5200 Troubleshooting: blank, black screen

[onemoretime]

Not that I often replace instead of repair, but Best has populated four port boards for sale. I bought one as a fresh start to do my mods on.

[Deteacher]

Update: So, I called Best Electronics and they were more than helpful! Before he sold me a bunch of parts, he asked me questions. One of which was "what other Atari products do I own?" When he heard that I had a 1200xl, he told me that the 6502 is socketed in the 1200xl and I could try swapping that chip out with the one in the 5200. So, I did the swap. Putting the 6502 from the 1200xl gave me the same result in the 5200 (black screen.) I put the 6502 from the 5200 in the 1200xl and I got a black screen as well. So, I now know that the 6502 is bad, but since putting the good one in didn't fix it, it looks like one or more RAM chips are also bad.

 

So, I guess I'll be calling Best Electronics back tomorrow to order a new 6502 and RAM chips. Hopefully that will do the trick.

 

One positive I'm getting from this is that I'm learning a lot.

[Deteacher]

Not that I often replace instead of repair, but Best has populated four port boards for sale. I bought one as a fresh start to do my mods on.

 

He did tell me that he had motherboards too. But I'm going to try ordering the chips first. If that doesn't do the job, then I'll go for the whole mobo replacement. Worst case scenario is that I'll have spare parts.

[onemoretime]

On mine, I used the new board to help diagnose the compromised one and get it working, then I did the mods on the new one. That way if I fraked something, I wouldn t be stuck out in space for all of eternity like Lorne Greene.