switch for multiple systems

[+RangerG]

I know this has been discussed before and I looked for the old post but couldn't find it. I want a way to hook up several classic systems (Atari, Coleco, INTV, maybe Odyssey2 someday) to my Commodore 1702 monitor. I would like to hook them with some type of switch. Please give suggestions. Thanks for your replies. -- RG

[Lemmi]

yes and could you please include pictures or something close to what it might look like

 

cause im an idiot when it comes to things like this and i dont want to get the wrong thing

 

plus i have a 20 inch TV with nothing but the UHF/VHF screws on the back

 

actually any help will do

[sway3]

I don't have pictures (or even a product number), but all you gotta do is walk into Radio Shack and tell the 15 year old behind the counter what you want to do and he'll show you exactly what you need.

 

Ranger, they sell multiple switches at radio shack with either AC or coaxial or both. I believe the commodore uses the AC yes? (look like rca stereo wires)

 

Lemmi, you just need an adapter - it's about $2.99.

[+RangerG]

Sway3 -- great I should be able to figure it out at Radio Shack. My monitor has to be hooked up to an old VCR (don't ask me why -- I learned it off AtariAge and it works great). I believe my monitor ANT is coaxial so that is what I need. I have been using one of those coaxial to female RCA plugs and avoiding the RF switch (yet another AtariAge trick). Thanks.

[+RangerG]

By the way, Lemmi -- with over 600 messages I thought you'd be an Atari pro. It is nice to know even the members with all those stars by their names can still be electronically challenged (like me - but learning!).

[Lemmi]

LOL thanks RangerG maybe i should read the hardware section huh?

 

but im not as bad as i made it sound, its just ive bought stuff and come to find out its the wrong thing, and ive never delt with switches of any kind for video games except the RF switches and the switches on the systems

[+RangerG]

Well -- I went to RadioShack and they have a switch for two or three systems. Has anyone ever seen one for four systems? I guess one could wire the two and three together and get a really crazy looking mess that would work for six systems, but wouldn't this really decrease the picture quality?

[jsoper]

I just bought a Pelican 4 to 1 switchbox from Fry's Electronics for $20. It has stereo audio, video, and S-video jacks.

 

Seems to be working fine. Got my Atari, C64, PSX, and Dreamcast hooked up with S-video to a 1702 monitor.

John

 

[ 12-10-2001: Message edited by: John Soper ]

[+RangerG]

John -- how does the pelican switch work? Do you have your monitor connected to a VCR to the switch? Does a regular Atari connect to it or is it some type of mod? Thanks -- RG

[jsoper]

The Pelican switchbox has standard s-video and rca jacks on the back for signals, four sets in, one set out.

 

It has four buttons on the front, push in the button you want.

 

My setup is as follows:

psx -- $10 s-video cable from store

dreamcast -- same

c64 -- homemade DIN to s-video jack cable

atari -- homemade RCA to s-video jack cable (my atari has the chroma luma video mod and rca output jacks). Remember -- chroma/luma is the same thing as s-video.

 

There was another idea I was thinking of. If you only want mono sound, you could hook up 4 systems with s-video and 1 audio jack, then hook up another 4 with the rca video and the other audio jack. Then toggle your tv between s-video and regular video to support 8 systems with one $20 switchbox

 

 

John

[Ze_ro]

quote:

---

Originally posted by RangerG:

Well -- I went to RadioShack and they have a switch for two or three systems. Has anyone ever seen one for four systems? I guess one could wire the two and three together and get a really crazy looking mess that would work for six systems, but wouldn't this really decrease the picture quality?

---

 

I don't think I've ever seen any that do more than three. I guess they figure not many people out there have more than three systems sitting around (Apparently, Atari nuts are a minority in society ) Yes, you would get a loss in picture quality if you had a lot of switches... but it depends on what you have connected to where. Here's what I mean:

 

One of the switches will be connected straight to your VCR (consider this to be switch #1), and the others will be plugged into this one, right? There's obviously a couple of different ways to connect them:

 

1. Connect switch #2 into switch #1, switch #3 to switch #2 and so on. This is generally a bad idea, because at the end, you'll have one system that's going through every single switch... which means you'll get much more signal degradation. However, any system you have plugged into switch #1 will get almost perfect quality, since it's only going through one switch.

 

2. Connect all the other switches to switch #1. This would mean that all of your systems get the same signal quality... however, none of them will get as good a picture as you would get with only one switch.

 

Which setup you use depends on how good a picture you want out of each system I guess... you may want a better picture out of a SNES than out of an Atari, since degrading an Atari's picture is a lot less noticable. Depending on the quality of the switch, you may not even notice any difference. Generally, these multi-system switches are of a MUCH higher quality than the crappy RF switches we're used to.

 

Of course, setting each of the switches to the right position for the right system will get more and more complicated with more switches

 

--Zero

[sway3]

I had several systems wired together using three three-switchers. The wires just got too disorganized so I now have several monitors. One for atari (2600 & 5200), one for nintendo (NES & SNES & 64), one for my saturn, 3DO, and TG16, one for my gamecube, one in the garage for testing systems, and my vectrex has it's own monitor.

 

Systems not currently set up: intellivision, odyssey 2, colecovision, turboduo, sms, genesis/cd (JVC), and about 12 different pongs.

 

I am also setting up my atari computers... I have a vic 20 somewhere too that I want to set up. All I am missing is an apple IIe.

[Albert]

I have used all sorts of switches to hook up multiple systems to various televisions and stereo receivers. I have several pushbutton S-Video switchboxes (good for newer systems), several RF switchboxes (good for older systems) and a nice six-switch S-Video switchbox from RCA that can be switched with a remote.

 

Ideally, it'd be awesome if someone made an A/V sized component (same width, but not very tall) that I could stack with my other A/V components, that had like 10+ inputs. Then I could program a universal remote to switch the correct input on this special component, while at the same time switching my receiver to the input this switchbox is plugged into. That would make me quite happy.

 

..Al