2600 Junior turns on, very snowy picture

[JohnD]

I’ve got a junior that turns on fine. You see the game, but it’s as if the signal is not fully lined up with the channel selected. I’ve tried different channels, gave it a cleaning, twisted the red thingie to see if that would help, asked politely but nothing’s made a difference. I also tried to find what’s always referred to as the chiclet looking film capacitor on earlier models but not having luck. Any experts know if there’s a specific that seems like an obvious fix?

[RahaT]

Did you check your channel switch on console? Did you try to move and wiggle RF cable? What kind of adapter you use to connect cable to antenna input? Did you try different TV? 

[Voxel]

Post #4

[christo930]

On 8/5/2020 at 8:23 PM, JohnD said:

I’ve got a junior that turns on fine. You see the game, but it’s as if the signal is not fully lined up with the channel selected. I’ve tried different channels, gave it a cleaning, twisted the red thingie to see if that would help, asked politely but nothing’s made a difference. I also tried to find what’s always referred to as the chiclet looking film capacitor on earlier models but not having luck. Any experts know if there’s a specific that seems like an obvious fix?

 

I resolved a similar situation by cleaning the channel select switch with deoxit.  So far, every Atari I have with snow problems have responded well to a little deoxit. 

 

[jtburkh]

I just resurrected an old heavy sixer that I found at a thrift store.  I had replaced the capacitors and regulator, and when I powered it on I had an awful picture.

 

At first, I tried adjusting the RF pot, but had no real luck.

 

What solved the problem for me was that I unseated the old RF cable and got a q-tip.  I pulled most of the cotton off the end of it, squirted it with deoxit, and then cleaned the male and female ends of the rf connections at the main board.  Then I ran another dry q-tip over both, started the system up, and viola, great picture.

[0078265317]

I use a universal power adapter and it works fine.  No snow.  Just have to wiggle the rf a little.  And the power is not stiff but just lay it on a flat surface.