PC to Atari 2600

[Shaft]

Hi,

I'm a newby here, I'm 74 years old and a retired Engineer, worked in aerospace and defence (UK resident).

 

I bought an Atari Woody back in the 70s the family and me played it to extinction almost.

Was talking to my grandson a few weeks back about it and wondered if they were still going. Ebay was amazing, lots of them.

So I bought one. Thing is, is it possible to connect it to a PC?, can get it working on my TV but thought I might like to play via my PC.

I am running Wins 7 Ultimate 64 bit with 8 Gb Memory, NVidia Graphics GeForce 8600 GT and Intel Pentium ® D CPU 3.00 GHz

 

Would appreciate any help.

 

Shaft

 

[+Gemintronic]

There are old TV tuner cards / USB devices with coax connectors. I'd look into those. Hauppauge is a decent brand.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

But the picture will be pretty bad using coax. Especially on a sharp LCD display.

 

Maybe a modded console which creates e.g. S-Video output would be a better way to go. I think a video capture card should be the choice.

Edited May 20, 2014 by Thomas Jentzsch

[+Gemintronic]

Or you could make your PC into an Atari 2600

http://stella.sourceforge.net/

 

and play games for free

http://pdroms.de/news/atari2600/

[Andrew Davie]

Shaft, why not just use an emulator like Stella, if you want to play on PC?

[Shaft]

Thanks for the info guys.

I will get a TV Tuner card, don't know enough about electronics (beyond me mostly) to modify my console.

 

 

Regards Shaft (aka: The Old Man)

[bikeguychicago]

The emulator (Stella) may be the best option for your needs. Additionally, one of the companies mentioned here with some frequency produces a USB version of the Atari joystick, which would allow you to play the games in the emulator using the original controller.

[davyK]

I love using original hardware, but if you want to to play on a PC then use an emulator and the USB joysticks - will be a far better experience and - free - apart from the controllers. You will also be able to play every game ever made including the stupendously good homebrew efforts people in this community create.

 

Great to hear someone your age is still playing. At 48 I am now feeling young (relatively!).

[flammingcowz]

Using a video capture card to play on your computer will have significant input lag, around several seconds. I've tried it before.

[Shawn]

Sounds like you might want to look into software emulation of the Atari. That would cover your bases for playing on the PC "Old Man" Shaft.

[BigO]

Using a video capture card to play on your computer will have significant input lag, around several seconds. I've tried it before.

This. Been there, done that. Lasted about 10 minutes.

 

For whatever reason, I'm not a fan of emulation. But if you want to play 2600 games on your PC, the multitude of others who've said emulation are right on the money.

You can even get a USB version of the classic Atari joystick to plug into your PC and complete the experience.

[Osgeld]

Using a video capture card to play on your computer will have significant input lag, around several seconds. I've tried it before.

 

I have zero problems with an internal PCI model, even while using a pretty stinky computer and its intergrated video

 

USB ... sometimes, depends on how much of a chunk of crap it is, and how much is getting shuffled around on the same USB bus (aka each hole on the computer is not an individual USB port)

Edited May 21, 2014 by Osgeld