clh333 Posted October 11, 2021 Share Posted October 11, 2021 Greetings! Acquired my first Atari8 today, an 800XL; came with a 1050 and a small printer, 1025 if I recall. Missing a video cable and only one SIO cable so I haven't done much checking yet, except for reading on line docs and FAQs etc. I'm encouraged to find that members here have experience with mods as at some point the covers are coming off. But for now, I know nothing so pardon some stooopid questions... Thanks in advance and hi! -CH- 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenames99 Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 hi clh333, first thing to check is power supply even before you plug it into the 800xl. make sure it is outputting very close to 5 volts. also, check it on the AC function of the meter, it should have no ac component. that tells you if you have bad capacitors. anyway, welcome. Ken Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erichenneke Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 Welcome!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tep392 Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 Welcome! The 800XL and 1050 drive are a great place to start. You will want to make sure you don't have one of the "ingot" power supplies, see the supply circled in first post of this thread. If that is what you have, throw it out and get one of the other designs. The ingot type power supplies are known to randomly go bad and take out the computer with it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+scorpio_ny Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 1 hour ago, clh333 said: Greetings! Acquired my first Atari8 today, an 800XL; came with a 1050 and a small printer, 1025 if I recall. Missing a video cable and only one SIO cable so I haven't done much checking yet, except for reading on line docs and FAQs etc. I'm encouraged to find that members here have experience with mods as at some point the covers are coming off. But for now, I know nothing so pardon some stooopid questions... Thanks in advance and hi! -CH- Welcome and congrats @clh333! Here a thread that shows and talks about the "ingot" power supply that @kenames99 and @tep392 had mentioned: Ingot Power Supply --> Garbage Can? And there are no stupid questions! A lot of members here are very knowledgeable with the systems and as you already seen, glad to help out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tillek Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 1 hour ago, clh333 said: Greetings! Acquired my first Atari8 today, an 800XL; came with a 1050 and a small printer, 1025 if I recall. Missing a video cable and only one SIO cable so I haven't done much checking yet, except for reading on line docs and FAQs etc. I'm encouraged to find that members here have experience with mods as at some point the covers are coming off. But for now, I know nothing so pardon some stooopid questions... Thanks in advance and hi! -CH- So... is it a 1025 or a 1027? Or a 1020 or 1029? Oh ... wait... you meant YOU were going to ask the stupid questions... my bad. (Seriously though, welcome to the party!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sugarland Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 U1MB and SIDE3 would be my first upgrades, followed by Sophia 2 if the global semiconductor shortage ever comes to an end. Do you plan on connecting to BBS's (you need to connect to BBS's)? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beeblebrox Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 (edited) Welcome. ? Yup get yourself a USB power lead (£10 on ebay here in UK). Then if you want to start with loading games and such downloaded from internet, you could start with the cheaper route and get yourself an sio2sd or a slightly expensive but great sdrive max. But I agree I think you defo want something like Side3 and at some stage U1mb. I have both and couldn't do without them. I am on my mobile at the mo so not got time to link to all of this. There are many new games and wip if you look here on AA. Exciting time to get into these amazing machines. Edited October 12, 2021 by Beeblebrox Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clh333 Posted October 12, 2021 Author Share Posted October 12, 2021 Thank you all for your responses and suggestions. To clarify: The printer is a 1025, neither the the XL PSU nor the 1050 PSU resemble the one identified above, and I neglected to mention the deal included two APE interfaces, which look intriguing but whose utility is a mystery to me now. If I may I'll attach pictures for reference - I don't know how people feel about that so let me know if this is discouraged by the moderators. Thanks again, -CH- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beeblebrox Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 @clh333 images are fine to post. ? Head on over to the Atarimax website for more info on the APE kit. (I'm just trying to get to grips with APE myself ths week). I'd imagine the licences for APE are registered with whomever you bought it all off. I guess you could contact Steve at Atarimaz and see if it can be transfered. Do you have a Windows (or Linux or Mac) setup you can hook your Atari up to? You can do a lot of reading up on a lot of this stuff here on AA. Also have a look at the pinned thread for newbies/returning Atarians. If n doubt ask but most info is already posted in some form or another. I did weeks or reading 100s of posts when I returned to the Atari scene earlier this year. (20plus year break). I've gone a bit nuts and am possibly slightly more obessed with Atari than I was in my teens. Ah well, there are worse things to obess about eh?! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
800XLNZ Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 Insert USB sticks, attach everything, push the button, see what happens Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
800XLNZ Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 Could be a double 1050/ XF551 disk drive power supply, I have something similar Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atari8guy Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 7 hours ago, Beeblebrox said: @clh333 images are fine to post. ? Head on over to the Atarimax website for more info on the APE kit. (I'm just trying to get to grips with APE myself ths week). I'd imagine the licences for APE are registered with whomever you bought it all off. I guess you could contact Steve at Atarimaz and see if it can be transfered. Do you have a Windows (or Linux or Mac) setup you can hook your Atari up to? You can do some good stuff, just with the free version of APE, it has a time delayed start but still fully functions as a drive replacement to load images. You can also check out RespeQT for an open source peripheral emulator that should work with those APE interfaces... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beeblebrox Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 (edited) 8 minutes ago, 8bitguy1 said: You can do some good stuff, just with the free version of APE, it has a time delayed start but still fully functions as a drive replacement to load images. You can also check out RespeQT for an open source peripheral emulator that should work with those APE interfaces... @8bitguy1 I've not been able to get RespeQt running at all with Atarimax sio2pc usb devices on Windows 10. (see this thread). Only APE for Windows trial. Just literally copied my first disk to atr in the last hour. Gonna try and make a real 1050 drive diagnostic disk from an atr now. ? Edited October 12, 2021 by Beeblebrox Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atari8guy Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 1 hour ago, Beeblebrox said: @8bitguy1 I've not been able to get RespeQt running at all with Atarimax sio2pc usb devices on Windows 10. (see this thread). Only APE for Windows trial. Just literally copied my first disk to atr in the last hour. Gonna try and make a real 1050 drive diagnostic disk from an atr now. ? You might be right, I'm going from memory, as I have both lotharek and Atarimax sio2pc devices, I could have easily mixed up my memory...other's here will know more. Sorry to OP if I caused any confusion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beeblebrox Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 2 minutes ago, 8bitguy1 said: You might be right, I'm going from memory, as I have both lotharek and Atarimax sio2pc devices, I could have easily mixed up my memory...other's here will know more. Sorry to OP if I caused any confusion. @8bitguy1 No worries. It might just be my setup/Windows 10 but I went through several days of frustration as new to the SIO2PC side and then found out it is an Atarimax device. (I naively thought all SIO2PC devices shared the same "base" as it were). I really wanted to get RespeQt to work but given my 800XL came preinstalled with the AtariMax SIO2PC USB I am happy enough to use APE. Lotharek's device uses FDTI drivers, etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clh333 Posted October 12, 2021 Author Share Posted October 12, 2021 I sent an email to Mr. Scott Tucker of AtariMax but have not received a reply, so I don't know if I'm licensed or need to purchase one. I do have Win10 and Linux PCs with which to connect; one of the two adapters is USB and the other serial, so it may be there is a DOS version of the interface software as well. But that's TBD: just now I have cleaned everything and physically inspected it. I have verified output from the two power supplies - 10.3 VAC for the drive PSU and 5.3 VDC for the console PSU, both unloaded. Virtually no AC present in the console PSU's output - down in the thousandths of a volt. With that in hand I powered everything, one at a time, checking for heat or smoke; none observed. Now I'm working on getting a display. There was no switchbox or monitor cable included with the deal so I am trying to figure out a way of displaying the XL's output from its "TV" RCA outlet. My best guess was to feed the output to a Commodore 1901 monitor but I couldn't find a combination that gave me a display. I'm assuming here that the output is RF and was intended to be input to an older analog TV's VHF terminals. But that's an assumption and maybe I do need an interface such as the infamous "switchbox", only I don't have one. Nor do I have an analog TV any longer. May I ask for suggestions? Thanks. -CH- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beeblebrox Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 (edited) @clh333 Perhaps I suggest you check out the pinned newbies/welcome to returning atarians section as a lot of info there, especially when it comes to often sought common questions about hooking displays up, etc. Your 800XL should have a 5 pin monitor out DIN. You'll need a din to composite cable or as you say use a TV with an rf aerial input, tune it in, etc. Obviously rf is the worse of the video outputs. Din to composite cables are relatively cheap on ebay. FYI if you are throwing s-video into the mix and you have one of the majority of older run 800XLs (without a Freddie chip) then s-video, (chroma), won't be enabled inside the machine as standard. (Atari left it unconnected). This means on a din to s-video cable you'll get a black and white image. There is a dead easy mod you can do if you are handy with a soldering iron at a later stage. As you are based in the states I assume yours is an NTSC 800XL rather than PAL? Anyways the pinned section I mentioned has a lot of this stuff. Steve Tucker at Atarimax will have the previous licencee on record I'd imagine.. Whether you can transfer the license is another matter. Edited October 12, 2021 by Beeblebrox Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eightbit Posted October 13, 2021 Share Posted October 13, 2021 Congrats on the score! I grew up with the Commodore 64 and never even saw an Atari 8-bit computer until the late 90's. Got one just out of curiosity and that began a happy marriage with the computer ever since. I adore these machines. I PMed you as looking at your picture you have two SIO2PC devices from AtariMax. One is the USB version and the other is the older serial port version. I was actually just going to buy the serial port version from Atarimax as I have an old P3 machine with serial ports and I can use it. If you have no need for it let me know and I will take it off of your hands. Otherwise, enjoy! I highly recommend the APE software as you have the hardware already to use it. If you have a computer nearby all you need to to is install that USB version fo the SIO2PC device (SIO cable from it to the 800XL, USB to the computer) and boot the APE software and you will be in business. It's really convenient if you have a PC nearby. Otherwise you might want to look into the UNO Cart or SIO2SD devices. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted October 13, 2021 Share Posted October 13, 2021 Can the FTDI based SIO2PC based devices be used with APE? Because, personally, I wouldn't limit myself to a device that only works with APE when RespeQt is well implemented and free. I'm not saying don't support the developer of APE, I'm just stating that as a means of future proofing it may be best to buy hardware that keeps one's options open. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clh333 Posted October 13, 2021 Author Share Posted October 13, 2021 Thank you all for your suggestions. I looked on several other forums for a group actively supporting the 8 bit Ataris before deciding to participate in this one. I am grateful for your advice as I know very little about Atari8s. I plan to order a DIN cable from Hercules Workshop in Canada but it will take a while to arrive. I haven't used an RF adapter since I first acquired a Commodore 64 years ago. I'm assuming this is an NTSC machine but until I see a display I won't know for sure. There is an FCC ID on the badge, suggesting NA use. The badge also states "Hong Kong"; from what I have read this represents the later series motherboard with socketed ICs. I can solder but will need to know a lot more before deciding what and how to modify. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clh333 Posted October 13, 2021 Author Share Posted October 13, 2021 Wikipedia answered my question, poorly phrased, about the video output from the Atari 800XL: What comes out of the "Switch Box" RCA jack is pre-modulated RF. The switch box itself is therefore only a signal switch (computer or antenna source) not a signal converter. QED. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted October 13, 2021 Share Posted October 13, 2021 2 hours ago, clh333 said: Thank you all for your suggestions. I looked on several other forums for a group actively supporting the 8 bit Ataris before deciding to participate in this one. I am grateful for your advice as I know very little about Atari8s. I plan to order a DIN cable from Hercules Workshop in Canada but it will take a while to arrive. I haven't used an RF adapter since I first acquired a Commodore 64 years ago. I'm assuming this is an NTSC machine but until I see a display I won't know for sure. There is an FCC ID on the badge, suggesting NA use. The badge also states "Hong Kong"; from what I have read this represents the later series motherboard with socketed ICs. I can solder but will need to know a lot more before deciding what and how to modify. Flashjazzcat, the developer of the firmware for the SIDE3 and U1MB, has an excellent YouTube channel going over the installation of the U1MB and other items in relation to internal Atari upgrades. He's also very approachable with none of the developer elitism so prevalent these days. Be sure to check out his video's (some are quite humorous). 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manterola Posted October 13, 2021 Share Posted October 13, 2021 (edited) In order to test what you have while waiting for the Hercules video cable you can use the RF output with any Rca-Rca cable and the adapter of the picture which is super unexpensive and ready available everywhere (amazon, ebay, etc). I guess it's called rca female to F-type male, or something. Then you need your TV in "ANT" and make it tune channel 2 or 3. If need a super quick test and don't want to wait for the Amazon 2 days, you can also slice an RF cable (coaxial) and an Rca one and make temporarily connections in a breadboard or something. And finally, of course you can build you own cable by using a MIDI cable in one end and and audio/video rca cable the other. Edited October 13, 2021 by manterola 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
AtariAge on Instagram
Watch us on YouTube
Chat on Discord
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.