fine0023 Posted September 23, 2015 Share Posted September 23, 2015 Sorry for asking such basic questions, but my knowledge about this is pretty low and I just discovered this harmony thing yesterday. After you purchase it, where do you find/how do you get games to put on it? Is there some place online where there's a list of almost every 2600 game ever created and you can just choose which ones to download? How do you download them? Do you have to pay for the files? Does this mean that all my hundred something 2600 cartridges are basically pointless to have now (other than being cool to have as a collector's item)? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted September 23, 2015 Share Posted September 23, 2015 Sorry for asking such basic questions, but my knowledge about this is pretty low and I just discovered this harmony thing yesterday. After you purchase it, where do you find/how do you get games to put on it? Is there some place online where there's a list of almost every 2600 game ever created and you can just choose which ones to download? How do you download them? Do you have to pay for the files? Does this mean that all my hundred something 2600 cartridges are basically pointless to have now (other than being cool to have as a collector's item)? ROM files are available just about everywhere (just Google it), including from AtariAge. Unless it's a specific homebrew under author control, there's no one to pay for them. It does render your cartridge collection obsolete in many ways, but there's something to be said for having the individual games as well, particularly if they're complete in box. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+SpiceWare Posted September 23, 2015 Share Posted September 23, 2015 Does this mean that all my hundred something 2600 cartridges are basically pointless to have now (other than being cool to have as a collector's item)? Not necessarily. I still use the cartridges for my favorite games as it's faster than scrolling thru the Harmony's menu. I suspect a big part of that is I reserve the root directory for homebrew games that I'm either working on or play testing for other programmers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VectorGamer Posted September 23, 2015 Share Posted September 23, 2015 Once I got a Harmony I sold off over 300 cartridges in my collection. Why keep them around? I'm a player first and foremost I just want the games to be played on real hardware. I had problems with ROMs AA has on their site. See the attached zip for a complete collection of working ROMs. ROMS SORTED BY COMPANY.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted September 23, 2015 Share Posted September 23, 2015 Not necessarily. I still use the cartridges for my favorite games as it's faster than scrolling thru the Harmony's menu. You know that can scroll page by page and even multiple pages at once? I put a lot of effort into this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+SpiceWare Posted September 23, 2015 Share Posted September 23, 2015 You know that can scroll page by page and even multiple pages at once? I put a lot of effort into this. I know and it works well, but I still find it faster for the few favorite games to have those cartridges stacked up by the Atari and swap cartridges 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GadgetUK Posted December 18, 2015 Share Posted December 18, 2015 What are the limitations (if any)? What I mean is, what's the compatibility like, are there any problem games it won't support etc? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Monk Posted February 16, 2016 Share Posted February 16, 2016 I know and it works well, but I still find it faster for the few favorite games to have those cartridges stacked up by the Atari and swap cartridges By the way, did you know that you can actually create any kind of file structure on the SD? You can even make it so that you can have those "few favorite games" right there, selectable, when you turn on the Atari, so it's going to be much faster than having to take a physical cartridge, switch it with the previous cartridge, etc. You don't have to use a menu with ALL the games - you can customize directories and even put the games right there in the main menu, quickly selectable. I have many customized menus - for example, I have "Best Games" menu (basically it means 'Monk's favorites'), I have "NTSC Games" and "PAL Games" menus, then I have different sortings, like "Alphabetically sorted" and "Sorted by Company" (so it's easy to play every Activision game quickly if I want, for example), and so on. Of course it's going to be slow, if you just dump ALL the games there, and then try to find your few favorites from there. But if you use CUSTOMIZATION and just make things the way you want, there's no reason to use the separate cartridges - which are a hassle, in my opinion - unless you have an interference problem and don't know how to correct it. Thankfully, it can be corrected with aluminium foil .. but I still am unsure as to how to do it 'elegantly', as in can I somehow open the Harmony Cart and line its innards with aluminium foil, or can I put the foil around the cart and have the solution work, or do I have to try to make some kind of 'inner faraday cage' around the module section (if that's even possible, everything being so TIGHT), or whatnot. The last and the least desirable solution is to just permanently remove the cover / lid and just wrap everything around the cart in the foil. I got this solution to work a long time ago, but I am only thinking of it as the last resort. Thankfully not every game suffers as badly, and with some games, you hardly notice it. Perhaps I could just purcahse those games as separate cartridges, where the interference is most annoying and noticeable. Having said that, I had great fun yesterday playing many of my favorite games that I had missed so much .... and the interference didn't really make it any less fun, although it was a little bit annoying with some games. For most of the time, it was just fun gameplaying, and I blessed the creators of Harmony Cart in my mind. Such a great device! I wish there was some kind of 'intelligent + elegant' solution though, where I'd just need to blu-tack some aluminium foil around some small component on the motherboard, and that'd solve it once and for all..But I guess life isn't supposed to be easy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+SpiceWare Posted February 16, 2016 Share Posted February 16, 2016 You don't have to use a menu with ALL the games - you can customize directories and even put the games right there in the main menu, quickly selectable. I suspect a big part of that is I reserve the root directory for homebrew games that I'm either working on or play testing for other programmers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted February 16, 2016 Share Posted February 16, 2016 Does this mean that all my hundred something 2600 cartridges are basically pointless to have now (other than being cool to have as a collector's item)? I suppose so. It really depends on how much importance and value (sentimental or otherwise) YOU want to place on your cart collection. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Random Terrain Posted February 16, 2016 Share Posted February 16, 2016 I have links to hacked ROMs and a link to a collection of normal unhacked ROMs at the bottom of the list: randomterrain.com/atari-2600-memories-harmony-cartridge.html#hacks 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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