Atari 2600 Repairs

[martin oconnor]

I have a 6 switcher 2600 that will only send a black and white signal to the tv. The color/black and white switch still works as the screen goes to negative when its toggled. Anybody any idea what the problem maybe and how to fix it?

[Max-T]

You aren't by any chance trying to use an automatic RF switchbox with your VCS, are you? All 2600 models AFAIK (due to a restriction placed on Atari by the FCC) put out a rather weak signal, which is not of sufficient strength to properly trigger the auto-switching RF boxes (the kind that came with NES, SNES and Genesis systems).

 

It's easy to tell which kind you're using -- the manual switchbox, which you should be using, has a slider to switch between game and TV input. The auto-switches don't have a manual switch on them. The easiest thing to do if you use a separate TV for gaming than cable TV (or if you have your cable/satellite/HDTV tuner hooked up through composite/S-Video/component connections instead of the RF inpute) is to buy a little adaptor from Radio Shack that accepts a male RCA input and terminates in a male coax jack. YOu just plug your Atari game cable into one end, screw the other end onto the CATV input of your TV, and then you don't have to worry about a switch at all. This adaptor will generally give you a better picture too, since it doesn't have internal contacts and wiring that can leak signal. It's what I use, since I use a separate, smaller TV for gaming, and it only costs like $3 or $4 bucks, so it's even cheaper than you could get a replacement Atari manual switch for. Hope this helps -- feel free to send me a PM if you hae any more questions or if this doesn't solve your problem.

[Tsukasa]

I had a 2600 that only played in B&W, it turned out that it had a bad tia chip.

It might be that you are trying to use a pal system on an ntsc tv, that often results in either a rolling picture or lack of color.

[Bruce Tomlin]

You aren't by any chance trying to use an automatic RF switchbox with your VCS, are you?  All 2600 models AFAIK (due to a restriction placed on Atari by the FCC) put out a rather weak signal, which is not of sufficient strength to properly trigger the auto-switching RF boxes (the kind that came with NES, SNES and Genesis systems).

Auto RF switchboxes aren't triggered by a "signal". They have five volts applied to the output, added after a capacitor from the RF modulator (for DC blocking). The RF is simply mixed into the wire on top of the DC power. Which is why you shouldn't use an old manual switch with a modern system.