Need help hooking up my atari.

[marshalldylan1]

Yes, I'm sure you guys get a lot of these, but I am in need of some assistance hooking my Atari up, and playing it. Ok, so, here it goes.

 

I got an Atari 2600 from ebay, the description said it was working, and it even had a picture of the Atari in play. It came with the Antenna hook up(or whatever you call it) that has a switch that slides from TV to Computer. Unfortantely, none of my TV's have the old style Antenna thing, so I read to get some kind of adapter. So, I went to Radio Shack, with the Switch box thing that I got in the Auction, and the lady got me something that should work. It has the two places to hook up the Antennas, and the place where to plug into the RF on the TV, and a place to put the Cable through. I hooked it up, had it set to Channel 3(both the TV, and the Atari), put a game in, and I flip the power. Nothing. I have everything hooked up the way I think it should go, but there is still no picture. I know you guys are the masters of Atari, and I was wondering if you could help out?

 

Thanks

Marshall

[marshalldylan1]

Here, I found the thing I bought at Radio Shack, was it the right thing?

 

http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?cata...ct%5Fid=15-1296

[Chris++]

Okay, one thing at a time.

 

Do you have a VCR hooked up to your TV set that works well?

 

Is there an "In From Antenna" jack on the back (threaded co-ax female)?

[Chris++]

Also -- there's definitely a 9-volt adaptor plugged into the back of the Atari, as well as into a wall socket that works, right?

[Chris++]

9-volt power supply, I mean.

 

<------still misses the EDIT button

[Seob]

Try to let the tv set search for the channel. Modern tv's offen are a little to sensitive, so the atari could also be at channel 2+ or 4-.

And don't forget to slide the switch to computer.

It'also could be the switch.

I tryed a computer-tv switch from my old nes and the only thing i got was a realy bad picture. When i tryed the switch of a colecovision, everything was allright.

You could also try to plug the atari staight to your tv without the switch.

The cablesignal could also influens the signal of the atari.

The only thing i don't understand is this line:

"Unfortantely, none of my TV's have the old style Antenna thing"

Does it mean that the tv's at your country haven't got an tuner with antenna plug? Cause over here in the Netherlands we still have the same antennaplug as was then in the 70's when the atari was on the market.

[Max-T]

I've founf that easiest way to hook an Atari (or other classic game machines) is buy a direct adapter from Radio Shack, which will allow you to connect the female RCA jack from the end of the Atari's game cable, then provides a standard crew-on coax jack onto the other end.

 

Here's a link to that part:

http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?cata...%5Fid=278%2D255

 

There are advantages and disadvantages to doing it this way. The bad part is (unless you also use a coax spliter) that you will only be able to have your Atari hooked up, or the cable TV line, but not both simultaneously. (I have a separate TV for gaming which is not hooked up to my CATV, so that issue is moot in that case.) The upside of a direct connection is that there will much less RF interference and better color fidelity.

 

I almost forgot to mention -- don't try to use an auto-switching selector between your Atari and TV. Ataris' output signals are too weak to properly trigger an auto-switch (like the one that came with the NES). The direct connector is the way to go, IMHO.

 

If you want to try this out, and if you have any more questions, please feel free to PM me for futher help. Good luck!