dphirschler

My apologies. The "before" pitfall image is incorrect. Here it is: And for comparison's sake, here is the after shot: I wanted to ask about the ghosting I see on the white numbers in the upper left corner? What could be causing that? Is it all because of the weak video signal coming out of the circuit? Here is just a shot showing the garbledness that is the tree. Darryl

OK, please be patient. I won't be able to report back until I get some more resistors. I ordered them from the link above. Since I will have so many, I may also try Ben Heck's composite mod "reloaded". Of course that means I need to get some perf board and a transistor.. Darryl

OMG! 1500 pieces! Thanks for the link. Darryl

Yes, you are correct about the transistor. I brought that up on my own. I was concerned that maybe I caused it by removing it rather than clipping the lead. Concerning the 75 ohm resistor. I am inclined to leave it in place for now. But I am curious about the options mentioned above. I was reading the other thread to try and understand the reasoning behind why replacing 2.2k ohm and 3.3k ohm with 4.7k ohm and 6.8k ohm works. Seems to me, if you nearly double the resistance, won't you weaken the signal? But even if that's a good solution, I don't have them on hand yet. I need to get some resistors. I haven't spent time checking into the other two solutions yet either... using the R209 (1.8k ohm) and the 1.5k ohm from the RF modulator. Darryl

Also, I completely removed the transistor instead of just clipping one of its legs. Don't think that has anything to do with it because some of the tutorials I saw said to remove it completely. You should be able to see that in the picture above. Also, the b/w picture on my Sharp TV bounces up and down a bit at times. Doesn't roll, just a bounce. So, what is the purpose of the 75 Ohm resister between ground and video on the output side of that circuit? Darryl

Rev 14.

Not happy with the picture after composite video mod. See pics here: Before the mod: after the mod: Here is after the mod on my Sharp TV: Here is a pic of the mod kit: So the picture seems crisp, but there seems to be some extreme sharpening artifacts. Like doubled and ghosted lines at the edges. And it doesn't even work on the Sharp TV! What could I have done wrong? Darryl

Hey, I am no repair expert, but I had similar symptoms in the past and it turned out to be a bad sound ship. I just replaced it (using one from a donor board) and it was back up and running. Darryl EDIT - oh never mind. I just read the update.

Can somebody recommend alternate solder points for the LED's 5v power? I don't want to solder directly onto the 7805. Can I take the power on the right side of the board (where we draw power for the composite video circuit)? Darryl

1. I black/silver models had a tendency to scrape the top of the carts because of the aluminum tab. That could have been designed better. 2. The power switch sucks on the black/silver models. They fixed it on the beige models but took away the LED (but it can be added back in). 3. Better sound or at least 3 more voices of music? The C64 has great sound. 4. Real functions keys. 5. Built-in speech (in the console) 6. And my god the firehose! Surely there was a better way. Darryl

No hard feelings. But man, you broke my heart! Didn't even know they existed until that auction. And I thought I was the only person that noticed they were beige. They kind of looked like they were black and reflecting light to the untrained eye. Darryl

You can also check out this post: http://atariage.com/forums/topic/228626-who-has-vga-out-on-their-console/ Darryl

I actually prefer the beige TI. <ducks> ... especially the power switch. See my post on adding an LED to it.

I have three beige consoles: - My main "mod" computer. Currently with VGA a blue power LED, and soon to have internal speech. This one has a blue power switch. - a beige QI with 1981 firmware. This one has a red power switch. - a completely stock model (with blue power switch). All three have good keyboards (ie, non-Mitsumi). If you are in the market for a beige unit, make sure you check out the under side. You don;t need a very good photo to see it is not a Mitsumi keyboard. Those keyboards have a brown/reddish color to them. The good keyboards are green and you can see solder points all over it. FWIW, I also have a black/silver model. I prefer the later versions of this. I never ever saw a beige speech synth except prototype photos. I think I saw one here on this forum. I wish somebody would make a mold of it. I came close to winning an auction of about twenty joysticks all thrown in a box, about six of them were beige joysticks. I wanted it so bad! I only wanted one beige set and I was going to sell the rest. But somebody beat me. Ebay can be a bitch sometimes! lol. It was probably mdude that won. So instead I got an Atari 400 joystick. It's beige and exactly the same as the CX40 Atari joystick. Look it up. It's awesome! Darryl

You can probably clean that sharpie off completely with rubbing alcohol. Darryl

Good news is I have an old dead TI mobo I can practice on. I've already canibalized it a little in he past. So I can practice the delicate trace soldering. Darryl

Here's another guy that did the mod. Hopefully mine is cleaner than this. http://www.nightfallcrew.com/23/10/2016/texas-instruments-ti-994a-internal-tms5220-speech-synthesizer/ Darryl

I may go ahead and attempt this mod this weekend. However, I want to use much smaller wire. http://www.mainbyte.com/ti99/speech/speech_console.html The top of mobo solder point (in the traces) concerns me a little. Any advice from the pros? Darryl

Ha, I was just reading the text inside the box. "© 1979", and my favorite part, "Texas Instruments Command Modules are not cassettes, cartridges, or recordings." Funny, they seem an awful lot like cartridges to me. In fact, weren't they renamed "Solid State Catridges" later on? Darryl

OK, here are photos of the boxes. They are the old style with the opening flap (with the booklet in it). Are these 99/4 style boxes? I will give them to anybody that pays for the shipping. I just can't throw these out. And if you guys convince me that it's ok to throw these out, then I will do so without guilt. Set me free! Darryl

I am slow. And I forgot about this thread. I just rediscovered it again. lol. pm reply sent. :-) Darryl

Give me your address and pay for shipping. I have a bunch all packed up and ready to go. As a bonus, they also have the plastic inserts. I have a picture of them around here somewhere. I think these might be the older style boxes (without the plastic insert and with the flip open cover), and some tan colored boxes. If I cannot find the pictures, then I will just reopen the box. Darryl

I had an MBX back in the day, and all the games too. It's all gone now though. I never programmed for it, but I did use it quite a bit. I seem to remember the analog joystick working for normal TI games. Am I right? Darryl

OK, found the picture, and a short writeup about the mod here. I believe it is referencing a mod for analog joystick support. Oh well... Darryl

I was just poking around the internet and found an interesting photo of what appears to be the TI99 joystick port with a mod made to it. I am curious about this because I think it could be an alpha-lock mod made on the main board instead of on the keyboard. I prefer this method if it is possible. Can you experts determine if this is the case from the photo? I tried to navigate to the webpage and read about it myself, bit I could not find reference to this photo. Didn't think to try the wayback machine... I'll be right back. In the meantime, can somebody analyze the photo? Darryl