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New 800 and 810


Colleton

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The 800 and 810 I bought on eBay this weekend arrived today.  Fast shipping and excellent packaging!

 

They are both beautiful, it was like an early Christmas today.  Everything works as advertised, the 800 boots with no issues and the 810 loaded an original copy of Fort Apocalypse.  Image quality (via S-Video) is great.  These machines look and feel brand new.  The 810 still has the Warranty Registration Card and MPI drive mech shipping insert.  Keyboard on the 800 works perfectly with no loose keys. 

 

I think there may be a bit of case yellowing from sitting in a box for 30 years, but it isn't much.  I'm including some pics that show the interior and exterior plastic of the 800, let me know what you think.

 

I'm running out of shelf space.  LOL

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Edited by Colleton
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49 minutes ago, Colleton said:

The 800 and 810 I bought on eBay this weekend arrived today.  Fast shipping and excellent packaging!

 

They are both beautiful, it was like an early Christmas today.  Everything works as advertised, the 800 boots with no issues and the 810 loaded an original copy of Fort Apocalypse.  Image quality (via S-Video) is great.  These machines look and feel brand new.  The 810 still has the Warranty Registration Card and MPI drive mech shipping insert.  Keyboard on the 800 works perfectly with no loose keys. 

 

I think there may be a bit of case yellowing from sitting in a box for 30 years, but it isn't much.  I'm including some pics that show the interior and exterior plastic of the 800, let me know what you think.

 

I'm running out of shelf space.  LOL

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That 800 came, indeed, as promised and described (!!!)

 

CONGRATS for such special haul... No way to settle for less!!!

 

;-)

 

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Awesome!! That shelf rack display is very cool! Was the 800 unused? A good way to check is if the space bar has any smooth spots where normally pressed. What color are the keyboard plungers? The 810 looks great, btw.   You have the other 810 drive type. Are those good drives in general?

 

You have played Atari today.

Edited by Sugarland
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7 hours ago, kheller2 said:

I agree... where did you get that rack?    I still need to get a 400.

The shelf came from Amazon.

 

3 hours ago, Sugarland said:

You have the other 810 drive type. Are those good drives in general?

I have 1 MPI mechanism drive and 3 Tandon mechanism drives.  My original 810 back in the day was an MPI.  I never had any problems with it in 17 years of use.  The Tandon mechs are supposed to be very good as well.  The 3 Tandon drives were in horrible condition when I bought them, and the fact that they are still working with no issues shows that they (and 810s in general) are built like tanks.

 

Thanks everyone, it's been an exciting day for me.  I'm very pleased with these two machines.

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14 hours ago, Colleton said:

I have 1 MPI mechanism drive and 3 Tandon mechanism drives.  My original 810 back in the day was an MPI.  I never had any problems with it in 17 years of use.  The Tandon mechs are supposed to be very good as well.  The 3 Tandon drives were in horrible condition when I bought them, and the fact that they are still working with no issues shows that they (and 810s in general) are built like tanks.

The lengthy Atari8bit FAQ that says that the early 810's had some issues and so Atari added a data separator to improve the 810's function. Did some searching and here is the text below.

 

Quote

810 drives manufactured after September 1, 1981 ("DS" sticker) shipped with an
External Data Separator Board, which improves the drive's ability to
distinguish between data pulses and clock pulses on the disk, lowering the
chance of a misread.  It is installed in the Side Board where the FDC chip
would otherwise be installed. (810 FSM p.1-9)  The Side Board stepper motor
circuit voltage was increased to regulated 12 volts DC as well, leading to
greater power requirements for the drive:
  - Power Input: 9 volts AC, 3 amperes
  - Power Usage: 30 watts
  - Power: Used with an external 9 volt AC transformer power supply:
    Atari C016804 or equivalent
The External Data Separator Board was also offered as an upgrade for earlier
810 drives.  Earlier Side Boards must be upgraded in order to accept the Data 
Separator.

Next, Atari introduced the 810 Revision C ROM in November 1981 ("C" sticker). 
According to Antic (Oct. 82), "ROM C causes diskettes to be formatted with an
improved sector layout which is more efficient than that used by earlier 810
control ROMs."  Performance was reported to be 20% faster than with the
original B ROM.  The ROM C was also offered as an upgrade for older drives.

810 drives produced from February 1982 used the new "810 Analog"
("810M Analog") design, further improving reliability:  (see 810 FSM p.8B-1)
  1. A Power Supply Board now bolts onto the common base plate where the Rear
     Board used to be.  The Power Supply Board contains: 
      a) A redesigned Power Supply. 
      b) A Tachometer/Speed Switch I.C. (frequency to voltage converter)
         added as the Tach circuit to stabilize the motor speed.  
  2. An Analog Board now bolts to the top of the Drive Mechanism.  This board
     contains the Analog circuitry which used to be on the Rear Board.  The
     major changes are to the Read/Write circuitry.  The Analog Board
     contains: 
      a) Operational amplifiers ("op-amps") and discrete transistors in place
         of transistor arrays. 
      b) A multiplexor chip for switching the Read/Write amplifiers. 
  3. A 10 pin flat cable connects the Analog Board to the Power Supply Board.
810 Analog power: Used with an external 9 volt AC transformer power supply 
  rated for at least 30 watts; shipped with Atari CA017964.
The 3 new 810 Analog components were also offered together as an upgrade:
  - CB101128 "Grass Valley Analog Board Set" for Pre-Analog 810 drives.

In November 1982, the drive mechanism of the 810 Analog disk drive was changed
from MPI to Tandon.  The Tandon version is known as the "810T Analog" disk
drive.

 

Edited by Sugarland
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Good info, thank you!  I knew about the data separator board, but not the ROM rev change or the analog board.

 

From peering into my MPI drive through the drive opening with a flashlight, it has the analog board on the top rear of the drive mech, so it must have the other upgrades as well.  Nice.

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22 hours ago, ClausB said:

Please post your 800s' serial numbers in the 'Calling All 800s!' thread.

 

You too, Umberto.

Done, thanks for the suggestion.

 

So, adventures in old Atari maintenance...

 

800:  The 1st time I attempted to boot the 800 the power switch was stuck, wouldn't budge from the off position.  A little gentle pressure got it unstuck and it now moves freely and functions as advertised.  I opened the case to remove the RF cable as I have no intention of ever using it.  The RF cable is now stored in the computer box.  The interior was pristine, no dust or dirt.  The joystick and SIO connectors are clean and shiny, with no dust or dirt.  This machine saw very little use and has spent most of it's life stored away in a box.

 

810:  Two issues here.  For one, the MPI mechs have a spring catch that locks back when a disk is inserted and releases to eject the disk when the door is opened.  The catch was only locking back about 1 in 5 insertion attempts.  The second issue was writing to disk.  While the drive would read with no issues, when trying to format a disk it would run through a format cycle, grind and then repeat the cycle.  It would take 2-3 cycles before the format would complete successfully.  Sometimes it would just cycle indefinitely and never complete the format.

 

So, although I'd hoped not to have to do so, I opened the drive.  The cover dots on the screw holes came off cleanly so I was able to reuse them (I have new ones if necessary, but would rather not use them).  I located the disk spring catch and manipulated it a bit manually - the catch now catches and locks every time.  That's one down.  For the format/write issue, I ran the "burn in" routine on the 810 diagnostic cart through 5 cycles.  The 1st write cycle failed on the initial attempt but passed on the second.  I got 5 passes in a row which is slightly over an hour of constant use.  I then booted a DOS disk and formatted a disk - one pass and the format was complete.  Wrote DOS to the disk and rebooted with the new DOS disk - success.  I formatted and wrote DOS to the disk several times in order to verify the fix.  It's working like a champ. 

 

It looks like the issues were caused by disuse, and exercising the drive cleared the issues.  The interior of the drive was sparkling clean.  No dust, dirt or grime or oxidation.  It looks brand new.  As with the 800, the SIO ports are clean and shiny with no dust.  This drive has seen little, if any, use.  I did clean the R/W head and the head rails with alcohol, but they really didn't need it.

 

Also, thanks to ClausB's suggestion about recording the S/Ns, I checked the S/Ns on the boxes and they match the S/Ns of the machines.  Expected, but very nice to see.

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On 11/14/2019 at 9:39 PM, Colleton said:

Good info, thank you!  I knew about the data separator board, but not the ROM rev change or the analog board.

And the power board too, hehe. By the time Atari finished with reliability reengineering of the drive pretty much every PCB in the drive was replaced other than the mech itself. :)

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