5-11under]

1. did you rebuild the power button? corrosion on it is the #1 cause of video issues..

2. de-oxit on the cartridge slot?

3. clean the cart itself with q-tip and 98% rubbing alcohol?

4. make sure the power supply in well.. I had video glitches because of power supply.

5. does the working controller work in both player 1 and player 2? if its not working in one of them its probably a chip that needs replacing. If not.. when you took controller apart to clean it are all the wire still connected at the bottom of the board in the controller?

Sounds good.

[Deadbolt613]

I used brasso on the game cartridges and the cartridge slot then used 98% rubbing alcohol to make sure all of the brasso was off. the q-tips i used on the cartridges were black, when i was done nothing else was coming off of them. I cut an old credit card to fit the cartridge slot and wrapped a paper towel around it to use the brasso and rubbing alcohol between the pins. same thing with it, the paper towel was black when i started, when i was done nothing else was coming off of it. looked pretty clean.

 

The working controller works in both controller port, the non-working controller does nothing at all, the number pad doesnt register anything, the wires appear to be still properly connected to the board.

 

I never took the power swithch apart or opened the system for that matter, the console looks great for being 30 years old, but i guess maybe that will be the next step.

 

Like i said, after removing the cartridge and putting it back in it eventually works properly. I am used to my atari where it works just about every time, if it doesnt you can tell right away because it is completely unplayable. I didn't know if the colecovision was more like my nintendo, where you can play with graphic glitches (not that anyone would want to).

 

Thanks for the speedy responses.

[Deadbolt613]

I opened the system up and sprayed some contact cleaner into the power switch and worked the switch back and forth a few times, put it back together and tried a bunch of games... It worked flawlessly the first time, every time. I never would have imagined the power switch to be the issue as long as the system was powering on, but cleaning that switch did the trick.

 

The controller, I tore it apart and noticed the orange wire was off, so i soldered it back on, cleaned the board up a little bit, and it appears to be working EXCEPT it still wont rocognize joystick movement to the right. I tried the contact cleaner, i tried fine grit sandpaper between the dome part and the contact of the switch, still doesnt work.

 

Thanks again for pointing me in the right direction.

[NIAD]

Congrats on getting the system into an operational state so that you can enjoy some CV gaming fun the right way. The method you used, spraying contact cleaner into the power switch, is just a temporary fix and in time you will most likely start experiencing problems again wth the power switch. It will probably be a gradual process where you start seeing corrupted graphiccs, other oddities and certain games not working properly or at all.

 

The only method to REALLY fix the Power Switch issue is to desolder it from the PCB, refurbish the switch, clean the PCB, repack with deelectric grease (VERY IMPORTANT) and then solder the switch back into place. You could always just replace the switch with a modern alternative to solve the issue for good, but that's another endeavor in itself.

[+evg2000]

deelectric grease can be bought at an auto parts store for $2-$3