exxos's Atari, Amiga & retro forum

stephen_usher wrote: 21 May 2022 11:00 I'm surprised that the output from your modulator is poor as the one which came with the TI99/4A I generated a pretty good picture on the telly:



IMG_2619.jpg


I also notice that the power supply brick you have is HUGE relative to the one I had. Still, yours is a later model, maybe that's why.

Wow, very nice picture there. Might be my TV, you never know.

alexh wrote: 21 May 2022 12:50 Looking forward to seeing the Acorn A5000 repair thread.

The most knowledgeable person for repairing A5000's (that I know of) is Ian Jeffray over at stardot.org.uk. He's fixed 10s of them since I started looking into it. If you get stuck he can help with suggestions, even sell you a PostBox, a device which connects to the A5000 serial port and interprets the messages sent via RiscOS boot process. Help narrow in on what is wrong.

I myself have an Acorn A5000 Alpha (33MHz) sitting on my desk waiting to be repaired.

https://stardot.org.uk/forums/viewtopic ... 16&t=22332

Funnily enough I have briefly spoken to Ian over at Stardot, he was very helpful.

I'm going to assess the damage first, there are definitely broken traces due to corrosion, and the IC55 PLCC socket is done for, so there may be more damage underneath, I'm working on removing it at the moment, but it's slow going.

The PostBox sounds interesting as I was wondering if it had anything like that going on like the ST. We'll see once I get to the point of trying to boot again when the repairs are done.

Ian pointed me at the schematics so I should be able to figure out what's broken, but I can say for sure the RTC area is not a happy place!!

stephen_usher wrote: 21 May 2022 11:00 I'm surprised that the output from your modulator is poor as the one which came with the TI99/4A I generated a pretty good picture on the telly:

Well the component video cable arrived for the TI99/4a today, and wow what a difference!!


The picture has to rank amongst the best of standard video from machines of that era, it's really quite impressive!!

This is going to HMDI via my OSSC component input, which is input 2 and also includes sound through the OSSC too. I need to do some tweaking as it's a little washed out, but I am seeing this through not just the OSSC but the Retrotink too, though overall, it's very nice.

Arrived today:


SD card solution for my Dragon32.

Should take my mind off the A5000 for a bit :)

rubber_jonnie wrote: 27 May 2022 13:22 Arrived today:

SD card solution for my Dragon32.

Should take my mind off the A5000 for a bit :)

Ooo. Let me know how you get on with that CoCoSDC.

Icky wrote: 27 May 2022 19:51
Ooo. Let me know how you get on with that CoCoSDC.

Well, first look is encouraging.

Loading disks is easy, there are 2 slots and the command structure is very DOS like, plus there are ROM banks you can write to as well. For the price (Compared to some other similar items) I think it's good value.

I've not properly run anything off it, but have tested loading images to drives and it all seems pretty good. I believe it supports multi disk if you configure the files in a specific way and there is a disk swap button.

I've attached the startup instructions so you can have a look at the commands for yourself, be aware that for the Dragon you need to use the SDRIVE command not DRIVE as it says.

If you are going to use on a CoCo, there is a small mod you might need to do to the computer, and it has some jumper config to do for the cartridge, though I bought from this guy on ebay: https://www.8bit-tronics.com/ and he asked what my use case was and set it up prior to posting to me.

Thanks for the info @rubber_jonnie thats you got me buying more stuff :P

Icky wrote: 27 May 2022 23:40 Thanks for the info @rubber_jonnie thats you got me buying more stuff :P

Not sure if you have a TI99/4a, but the same guy does FinalGROM 99 cartridges too, £47 :)

Not in stock right now but soon.

rubber_jonnie wrote: 27 May 2022 23:52 Not sure if you have a TI99/4a, but the same guy does FinalGROM 99 cartridges too, £47 :)

Not in stock right now but soon.

Thanks. No TI99/4a but it’s on my list. The Enterprise was my holy grail. Which is now completed.

Icky wrote: 28 May 2022 09:22

rubber_jonnie wrote: 27 May 2022 23:52 Not sure if you have a TI99/4a, but the same guy does FinalGROM 99 cartridges too, £47 :)

Not in stock right now but soon.

Thanks. No TI99/4a but it’s on my list. The Enterprise was my holy grail. Which is now completed.

Yeah, kind of a grail machine for me too the Enterprise, but given prices are silly I'll hang back for now. I want a TRS-80 Model 1 next.