2 x Commodore Amiga 600 Full Recap and Repair.

Commodore Amiga 600 #1:

• Full SMD Capacitors Recap.
• Replaced the joystick port with a missing two pins. The joystick port has been recovered from a pcb (not amiga) for spare parts.

Gallery:

Commodore Amiga 600 #2:

• Full SMD Capacitors Recap.

Gallery:

The ABC 80 (Advanced BASIC Computer 80) was a home computer engineered by the Swedish corporation Dataindustrier AB (DIAB) and manufactured by Luxor in Motala, Sweden in the late 1970s (first model August 1978) and early 1980s. It was based on the Zilog Z80 running at 3 MHz and had 16 KB RAM, expandable to 32 KB, and 16 KB ROM containing a fast semi-compiling BASIC interpreter.

ABC 80 normally used a dedicated (included) tape recorder for program and data storage, but could also be expanded to handle disk drives (and many other peripherals). Some sound effects could be produced by a Texas Instruments SN76477 sound chip which was connected to an 8-bit output port, but there was no way to control the chip’s features in any detail, so sound was limited to 96 fixed sounds. The monitor was a black and white TV set modified for the purpose (an obvious choice since Luxor also made TVs). The computer had excellent I/O response times, something that was discovered when trying to upgrade to personal computers. The solution was to use a microcontroller that communicated with a PC. The main unit had a reset button as well.

ABC 80 was also manufactured on license as BRG ABC80 by Budapesti Rádiótechnikai Gyár in Hungary. It used the same keyboard, but the case was metal instead of plastic.

The ABC 80 was a huge hit in Sweden, and grasped a majority share of the rising personal computer market thanks to its office software in Swedish. Although the ABC 80 fans would defend the ABC 80 by referring to its good BASIC and usable extension bus, it couldn’t defend the home market against the gaming computers with color graphics and better sound that arrived in the early 80s like the Commodore 64, even though a new cheaper version was released that could use an ordinary TV instead of the dedicated video-monitor.

Luxor held on to its office market for a couple of years longer with the ABC 800 series, which had a more extensive BASIC, more memory and a 512×240 ‘high-resolution’ graphics mode, but otherwise similar performance. In 1985 Luxor also tried to compete in the office market against the IBM PC with its ill-fated ABC 1600 and ABC 9000 series UNIX computers, but failed.

Gallery:

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… and the boxes

Software: 

• demo
• software emulation and wav conversion

source: wikipedia

Commodore Amiga 2000 – Black Screen of death

The Battery Acid has corroded some pcb tracks (not visible to the naked eye) connected to the pin of the resistor packs RP900 and to MC68000 and probably other IC.

Gallery before cleaning and repair:

Commodore Amiga 2000 – All that glitters is not gold.

After some work it seems to work but still suffers of some problems.

Present problems:

• All Connectors are rusty and uprooted.
• Boot sequence problems, when boot correctly, there are no problems.

Resolved issues:

• Corroded tracks, i have made 12 bridges*.
• Replaced “deflowered” kickstart socket.
• Replaced not working Kickstart 1.2 ROM.
• Replaced 4 x LM33256 (RAM) shorted.

I need to assess whether or not continuing with the repair…

Big gallery of the repairing:

1234►

Welcome back, Commodore Amiga 2000.

I do it very shortly, i don’t like writing a lot because i don’t  have time to do and i don’t like it.

We are left with the Amiga 2000 that sometime works and sometime not.

Defect/Boot Errorr code was: gray / yellow / green / rainbow / out of sync / purple / white.

When this not happen, the boot works perfectly and i can see theusual “hand”

• To fix the problem of the green screen that indicates problems of the RAM, i had to replace 3 x LM33256 (Total RAM replaced: 7), these ram are not shorted but partially functional and 1 x 74LS244.
• To fix the problem of the yellow screen which created problems with the LATCH, i had to replace a 1 x 74LS373.

I have also replaced the socket of the MC68000 CPU and i have discovered another interruption between the pitche and track and also a lot of corrosion and recovered some connectors of an old Amiga 2000 REV 4 motherboard to give an decent aesthetic look to the repaired motherboard.

Now the Commodore Amiga 2000 works perfectly.

Before and after Gallery:

The Commodore PET 4000 series features Basic 4.0 as a standard feature, along with more memory and a lower price that made them attractive to schools.

Elementary, Middle, and High Schools all over Canada and the United States were filled with these impressive lumbering beasts. Introducing children far and wide to the wonders of BASIC programming. Another lesson taught was the importance of patience, since many schools provided only a tape datasette for loading and saving work.

Like the other models of PET, the 4000 series includes dual datasette ports, though only one is exposed to the outside of the casing. A standard IEEE-488 interface in the back allows the PET to connect to the numerous (and heavy) disk drives and printers being produced by Commodore and other manufacturers.

The PET also has a fully programmable bi-directional parallel interface called the “User” port, which allows the PET to connect and control almost any device one could dream up! The greatest feature, however, is the friendly READY prompt, and the well-laid out keyboard with graphic characters only a keypress away! Pictured here is the PET 4016.

Interestingly, although Commodore provided 8, 16, and 32k versions of their PET 2001 and 3001 series, they had a hard time getting people to purchase higher memory versions as an upgrade. It seemed that people were soldering in their own memory chips onto PET 2001 and 3001 8k and 16k models to upgrade them to 32k. To help prevent this, Commodore sold many PET 4008 and PET 4016 models with the empty memory sockets punched out and destroyed! This encouraged those who wanted more memory to upgrade to the 4032 instead of doing it themselves.

Gallery:

12►

source: zimmers.net

Defect:

• Black screen.

Replaced parts:

• Soldered a 24-pin IC socket.
• Replaced 1 x 901486-07 KERNEL ROM (UE12)

Gallery of the repairing:

A big disappointing this Commodore SX-64 USA purchased for spare parts to fix aesthetically one of my SX-64 PAL.

Why disappointing? because from the photo’s looked in a very bad shape, rust stains, various diseases and not working.

Conversely after removed the shit from the external case, replaced the booring PLA (906114), general cleaning + keyboard / Floppy Drive test and replaced one keyboard lock, the SX-64 is fully working and aesthetically in good condition.

Now i have for myself four SX-64 where the fourth is NTSC/USA, but honestly i was not looking for the USA version.

I am really unlucky :D

Gallery of the cleaning and repairing:

12►

Some new games or tools (Cracked / Trained or Unrealeased) for Commodore 64 have been released from your favorites groups.

Titles:

• Speeding on the A 81 +7
• Speeding on the A 81 + Bonus
• Slime Deluxe +3
• Lazarian +3DGH
• Fire-Drill +H
• Pirati +2DT
• Petaco´5
• Mini-Penetrator +3HT
• Sheepoid – Frozen in Time +4DF
• Sheepoid – Frozen in Time
• Slider Session
• Kill the Bit
• Frogger II – Three Deep +4D
• Castle of Life +3DT
• West +2DT
• It’s Magic 2 +4PI
• Movement Basic
• Shockway Rider +6DGH
• Pothole Percy +3D
• Buttonpress
• Chopper Hunt +3
• Heathcliff +DGMF
• Ring on a String [16kb cartridge]
• Slime Deluxe [16kb cartridge]
• T.H.E.A. [16kb cartridge]
• Alienator [16kb cartridge]
• Vortex Crystals [16kb cartridge]
• Pickle’s Pod Patrol [16kb cartridge]
• Icicle Race [16kb cartridge]
• Platman [16kb cartridge]
• Bug Hunt [16kb cartridge]
• QWAK [16kb cartridge]
• Blap ‘n Bash Revisited [16kb cartridge]
• Platman +4
• Pickle’s Pod Patrol +4H
• Night of the Valkyrie [seuck]
• Ring on a String
• Platman +2H
• Icicle Race +2
• QWAK +3F
• Bug Hunt +1H
• Blap ‘n Bash Revisited +5HD
• Alienator +4HF
• Vortex Crystals +9HD
• T.H.E.A. +2D
• Ring on a String +
• Alone Against the BSE9 +6T

Download: All Games in One Archive (3634)

source: csdb.dk

CBMXfer is a front-end to several command-line utilities for transferring files and working with disk images. CBMXfer makes using those utilities easy by providing a familiar windows interface that removes the need to learn the commandline syntax of each program. CBMXfer also includes a multi-format file and picture viewer.

The commandline utilities are:

• OPENCBM – transfers files/images to/from a real CBM drive connected via an ‘X-cable’ on the parallel port.
• CBMLINK – transfers files/images to/from a real CBM drive connected to a real CBM computer connected to the PC via a serial cable.
• C1541 – a utility from VICE that works with CBM Image Files (ie: D64,D71,D81 files).
• NIBTOOLS – Utilities to transfer images via parallel port. Supports protected disks.
• IMGCOPY – Utility to image IEEE and 1581 disks.

What can I do with it?

• Transfer files to or from real CBM drives
• Create D64 and other images files from real CBM disks
• Write D64 and other files back to real CBM disks
• Transfer files from WITHIN Image Files
• View Commodore files (BASIC, SEQ, Binary, ML, Chr Sets, and Images). Supports all all machine types
• ML viewer is a full two-pass symbolic disassembler!
• Simple file operations like copy, delete, rename
• Launch VICE and attach disk images plus autorun
• Zoom Floppy supported.
• Supports 1581 partitions with OpenCBM
• Format disks
• Supports IEEE drives with Zoom Floppy

Download: CBMXfer v0.41.1 (1196)

source: Steve J. Gray Homepage

Some new games or tools (Cracked / Trained or Unrealeased) for Commodore 64 have been released from your favorites groups.

Titles:

• Shark +2
• Hugohunt +5D
• Slime 100%
• Slime
• Slime +
• Mystic Mansion +3DG
• JANI 2 +2 [seuck]
• JANI 2 [seuck]
• Wizard’s Doom +3D
• Hessian
• Hessian +5
• Kormi a tetőn [hungarian]
• Spaceman Splorf: Planet of Doom +2D
• Spaceman Splorf: Planet of Doom
• V2 Basic Minesweeper Clone
• Snake
• Crackers Revenge +7DGH
• Dress Up!
• Happy Blocks Basic Preview
• Captain Fizz V1 +9
• Dungeon Wizard +DT
• Stack (My Bitch) Up +
• Telengard Remastered V1.1
• Rodland +7DHI
• Beppe Kid +3DEM
• Chobin II +2DES
• Slime Deluxe
• CRX Race
• Avenger +5DG
• Dragon Hunter Preview +3
• Drugs +5HFTD
• Ylcodrom +1FTD
• Space Defence +D
• Encounter +3DIGF

Download: All Games in One Archive (3668)

source: csdb.dk

Commodore A3640 CPU Card 3.2 Upgrade.

I have updated only the GAL (U209) because the GAL (U204) was already replaced.

Gallery of the work:

Commodore Amiga 4000 Replacing Battery Clock with a CR2032.

Gallery of the work:

Download: AmigaWiki GAL/PAL/PLD (1934)

The Amiga 4000 motherboard can be ´hacked´ to handle 64Mb of Fast Memory, to do this, you have to solder a new GAL and make some bridges between FASTRAM SIMM -> GAL -> CHIP RAMSEY.

This work is not complicated but you need to have a good practice with the soldering iron and PLCC soldering.

Gallery of the hack:

Download: Amiga 4000 64Mb Hack (1691)

source: Cosmos Blog John Hertell Blog

Commodore Amiga 4000 updating GAL 16V8 for IDE PIO-2.

After doing this update of the two GAL’s 16V8 from PIO-0 (commodore original) to PIO-2 mode the access of the IDE drives are 25% more faster.

Gallery of the work:

Source & Download: amigawiki.de

List of works that have been made:

• 1 x Commodore Amiga 4000 – Full Recap.
• 3 x 68040 -> 68(EC)060 Adapters – Testing & Fixing.
• 2 x Commodore A3640 – Full Recap and Polarity Fix.
• 1 x Commodore A3640 – Oscillator Socket.
• 1 x Burning Kick 3.1 patched version for 68040 -> 68060 adapters*

* exec.library has been patched to support a full Motorola 68060 CPU with FPU. This patch is not needed for the EC version without FPU.

Gallery of the work done:

Download: Kickstart v3.1 Exec Patch Version for 3k & 4k - Ready to Burn! (1574)

This post is dedicated to all the people that do not remove the damn battery on any hardware, not only Amiga.

It was better don’t make this repair, i knew from the beginning, when you find an acid lake that takes away everything, pad, pcb tracks and some welding is better left alone, however the Amiga 4000 was working perfectly but without the a way to Save or Load the system Date.

I wanted to challenge for the umpteenth time this problem where anything that i make comes off and worsens the situation already dramatic.

Conscious that the final work was a colossal shit, because with exploded pad, broken track and the through holes between layers fucked up you can not do miracles, you can only hope doing your best.

In fact, it works perfectly, but it remains a shitty job, unwatchable.

Moral: REMOVE ALWAYS THE BATTERIES and if the pcb is corroded by the leaked acid clean very well using appropriate products, not with the usual alcohol or a bath with soap, used products like PCC KONTAKT CLEANER or like, scratching well the pcb and also the holes between layers using a needle fine.

Gallery of the repair:

Commodore Amiga 1200 Full Recap.