HunterZero

Yes, the console will start and get to the title screen without the controllers plugged in. Infact, a faulty controller can cause black screen. - J

Here was my ribbon cable replacement solution: https://forums.atariage.com/topic/258132-power-ribbon-cable-replacement/ When bench testing the board like that, take care not to "over insert" the cartridge - try backing off the cartridge a little bit. Check as well that the reset button is OK, and give it a momentary press after powering on the board. And I do note in your photo that you've inserted the cartridge the right way up, taking into account the logic board is parts side down inside the console Also, some of the cartridge pins are grounded, and usually there's a generous blob of solder where the RF shield is attached to the logic board where these ground pins are. Make sure you didn't bridge something there that isn't meant to be ground. - J

It sounds like very likely now there is a break or flaky connection in the ribbon cable from the power supply board to the main logic board. That can definitely cause black screen. I would start with ruling that out. Be careful too not to introduce shorts when bench testing out of the case, as the RF shield is soldered to the ground plane that goes around the outside of the board. Unfortunately these consoles have multiple points of failure, the solution/diagnosis in the service manual is to "try replacing a chip with a known working one". I your case, the STIC sounds like the original culprit, and is a very common point of failure. And be VERY careful of the brick transformer unit, that has lethal voltages inside. - J

First guess would be SRAM issue. The egg looks to be made from two sprite objects, and both objects of the egg are moving together, so it's less likely to be the STIC. Resetting the console made no difference? It would be interesting to see if there are issues with other games. - HZ

I am not sure if they still have spares or are willing to part with them, but users Humblejack and -^Crossbow^- had spares of the ribbon cable at one point, if you wanted to keep it original. https://forums.atariage.com/topic/258132-power-ribbon-cable-replacement/?do=findComment&comment=3950008 https://forums.atariage.com/topic/347605-intellivision-power-ribbon-replacement/?do=findComment&comment=5204614 - HZ

As stated above, the soldering on these Intellivision boards can be rather messy - the brown stuff looks to be leftover rosin flux. It should clean up with isopropyl. There are a few different PAL board revisions that can be found in model 3668 Intellivisions - you have one of the simpler single board revisions (there are versions with a daughter board for the PAL colour circuitry). While much of the logic is the same as the more common NTSC boards, there are differences around the colour circuitry and RF output. And of course the STIC chip is a different version (CCIR vs NTSC). All electrolytic capacitor values should be clearly printed on the cans. PAL boards do indeed have 2 crystals - the 4.000MHz (XTAL2) one is the system clock, the other crystal XTAL1 is for the PAL colour signal. These very rarely go bad, you should not need to replace them even as preventative maintenance. I would verify that the power output from the power supply board are in spec, then try powering on the system. You should get around 12V across the 2 pin connector near the large capacitor at the back of the power supply, then from the rear pin of the 2 pin connector to the 5 pin connector, you should get 5V, 12V, an unregulated 16V voltage (will be around 23V at no load), 0V, and -2.1V. Be very careful with the 5 pin ribbon connector cable, and check it has continuity. I have found the SHOEI branded electrolytics on the mainboards of these systems are quite reliable, but it never hurts to replace ancient electrolytic caps. It's a good idea to replace the large filter caps and the 7805 and 7812 voltage regulators on the power supply board too. The voltage regulators run quite hot and can fail. Other than that, the main points of failure on these systems are ICs... The RA-3-9600, the STIC, the AY-3-8914 sound and the CP1610 can all fail, in order of how commonly they fail from most to least. Also look for burning around the Q1 and Q2 transistors. It's more likely to be these transistors than the crystal if your CPU is not running. - HZ

On the hardest mode, the most important strategies are finding and conserving arrows, and locating the sleeping cave guardian monsters without waking them. Definitely the spiders and bats are the most annoying in this regard - the spiders take your arrows, and the bats hide the sounds that indicate a sleeping monster (snoring sleeping dragon, hissing snake) is nearby. On the hardest difficulty they move at such a speed that they are a real problem. It's really important on the hardest level that you don't wake up the sleeping guardian monsters (rats, demons, snakes, dragons, winged dragons), so you can track their location and get that important 'free' first hit on them when they are asleep. Spiders and bats don't sleep, so always move while on screen, even when in the dark. Spiders are especially annoying when exploring and revealing the smaller rooms, as they are likely to appear out of the dark and steal an arrow or two if you are not careful. Sometimes when exploring, backing up a bit and pausing to give spiders enough time to show themselves from a dark room ahead is a wise idea. The best way to deal with spiders and bats (and blobs to a lesser extent) is to kite them by running back into explored areas where you can try to lose them in those areas. Shoot them only when there's no other option, and when there's no chance of waking up another nearby sleeping cave monster by firing an arrow. Once you have killed all the monsters in a cave system that are tracked by sound, then the bats aren't an issue any more - apart from the annoying sound! Every cave system has exactly one unguarded quiver of arrows - the grey mountains have a second quiver as the cave treasure, guarded by a rat. - J

Preorder placed! This looks really impressive. Nice work!

Sorry for your loss, my condolences. Cancer takes so many too soon.

Mine arrived yesterday, thank you!

1. Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Cloudy Mountain 2. Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Treasure of Tarmin 3. Thunder Castle 4. Thin Ice 5. Burgertime 6. Bump 'n' Jump 7. Space Spartans 8. Lock 'n' Chase 9. Pitfall 10. Utopia

Best tips I can give for soldering... 1. Use the correct tip, the larger the tip the easier it is to get enough heat into what you are working on. A chisel or bevel tip is better for this type of work than a conical tip. 2. Use flux! A flux pen is good enough, flux paste is also handy. 3. Always tin the tip of your iron. It should be nice and shiny. 4. Heat the joint, not the solder. The solder should flow freely into the joint and be nice and shiny. 5. Clean off flux residue with isopropyl alcohol 6. Tin wires (coat with a little solder) before soldering them If you have trouble with shaky hands, use a wrist rest, or try to rest your wrists on something solid to help stabilise your hands. A soldering station with a lighter soldering pencil might be easier to use. Check this link out, this is a neater solution to the broken power ribbon situation (the gap between the pins on the power connector happen to be a standard spacing): - James

Radar Cat Race? - J

The leaking green thing is a 4.433618 MHz crystal oscillator for the PAL colour signal. There's corrosion on the resistor next to it that should be fixed. Try replacing that crystal and trimming it. Gameplay crashing issues are usually logic board issues, most commonly the RA-3-9600 RAM chip. If only player 2 is having issues, it could be the AY-3-8914 sound chip. If you have a working unit, try swapping these chips. These chips are the same as the ones in the 2609 NTSC North American Intellivision, only the STIC chip is different of the logic chips (and the replacement of the NTSC color chip with the PAL daughter board). - James

Locomotion is fun too.

Faves: 1. AD&D Treasure of Tarmin and AD&D Cloudy Mountain (tied!) 2. Burgertime! 3. Bump 'n' Jump Hidden Gems: 1. Thin Ice! 2. Thunder Castle 3. Tower of Doom

This looks amazing, I am definitely down for 1 copy.

This is really useful info for anyone who might want to take on a project to create a drop-in replacement package for the RA-3-9600... Would revive quite a few dead Intys. - J

Quite normal, as the power supply board with its voltage regulators and heatsinks is in the top left corner.

Very interesting stuff here! So the RA-3-9600-1 could work as a drop-in replacement for NTSC systems, but not PAL due to the slightly higher CPU/bus clock? And the RA-3-9600A should work as a drop-in replacement on both? The SRAM is such a common failure I always wondered if a modern RAM chip could be adapted to fit the RA-3-9600 pinout with a small adapter board. It may need some logic for the buffering registers, and address bus logic, but can't imagine it being too hard. The STIC chips (CCIR and NTSC) and CP-1610 CPU would be good candidates for replacement with a FPGA drop-in replacement. This would be an interesting project for someone... - James

I won my Intellivision (with Star Strike pack in!) in a Streets Paddle Pop ice cream "Lick a Prize" competition when I was little. I mailed away a competition entry for 2nd chance draw, and they told me I'd won a bicycle... but the Intellivision turned up instead. It was the only game console I had as a kid.

Not including homebrew: AD&D: Treasure of Tarmin Thin Ice Thunder Castle Just missing out... Burgertime Bump 'n' Jump AD&D: Cloudy Mountain (the game that I remember most vividly being used to display an Intellivision at a Grace Bros department store back in the early 80s)

I'm not really interested in the Amico at all, I cannot see it succeeding long term unfortunately. I am more likely to support projects that push the original Intellivision hardware to its limits, I find that far more impressive. - J

Seriously impressive! I am definitely keen to support this. - J

Speaking of the RA-3-9600... In my experience this is the most common failure, it would be really good to develop some sort of adapter PCB so that a modern RAM chip could be used as a replacement. Similar for the EXEC PROM/SROM/GROM chip adapter boards, allowing replacement with newer flash EPROM. This would have the side effect of enabling things such as custom firmware and graphics mods. - J