Atari 7800 help/diagnosis to rescue 1/2 machines

[oky2000]

I have two 7800 consoles, with completely different problems.

 

OK I think I remember breaking one myself 10 years ago trying to clean up the RF output on the built in Asteroids game by over adjusting a pot (give me a break I this was 2 decades ago and I was an inquisitive kid ) so won't produce any kind of display.

 

The other one which was working fine last time I used it now just powers on to a solid black screen with no sound.

 

The power light comes on with both and the carts work fine on my 2600 so the carts are fine too.

 

Any ideas?

[Curt Vendel]

First thing -

 

Try inserting/removing the carts from the 7800 cart slot 5-10 times to clean the contact surfaces, see if that helps, otherwise you'll need to alcohol swabs and you'll need to carefully go across the cartridge contacts and clean them. Also look into the cartridge slot, the later 7800's used a thinner and cheaper connector and the metal contact fingers would sometimes get pushed in too far and wont make good contact with the carts, in that scenario, you may be better off desoldering the cart connector and replacing it.

 

Use a volt meter and check you power supplies, make sure you're getting 9v's @ 1a from them. Lastly, if by chance you have any IC's on the motherboard that are socketed, remove and reseat them. Those are the quick fixes, try those first.

 

 

 

Curt

 

I have two 7800 consoles, with completely different problems.

 

OK I think I remember breaking one myself 10 years ago trying to clean up the RF output on the built in Asteroids game by over adjusting a pot (give me a break I this was 2 decades ago and I was an inquisitive kid ) so won't produce any kind of display.

 

The other one which was working fine last time I used it now just powers on to a solid black screen with no sound.

 

The power light comes on with both and the carts work fine on my 2600 so the carts are fine too.

 

Any ideas?

[oky2000]

First thing -

 

Try inserting/removing the carts from the 7800 cart slot 5-10 times to clean the contact surfaces, see if that helps, otherwise you'll need to alcohol swabs and you'll need to carefully go across the cartridge contacts and clean them. Also look into the cartridge slot, the later 7800's used a thinner and cheaper connector and the metal contact fingers would sometimes get pushed in too far and wont make good contact with the carts, in that scenario, you may be better off desoldering the cart connector and replacing it.

 

Use a volt meter and check you power supplies, make sure you're getting 9v's @ 1a from them. Lastly, if by chance you have any IC's on the motherboard that are socketed, remove and reseat them. Those are the quick fixes, try those first.

 

 

 

Curt

 

I have two 7800 consoles, with completely different problems.

 

OK I think I remember breaking one myself 10 years ago trying to clean up the RF output on the built in Asteroids game by over adjusting a pot (give me a break I this was 2 decades ago and I was an inquisitive kid ) so won't produce any kind of display.

 

The other one which was working fine last time I used it now just powers on to a solid black screen with no sound.

 

The power light comes on with both and the carts work fine on my 2600 so the carts are fine too.

 

Any ideas?

 

Thanks I'll try cleaning the contacts, it has been over a year since it was powered on. Hopefully that will do it or maybe a simple swap of some ICs from the machine with the faulty video output.