Unknown Atari clone??

[kaloyanm]

Hello everyone. I am not sure if here is the right place for my question but something come to my possession and I don't even know if it is a retro game console or other animal.
Thank you.

[DavidD]

That looks more like an NES/Famicom connector to me... but I could be wrong.  What makes you think it's an Atari clone device?

[kaloyanm]

35 minutes ago, DavidD said:

That looks more like an NES/Famicom connector to me... but I could be wrong.  What makes you think it's an Atari clone device?

since I have little knowledge on this matter I tried to use google pictire search to find similar items but alas, this was close I could come up.

[emerson]

The cartridge connector is 60 pins according to my count which makes me believe it's a Famicom clone. There are plenty of "famiclone" keyboards floating around with 3rd party word processor carts. Some of them even have parallel port printer capabilities! What I find interesting are the rounded corners on the cartridge cutout where official famicom cartridges typically have a 45 degree chamfer.

 

As for that blown transistor, I would bet its a 5v regulator. Double check the pcb layout in regards to those diodes and capacitors to be sure. Check to make sure those diodes are still good, or just replace them with something a little beefier to be safe.

 

The joystick ports, are those DB9 connectors like an atari or sega genesis controller?

[Gemintronic]

Can you turn it on?  These famiclones usually have built in games.  Some countries had weird rules that would get worked around by including educational software.

 

My famiclone + keyboard uses the typical famiclone DB9 connector.

[kaloyanm]

3 hours ago, emerson said:

The joystick ports, are those DB9 connectors like an atari or sega genesis controller?

Hey thank you, I am getting close and closer to this mystery. I am still confused by this windows button on the keyboard. Why the heck on a game console is there such thing? I am uploading picture of the game ports. I have no idea which model they are.

[kaloyanm]

2 hours ago, Gemintronic said:

Can you turn it on?  These famiclones usually have built in games.  Some countries had weird rules that would get worked around by including educational software.

 

My famiclone + keyboard uses the typical famiclone DB9 connector.

Unfortunately there is a blown up transistor as emerson pointed out. I am looking for AC charger currently but it is hard since still didn't figure out the parameters.

[Gemintronic]

That 4W and PAL-B on the bottom seem to indicate a UK plug at 4w.. but, who knows with these machines.

 

Maybe there's something like an FCC ID further in on those boards.

[emerson]

7 hours ago, kaloyanm said:

I am uploading picture of the game ports. I have no idea which model they are.

I didn't mean a specific model, just a visual comparison was all. My bad.

 

You may be able to get a part number off that blown transistor if the face isn't completely destroyed. Try using some rubbing alcohol and a cotton swab to wet the face. Difficult to read text seems to pop out when the part is wet.

 

The blown transistor looks to be a TO-92 package, and all of the 7805 voltage regulator datasheets I looked at rate the TO-92 variant at 100mA max current output, which seems low for an application like this. Maybe that's why it blew? This is still assuming it's a voltage regulator of course...

 

Perform the following at your own risk. I can't be held responsible for anything bad that happens. It looks like there are 4 wires in the ribbon cable going from the av board to the cart connector board. If I had to guess, those are power, ground, audio and video. Right below where the ribbon cable attaches to the cart connector pcb is a circle that's half white, this is where a capacitor would go and I think it may be for a filter capacitor on the main power rail. If you were to connect 5V DC there with + on the bare half and - on the white half I think this unit would fire up.

[+Stephen Moss]

I wonder if someone was confuse by the label saying "AC Adaptor Only" and though that meant connecting an AC supply.

I cannot be certain without a schematic but I cannot see anything in those images that looks like a rectifier and so I would presume a DC input is required. 

[emerson]

1 hour ago, Stephen Moss said:

I cannot be certain without a schematic but I cannot see anything in those images that looks like a rectifier and so I would presume a DC input is required. 

If you look behind the blown transistor in the last photo it looks like there is a silicon diode and resistor. I'm guessing this is a half-wave rectifier circuit.

 

After some thought I think a better place to tap into the power bus would be the power switch. Again, do so at your own risk.