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What's going on with Solaris here?


Atarifever

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Maybe this is a common and well known thing, but I'm wondering what is going on with my copies of Solaris on my 7800. I bought a loose copy at a flea market a bunch of years ago, and then bought a boxed copy online awhile later. I took the boxed copy out and plugged it into my non-expansion port 7800 I used back then, and it didn't work at all. Luckily, the loose copy did, so I put that in the box, and dropped the broken one into a drawer, just so I'd have it if I wanted to put the boxed set back together.

 

Anyway, fast forward to me buying a soldering kit and needing carts to practice on. I wasn't sure if the one in the box was the good one or bad one anymore, so I took them both out to try them. Now, my current 7800 is a different one since my old one broke (something I am hoping learning to solder will fix), with an expansion port. And both Solaris games work now, sort of. However, the old "broken" cart has different colours than the other one.

 

Here are both games (colours may be off a little because of the cheap camera and the cheap TV), but this is pretty much how it looks. What is going on here, and why was one completely useless on one console and only kind of strange on the other?

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post-5952-0-96018900-1374195254_thumb.jpg

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Here are both games (colours may be off a little because of the cheap camera and the cheap TV), but this is pretty much how it looks. What is going on here, and why was one completely useless on one console and only kind of strange on the other?

If by useless you mean that the screen was rolling, that is because the left game is a PAL cartridge. It produces too many scanlines for your old NTSC TV to handle.

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If by useless you mean that the screen was rolling, that is because the left game is a PAL cartridge. It produces too many scanlines for your old NTSC TV to handle.

The screen wasn't rolling. The game wouldn't do anything. It was just black screen. I tried it a lot of times and got nothing at all. Now I have my current 7800 and it works like a charm every time, just with weird colours. There was no rolling before. There was no anything at all before.

 

How it could be a PAL copy is beyond me. I bought it in a sealed box from Atari2600.com, and I certainly didn't order a PAL copy. How would I be able to tell if it was a PAL copy? The box and cart look like every NTSC game I ever bought.

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How it could be a PAL copy is beyond me. I bought it in a sealed box from Atari2600.com, and I certainly didn't order a PAL copy. How would I be able to tell if it was a PAL copy? The box and cart look like every NTSC game I ever bought.

You can't tell from the box, manual or label, as they were identical for PAL and NTSC during part of Atari's red label period. But PAL and NTSC use different colour palettes. If you play the PAL Solaris ROM in Stella and press CTRL-f to switch the emulator into NTSC mode, the colours will look pretty much like in your left picture. Therefore I would be surprised, if it wasn't a PAL cartridge on a NTSC console.

 

If you still use the same TV as with your old 7800, then maybe the cartridge connector on that 7800 wasn't working properly anymore. If it was a different TV, it might be possible, that it didn't like the 50Hz signal and would blank out the picture completely.

 

IIRC several years ago there were other people complaining about getting a PAL Solaris in North America. So it might be possible that your's came from the same source.

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You can't tell from the box, manual or label, as they were identical for PAL and NTSC during part of Atari's red label period. But PAL and NTSC use different colour palettes. If you play the PAL Solaris ROM in Stella and press CTRL-f to switch the emulator into NTSC mode, the colours will look pretty much like in your left picture. Therefore I would be surprised, if it wasn't a PAL cartridge on a NTSC console.

 

If you still use the same TV as with your old 7800, then maybe the cartridge connector on that 7800 wasn't working properly anymore. If it was a different TV, it might be possible, that it didn't like the 50Hz signal and would blank out the picture completely.

 

 

Definitely possible. It's a newer Plasma TV, and back when I used my other 7800 I was using an older CRT. Perhaps the change in Ataris wasn't the difference maker, but rather the change in TVs. Thanks.

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PAL Solaris in North America: http://atariage.com/...pal/#entry81485

 

PAL Solaris colors on a NTSC display: http://atariage.com/...m/#entry2754957

 

Atarifever you definitely have a PAL copy respecting the one on the left of the screenshots you posted.

Looks to be exactly the same issue. Thanks!

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