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Did I buy a Repro Diagnostic Cart?


dec0dedab0de

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Hi Everyone, this is my first post here, but I've visited occasionally for over 10 years. Last week, while not entirely sober, I purchased a 5200 Diagnostic cart from ebay, and it just came in the mail. I think that it may be a reproduction, and I'm not sure if I should report the seller or not. I was hoping someone could help me make a proper identification. Some reasons I think it is a reproduction are below:

 

 

  1. The label is very clean and shiny, in better condition than any of the games I own.
  2. The back screw was missing, meaning someone had taken it apart at some point.
  3. The board does not match the one shown at http://www.atariprotos.com/5200/software/diagnostic/11.htm
  4. The ROM was definitely re-soldered at one point, you can tell because the solder is much shinier than the rest of the board, and there are burn marks from de-soldering.
  5. PINs 15/16 are directly soldered together, I don't know if this is by design, or just a mistake on whoever put the chip in.

 

I had trouble uploading pictures the first time around, so I will post this first, then upload them as a reply.

Edited by dec0dedab0de
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Can you post a photo of the cart and the board? The board in particular would be pretty telling. If you are having problems posting photos, try resizing them if they are particularly large. You should then be able to post them. You can also send them to me and I can post them for you. Will PM you.

 

..Al

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After a bit of searching, it looks like the seller Charles L Guinn, voltman3 on atariage, and ebay is already known for selling repros, and homebrew without permission. I guess I'll report it, what a bummer.

 

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/249780-voltman3-s-fake-homebrews-on-ebay/

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/229886-fix-it-felix-sr-atari-2600-on-cartridge-on-ebay/

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After a bit of searching, it looks like the seller Charles L Guinn, voltman3 on atariage, and ebay is already known for selling repros, and homebrew without permission. I guess I'll report it, what a bummer.

 

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/249780-voltman3-s-fake-homebrews-on-ebay/

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/229886-fix-it-felix-sr-atari-2600-on-cartridge-on-ebay/

That is correct, I would always assume anything he sells is a Repro. I am not sure how he represented it in this auction, but I know he generally is very deceptive in his listings. I would call ebay, demand your money back and point out that virtually everything he is selling is a fake.

 

Good luck

Edited by atari181
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That is correct, I would always assume anything he sells is a Repro. I am not sure how he represented it in this auction, but I know he generally is very deceptive in his listings. I would call ebay, demand your money back and point out that virtually everything he is selling is a fake.

 

Good luck

 

He did not indicate that it was a reproduction at all, but even if he did it would be against ebay's policy to sell counterfeit goods. I filed a report, will post back what happens.

 

 

Yeah, that is definitely a reproduction. Someone desoldered the ROM from another 5200 cartridge and soldered an 8K EPROM onto the board.

 

..Al

 

That's what I thought, how can you tell it is an EPROM and not a ROM? Did you just know the chip number? or is there another obvious give away?

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Both the genuine and counterfeit cartridges have EPROMS on them. You can tell by the case style, brown ceramic color, the sticker over the quartz erase window, and of course the part number. They're all the same style.

 

Generally a ROM (or PROM) is all black in color and typically has a custom Atari part number.

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That's what I thought, how can you tell it is an EPROM and not a ROM? Did you just know the chip number? or is there another obvious give away?

 

It's an AMD 27C64 EPROM, I've used this same part over the years to make 8K homebrew games for the 2600. This in itself isn't damning, since Atari also used EPROMs to build these.

 

..Al

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  • 4 weeks later...

Who cares?

 

It's an original atari PCB (the one with a full 16k of adress lines, no less), an original atari cart-shell, and an Eprom from the correct era..

 

What are you bitching about?

 

Did you pay HUNDREDS of dollars for this cart?

 

Is it really THAT BIG OF A PROBLEM that the Label might not be original Atari paper/printing?

 

I say, the guy did a good job and it's well worth the money.

 

 

also: The 2 pins that are "soldered together" in that picture are 27 and 28, which is normal for a 2764 EPROM. They are both VCC (+5VDC).

Edited by MEtalGuy66
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