800XL (video?) circuitry troubleshooting/repair

[mikec1701]

Hi everyone,

 

I recently brought my childhood 800XL and 1050 drive home from my parents place and was looking forward to playing with it and looking at the contents of some old floppies I had. I only got to use the computer for about 15 minutes before I heard a loud popping sound and thought "this is not good". All seemed OK until a few seconds later, when the video image on the TV started to roll vertically like an old TV with the vertical hold control out of whack. The rolling screen continued, with additional distorted dark bands running across the screen, and then I noticed exclamation mark characters appearing at random in various places on the screen. I don't remember if I could type on it or contnue using it (I think it was unresponsive), but the rolling screen would make any extended use next to impossible (see 2 photos attached).

 

I would like to avoid trashing the computer and am interested in repairing it, if possible. I'm wondering if the symptoms I describe point to any likely cause, and potential fix (hopefully a not-too-expensive one). I'm decently handy but not particularly knowledgeable about electronics diagnosis or repair. I did open up the machine and remove the RF shield to look for obviously blown or burnt parts, but found none. Part of the issue here is I don't know where on the board to look. My impression is something with the video circuitry is involved.

 

Can anyone offer any help diagnosing the problem (or pointing me on where to find out more), and also determining if it would be feasible for me to repair this or have it repaired by someone else? I'd really like to avoid sending my old 800XL to the landfill or even recycling center. I searched for repair places in the U.S. but the info I found seemed to be outdated and I wasn't able to reach anyone at 2 of the places I called. I'm located in Seattle but sometimes travel to Florida and other places.

 

My ultimate goal aside from wanting to play around with the computer was to view and possibly extract some info from the old floppies I have, so that I could use those with an emulator on my Mac, so I guess a secondary question would be is there a way to hook up a 1050 drive to a Mac (iMac, Intel Core Duo 2) for use with an emulator, either using OS X or Vista or something else.

 

Thanks in advance for any help, guys!

 

P.S.

Edited August 10, 2007 by mikec1701

[yorgle]

Hi everyone,

 

I recently brought my childhood 800XL and 1050 drive home from my parents place and was looking forward to playing with it and looking at the contents of some old floppies I had. I only got to use the computer for about 15 minutes before I heard a loud popping sound and thought "this is not good". All seemed OK until a few seconds later, when the video image on the TV started to roll vertically like an old TV with the vertical hold control out of whack. The rolling screen continued, with additional distorted dark bands running across the screen, and then I noticed exclamation mark characters appearing at random in various places on the screen. I don't remember if I could type on it or contnue using it (I think it was unresponsive), but the rolling screen would make any extended use next to impossible (see 2 photos attached).

 

I would like to avoid trashing the computer and am interested in repairing it, if possible. I'm wondering if the symptoms I describe point to any likely cause, and potential fix (hopefully a not-too-expensive one). I'm decently handy but not particularly knowledgeable about electronics diagnosis or repair. I did open up the machine and remove the RF shield to look for obviously blown or burnt parts, but found none. Part of the issue here is I don't know where on the board to look. My impression is something with the video circuitry is involved.

 

Can anyone offer any help diagnosing the problem (or pointing me on where to find out more), and also determining if it would be feasible for me to repair this or have it repaired by someone else? I'd really like to avoid sending my old 800XL to the landfill or even recycling center. I searched for repair places in the U.S. but the info I found seemed to be outdated and I wasn't able to reach anyone at 2 of the places I called. I'm located in Seattle but sometimes travel to Florida and other places.

 

My ultimate goal aside from wanting to play around with the computer was to view and possibly extract some info from the old floppies I have, so that I could use those with an emulator on my Mac, so I guess a secondary question would be is there a way to hook up a 1050 drive to a Mac (iMac, Intel Core Duo 2) for use with an emulator, either using OS X or Vista or something else.

 

Thanks in advance for any help, guys!

 

P.S.

 

Best Electronics has brand new 800xl motherboards for approx. $39.00. Unless you had spare parts lying around, I don't think you could fix it for less than that. And it would still be (visually) your old computer.

 

Their website is www.best-electronics-ca.com. They are really helpful.

Edited August 10, 2007 by yorgle

[+orpheuswaking]

I'm not able to help you with the picture output, but for connecting your 1050 to a PC you can use a 1050-2-PC or ProSystem cable

 

http://pages.suddenlink.net/wa5bdu/sio2pc.htm

 

I have an all in one SIO2PC with the Prosystem built in that I got here

 

http://atarimax.com/sio2pc/documentation/

[Bryan]

I've seen this before when the 5V power brick failed. The power was full of AC ripple which caused the black band in the picture.

Edited August 10, 2007 by Bryan

[puppetmark]

Number one rule of any electronics repair, CHECK THE POWER SUPPLY FIRST!

[mikec1701]

Hey, thanks to everyone for the responses. I just checked in for the first time since posting.

 

I will see if I have or can try out another compatible power brick first, since that's the simplest possible solution. Otherwise I'll look into a motherboard replacement or look for an inexpensive 8-bit Atari to use instead And thanks for the cabling response-- I will look into that as an alternative! Just the whoa factor of having a 5.25" drive hooked up to my new iMac (under the desk, of course) makes that appealing.

 

Michael

[mikec1701]

I guess I should ask-- is there anyone here in the Seattle area who'd be willing to help me test out the power brick theory? I'd be willing to bring my 800XL over to your place to test it with a known good brick.

 

Thanks,

 

Michael

[tjlazer]

I guess I should ask-- is there anyone here in the Seattle area who'd be willing to help me test out the power brick theory? I'd be willing to bring my 800XL over to your place to test it with a known good brick.

 

Thanks,

 

Michael

 

There are a few Atari users in Seattle. I am in Tacoma and if you can't find anyone you could drive down and test it out here. I have quite a few Atari computers from the 400 up to the 130XE. The power bricks between the 600XL/800XL/65XE/130XE are the same btw. I have had a few go bad too and usually got a black screen.

 

As far as hooking up Ataris to Macs, you could try SIO2OSX, haven't tried the Mac version, but the PC version works fine.

Edited August 19, 2007 by tjlazer