This one came of for a bargain price on one of the Facebook groups so I coulnd’t resist adding another Amstrad to the collection. I already have a CPC M4 board for this computer to allow loading software from SD Card and over Wi-Fi. Will definately be setting this one up and experimenting a bit more with the features the M4 has to offer as I’ve not really done much with it so far.
I recently purchased a cheap Atari 800XL which was listed as not working. I’ve been trying to find some broken computers as fixing them up and learning about how they work has started to become a big part of this hobby for me.
So when I plugged in the computer and it sprang into life, I was pretty dissapointed. At this time it seemed like the only fault was a loose connection on the power LED.
However, the 800XL has a built in system test mode, and when I ran this it looked a bit odd. All the memory passed the memory test, but there wasn’t enough of it showing. This issue was confirmed when I tried to run a game on the system and it just crashed.
I looked at the system using my thermal camera and couldn’t see any obvious faults with the memory.
I had some spare RAM chips, so decided the next course of action would be to fit some sockets and start swapping the RAM chips around. I decided to fit the sockets one chip at a time and then test swapping the RAM as I go.
As luck would have it, after swapping the first chip, things started to look correct on the system test, and games now loaded without issue.
So, as repairs go, this was a pretty easy one and not the most exciting I have dealt with. But is was nice to pick up a bargain computer and return back to its working state.
My next task will be to give it a bit of a clean up and see what this system has to offer. I have a couple of other 8bit Atari’s but it isn’t really a platform I have spent too much time playing with yet. This is something I need to change.
One of the computers I have setup on my new desk is the Yamaha CX5M MSX Computer. The only issue with that is the UK version of this machine only outputs a composite video signal and that is going to look terrible on an LCD monitor.
After looking around the internet for bit, I came across the TMS RGB V2 mod from videogameperfection.com. This device works on many different systems that use the TMS9928A and TMS9929A chips, such as the MSX.
The fitment of the device is pretty simple, you just place it over the pins of the TMS chip on the underside of the PCB, and then solder the holes that have the metal ring around them.
Once that was done I routed the wires to the back of the case where I made a small cutout and fitted a mini DIN connector to output the new RGB video signal.
I then made up a quick mini DIN to scart cable and re-assembled everything. After connecting it to my Open Source Scan Convertor (OSSC), I was greated by a beautiful sharp RGB image being output to my LCD Screen.
I think I am going to be much happier now, exploring the MSX software library with a nice sharp picture. All in all, a good afternoons work 🙂
Recently a BBC Master was listed on one of the Facebook Groups I am on. It was listed as not working for £75 so I decided to grab it and try and revive it.
My assumption was that the issue was going to be the Rifa caps in the power supply.
So after waiting for Royal Mail to take a week to deliver a 24hr parcel, it finally arrived.
First of all I opened it up to see what we were dealing with. I was not surprised at all to discover the Rifa capacitors had indeed let go.
Luckily I had already ordered some replacements so a few minutes later, I had the old ones out of the board.
All of the other capacitors in the PSU looked fine so for now at least, I have only replaced the main culprits.
Upon putting everything back together, the BBC got powered back up and it sprang into life. Since the CMOS battery was also dead, I had to reset the settings and replace the batteries.
I really want to set this up somewhere where I can use it easily. So I think I’m going to look into getting an additional desk for my retro room. Hopefully I can setup some Acorn and Amstrad computers as I don’t have any out currently.
After moving house, one of my first tasks was to sort out my new retro room. I have really enjoyed getting it all sorted, but for a while now I kept having one thought which I didn’t want to know the answer to, where the hell is my FunKey S!!!!
All of my handhelds were neatly packed and bubble wrapped into a single box so nothing got misplaced during transport. However, the FunKey S is the size of a biscuit and weighs next to nothing. After searching high and low for the thing, it was finally time to come to the conclusion that it got thrown away with the box filled with the remaining bubble wrap😭
So let that be a lesson to everyone, when you move house, create a list of what you put in the boxes, and tick them off when you unpack them!
Anyway, I am not one to edit my website and simply remove an item from my collection, so instead, here it is, my new FunKey S! This time I got the transparent version so at least it’s slightly different to my previous one.
When I first started building my mini pinball cabinet, it was designed to be powered by the Steamdeck. This was mainly because I didn’t have a spare PC kicking around that could do the job.
The Steamdeck has being doing the job, but it had one issue, the loading times! Because the pinball software runs on Windows, I was booting Windows on the Steamdeck from Micro SD. Yes, I could have installed Windows on the Internal storage, but I didn’t want to mess around with dual booting and I wanted to actually use the steam deck for its intended purpose with Steam OS.
I decided I needed a dedicated machine to run the cab moving forwards, but I didn’t want something that was going to take up a load of space. So after looking around at various Mini PCs I decided to give the AceMagician AMR5 a go. This little PC runs an AMD 5800U processor with integrated GPU which I figured should do the job for my little 1080p cabinet. It also has a 512gb SSD and 16gb of RAM.
The PC has a USB-C port on the front so the cable that used to plug into the Steamdeck now just plugs into this. After running the Baller Installer and doing a few extra tweaks, my cabinet was back up and running, but now with amazing boot/load times.
All I need to do now is finish off the physical appearance of the cabinet and then setup some additional tables to play on.
A while ago I purchased some UV overlays for the Vectrex. These overlays require a UV light source to make them glow. At the time when I purchased them, my 3D printer couldn’t handle the size of the Vectrex screen so I made a frame using multiple 3D printed parts and glued them together.
I was never really happy with the design though so decided now I have larger printers, I would re-visit this project.
I also decided to experiment which switching filament during the print so I could use transparent filament as a diffuser.
This still may not be my final version, but I am pretty happy with how this has turned out for nowadays
After another busy couple of weeks, I finally have my new retro room/workshop in a possition where I can start to enjoy it.
Obviously, a room like this is never truly finished, but at least I can now escape from the real world and have a nice place to relax.
So let’s have a quick tour!
We start off with my workbench area. This is where I will spend my time fixing old computers/consoles and tinkering with developing hardware for old systems. I also have a PC in the corner which I use for creating models for 3D printing.
Next, we move around to the 3D Printer zone. I have a resin printer on the workbench above, but mostly I use the FDM printers. The K1 MAX is my go-to printer, but recently I also purchased a Neptune Max 4 which has a huge build volume. I’m looking to use that for printing a replacement computer case in the near future. I also have a vinyl sign cutter which is very useful for creating logos etc.
Next, we move on to the console area. Everything is now connected up using Wi-Fi smart switches and automatic Scart switches so everything is playable within seconds.
We now go around to my modern gaming PC which I mainly use for VR gaming with the Meta Quest 3. I also have my bookshelf filled with games from various systems.
Next in line is the retro computer setup. I have some of my favourite computers set up here, but can swap them out with other systems when required. The black monitors are 4:3 HDMI monitors off amazon and a couple of them have OSSC Scart converters connected so I can connect any system up via RGB Scart.
And finally, my home-made mini arcade cabinet and my work-in-progress virtual pinball machine.
I will see about doing a video shortly of everything up and running. You get that real arcade vibe once you have multiple systems all blasting out their own game music.
I now have my computer desks in and setup so just thought i’d do a quick post showing what it looks like. Still got some cable management to do and then I need to make a start on cabling up to 20+ consoles on the other side of the room!
I was hoping to get everything finished off this week as I have another week off work. But think this is going to turn into a longer project than originally expected. It took me two hours yesterday just to sort my cables into two piles of power and video cables lol.
Anyway, here it is!
I have just finished my two week break from work, of which much of it was spent doing bits and pieces to the new retro room. Still have a lot to do, but here are a couple of updated pics. More to come in the following weeks 😀
