Ramblings (Underdog Chamber)

Well, after a mixup with the post office, the video upgrades have finally arrived for the Astrocade (Bally) and the Intellivision I. Finally, I can start working on these two systems. If these thing work as good as I hope they do, I’ll be able to put these two classic consoles onto better TV sets, with a sharper looking game screens. At least, that is the theory. I still have to put in the upgrades, test them, and then modify the consoles for the output jacks. If all goes well, these two systems should be on the ‘at the show’ list in a week or two!

Also, if I like the way these upgrades work, I’ll post pictures here – along with a plug for the place that I bought them from!

As busy as I’ve been working on other projects, I managed to get in a little time early today to go through part of my TV collection. Yeah, you need one of those if you have lots of game systems, especially old systems. My old Arcadia 2001 system was on display last year with a very ancient ADC television, but that one bit the dust late last summer. This system, like many old ones, is finicky in regards to the television it is playing on. So, I decided to try it on my old (but not as old as the ADC) Sharp set, and the Arcadia 2001 worked just fine on the thing! Of course the picture is not as clear as you’d get with video out or S-video, but this is an Arcadia 2001! As far as I know, there are no video modifications for it, and frankly I don’t care. RF is good enough for me with these old game systems.

So, with this test out of the way, the Arcadia 2001 is the 2nd system to be set for my Underdog Chamber ’07 display! Jump Bug will return (a system exclusive) along with other games such as Funky Fish, Astro Invaders, and more. This system doesn’t have the greatest collection of games in town, but some of them are pretty good, and that is fine by me.

Note however that this will probably be the last year I display the old Arcadia 2001, at least for a while. I don’t plan on showing the same stuff every year. Even this year some things are getting moved in while others are being moved out from last year.

As for those video mods I’ve been waiting for, looks like they got lost in the mail! New sets should be sent out soon, and I hope to start work on the Astrocade (Bally) and Intellivision soon. I’m also waiting to see when my G7400 arrives in Europe (hopefully soon) so it can be worked on by a friend of mine. I still need to get some serious work done on the Mac LAN too, but that will have to wait until early next week. Till then…

Jump Bug – on the Arcadia 2001

I’ve got to admit that I have been working on other things. The video mods I ordered got lost in the mail, so I’m waiting for replacements. I have not tested a thing since the last post. Lots of work to do, but other things to do as well (its called a Life). That is all I’ve got for this post. Hope that this thing gets rolling by the next time I stop by here, as June is approaching fast!

In the midst of doing some other work for Digital Press (yes, I’m doing some volunteer stuff for them), I finally got around to taking a look at the special software that Ted ‘Foolery’ Szczypiorski sent me about a week or so ago. As was expected, the software worked like a charge, and is just amazing to watch. What is it? Well, I can say that it runs on a Timex/Sinclair 1500, and is rather amazing that it runs as fast as it does on an old 1Khz computer with 16K of Ram! I’ve got the pictures of it below here, but I won’t show what the software actually does until the show. That is just the way it is going to be. I expect it to be a fairly popular display in the Underdog Chamber, as it was last year. I’ll be putting up last year’s extended version from time-to-time as well, along with a few really good games for the old Sinclair as well.

At this point, it is just nice to finalize a system for the show. Now if those video Mods would just show up in the mail for the Atari and Intellivision systems…

T/S 1500 loading the mysterious software – a close up of the T/S 1500

I’ll admit that I have not gotten much done in regards to MGC 07 in the last week.

Things waiting for me…

1 – T/S 1500 software sent to me by Ted Foolery.
2 – Actually test Quake on a LAN.
3 – Got the part today for iMac I got a few weeks past (need to finally fix that thing)
3 – Lots more

For now, I am sending out my G7400 (Odyssey3) over seas to have some work done on it by my friend René van den Enden. This videopac/Odyssey guru is going to put a Voice module inside the G7400, plus also do the Video Mod on it. I can’t wait to have a G7400 with a Voice module built into the unit.

That’s it for now… hopefully will get more done next week, as I have some other things I really need to get done this week.