What to do with broken Colecovisions?

[+DamonicFury]

I've had simply the worst luck with Colecovision consoles. I have 4 of these things now that don't work. One just broke on me today after several hours of playing fine. Most of them just have the black screen of death. I've had no luck repairing these things beyond the power switch fix... I've ruined a couple motherboards attempting to replace RAM and VDP chips and I'm done trying. What an aggravatingly poorly built console! So what do I do with these things? Just sell them for parts, I guess. Argh.

[+DamonicFury]

Some good news on the one that just crapped out... Seems to be the power supply not the system. Works fine with a different supply... Whew! Original supply seems to be putting out the correct voltages, but just doesn't work with the CV. Weird. Oh well , at least the system is fine.

[+cmart604]

Send them to Yurkie.

[dashv]

Regarding the ones with toasted motherboards. Are the cases still good?

[metzger130]

I have 1 that doesn't work either. I'm going to keep it for when the new board comes out, or hopefully comes out so that I have a case for it.

[Pixelboy]

I have 1 that doesn't work either. I'm going to keep it for when the new board comes out, or hopefully comes out so that I have a case for it.

Yeah, here's hoping that 5-11under eventually finishes his CV replacement motherboard project.

[+DamonicFury]

Regarding the ones with toasted motherboards. Are the cases still good?

Yeah, the cases are basically fine.

[NIAD]

Depending on what your finances dictate and what exactly was damaged in your attempts at repair, I would send at least one of the systems to Yurkie for repairs and a complete refurb. The numerous mods that Yurkie provides should not be overlooked (especially the modern power supply mod and A/V mod) and if you decide to have some or all of these mods performed, you will have yourself a very reliable system for your gaming pleasure and then a backup with the working original system... which you could consider selling to recoup some money spent using Yurkie's services.

 

As far as any other defective systems you still have, selling them "AS IS - FOR PARTS" could recoup some more money or you could even hold onto one of them for when 5-11 releases his replacement CV board.

[+DamonicFury]

Depending on what your finances dictate and what exactly was damaged in your attempts at repair, I would send at least one of the systems to Yurkie for repairs and a complete refurb. The numerous mods that Yurkie provides should not be overlooked (especially the modern power supply mod and A/V mod) and if you decide to have some or all of these mods performed, you will have yourself a very reliable system for your gaming pleasure and then a backup with the working original system... which you could consider selling to recoup some money spent using Yurkie's services.

 

As far as any other defective systems you still have, selling them "AS IS - FOR PARTS" could recoup some more money or you could even hold onto one of them for when 5-11 releases his replacement CV board.

Thanks NIAD for the solid advice! Will definitely consider sending a broken (but not hacked up) CV to Yurkie once he has parts available for the power mod. And I can hold onto the cases until 5-11's exciting new board is available. That should just leave a couple of damaged boards and power supplies to send to the electronics recycler.

[retroillucid]

In any case, don't trow the board away , or send it to me

I would recycle chips on it

[Rik]

Geez, I guess I've been pretty damn lucky. ALL CV's I've found at flea markets and thrifts have worked great, controllers too, all 6 of them. The only thing I've found to be faulty are the power supplies, and the sometimes temperamental power switch easily fixed with a cleaning and lube job. I know a gaming store that has a stack of about 20 non working CV's in the back store room, I couldn't believe it when I saw them all! He said they were planning on fixing and selling them, I didn't check back on if they did or not. The CV's they did sell were sold for about $50.00 each.

Edited October 7, 2014 by Rik

[freewheel]

My only broken CV has been one with the I/O chips fried. Controllers no worky. Annoying as it's a decent desolder/solder job, not just a simple cleanup. Hell I'd rather have a dead power supply because contrary to people's experiences here, I seem to find spares from time to time. At least those are user-replaceable.

[shadow460]

Mine had power supply problems until I hardwired the thing. Getting the Roller Controller to work will be a small project. Other than that and the occasional glitch from the Expansion Module 1, it fires up the first time every time.

[Kamshaft]

The controller chips are easy to fix, the ram on the other hand not so much. Lol

[pseudo_intellectual]

I recently had a ColecoVision which only produced a black screen. It wasn't due to the VDP DRAM, as many mention on here, but rather the SRAM used by the CPU. I wonder how common a failure that is.