exxos's Atari, Amiga & retro forum

@Badwolf actually noticed at CL4 yesterday that the DFB1X was "slanted" when plugged into the motherboard.

Turns out that for some bizarre reason the headers on the motherboards are actually different heights if you look at the actual black plastic parts..


The header pins themselves are actually the same length. So you can't exactly add a spacer to even it out because the frontside pins would end up being like 2mm "shorter" and may not contact as well in the header sockets.


The slant in some respects looks quite extreme...


But when the CT60e is inserted, its almost nothing really.


The CT60e sockets look the same height anyway.


The Falcon RAM socket seems to be the same as well.

I thought I would document this because I hadn't actually noticed it before. My board is a REV C/D and I have @JezC's REV A , which is the same as well. So I don't know if all falcons are like that.. I assume so...

On the shorter side, I got a row of header-pins, pulled the pins out and kept the plastic part (with holes in) I then pushed that onto the short pin header, effectively making the base higher.

I realise you say it isn't ideal since it shortens the pins, but in my experience it's been fine for years on my ct60e.

Is the slant from rear to front? If so perhaps it was done like this so upgrades didn't foul with the keyboard?

If not, because they make pin headers like this then perhaps they made pin sockets the same way? Have a look at an authentic Atari RAM card to see if it has different height connector on each side (so as to sit level when inserted)

alexh wrote: 13 Oct 2025 11:31 Is the slant from rear to front? If so perhaps it was done like this so upgrades didn't foul with the keyboard?

We assume so..

Though it wouldn't really give much more clearance anyway as the slant is so slight. Unless there was some Atari card which was pushed for every mm.. But can't say I ever even saw any Atari made cards.

I'm pretty sure my Atari 4MB card is equal height and therefore you get a slant.

My guess when I first saw it the board I'm repairing currently was for keyboard clearance. 'My' Falcon doesn't have the slant which is why I was originally unsure if replacement headers had been added.

It feels like the older the board the more likely they are to be of differing heights.

BW