Intellevision 1- space armada question

[jham55]

So I got my intellevision working but I’m thinking their might be an issue with the controller. I started playing space armada and it just quickly dies in 5 seconds no matter what happens. Anyone experience this?

[walldog1]

18 minutes ago, jham55 said:

I started playing space armada and it just quickly dies in 5 seconds

What dies? The game dies or use of the one controller dies?

 

If controller, switch them and see if problem follow controller or if it stays the same. If it stays the same, good chance Sound IC Chip is bad. Make sure 9 pin Molex connector is connected correctly to Logic Board also.

 

If game dies, could be one of many things, need more detailed info on your diagnosis so far.

[jham55]

No sorry the character in the game. You don’t have time to move even in practice mode. 

[walldog1]

Does not sound like a controller problem.... another IC Chip may be dying or many other causes.

[jham55]

I put baseball in but after the first pitch you cannot do anything. 

[walldog1]

You need to diagnose the problem IC Chip or a power supply issue. Or whatever else is going on.

[mr_me]

What other cartridges do you have to test; any Activision or Atarisoft?

[jham55]

No all intellevision.. should I try something else?

[jham55]

[jham55]

That’s what the screen looks like. I tested all the games in an int2 and they work fine. 

[+-^CrossBow^-]

Yeah that is an IC problem but which one I don't know off hand. I would have to try and use the diagnostic cart to see if it can give any error codes to point to which IC is at fault.

 

[walldog1]

1 hour ago, -^CrossBow^- said:

Yeah that is an IC problem but which one I don't know off hand

There is a thread called "strange characters & symbols in background" from around December 2021 in the Intellivision threads that I started. Picture looks just like this and lots of info in the thread. Problem was eventually solved.

[+-^CrossBow^-]

Is that the one you started that ended up being the GTE chips for the video RAM? Mine had completely different graphic issues on the SVA I had to replace them in for mine.

 

[walldog1]

4 minutes ago, -^CrossBow^- said:

Is that the one you started that ended up being the GTE chips for the video RAM?

I started off replacing the Hi/Low RAM Chips with what you mentioned above. No help. I eventually put in a socket for every IC Chip so I could try different & original IC Chips. I repaired all tracings while IC Chips were out also. I ended up putting all of the soldered to board chip locations original IC Chips back in and it worked. A bad solder joint or tracing was the problem in that case.

 

There still is a lot of good info for diagnostics in that thread. I would recommend reading it "jham55".

[mr_me]

9 hours ago, jham55 said:

No all intellevision.. should I try something else?

Almost all the Mattel Electronics cartridges make heavy use of the exec rom.  If a third party cartridge runs correctly it could suggest a problem with an exec rom.  Rom chips aren't the most likely IC to fail so it's probably something else anyway.