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Anyone have any experience with fixing Intellivisions?
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Brandonh1091:
Recently me and my wife made a trip over to her Grandmother's house to help clean out a really old storage building in her back yard. Mostly just a bunch of papers, and a few power tools, but everything inside was pretty much up for grabs.
I immediately scanned the room for any treasure, and lo and behold over in the corner right next to a 19(60 something) Symphonic record player cabinet (which I picked up as well) I saw an Intellivision (Model 01), the voice module, and a stack of games (most of them missing the label). I practically shit my pants from the pure, child-like excitement that shot through me. As we sifted through boxes, I eventually came across a few of the game's original boxes, along with most of the manuals, the control pad inserts, and even the original booklet that came with the system itself. We were nowhere near finished when we stopped, so I can't wait to go back and finish up to see what else I can find.
The console itself looked like crap, but a good cleanings got it looking almost as good as new. I opened it up, cleaned out all the dead insects and cobwebs, and cleaned all the contacts really well.
When I plugged it into the small tv in our bedroom, all I got was a pitch black screen. Usually when I hit the reset button, white blocks appear across the screen for a second. I highly doubt all 5 of the games are the problem, so I'm assuming it's the console. The main thing that worries me is that upon opening up the inside, the metal guard that goes over the circuit board is slightly rusted. The building had a few leaks in the ceiling, so I'm concerned that maybe it may have gotten wet at some point or another. The fact that it actually does power on is the only hope I have to go on right now.
Does anyone have any clue about troubleshooting one of these? I know there are various service manuals, etc. online, but I was hoping that someone around here was experienced in console repair, or if maybe there are some simple things to try before giving up on the console altogether.
juan0tron:
Bought one about a year ago with no games and I still don't know if it works. I know that doesn't help you at all, but I'm interested now, lol.
irvgotti452:
First guess would be the cart slot. Check for any irregularities. Usually a slighty alcohol dampend cloth and a old credit card (or metro card if u live in new york lol)
tiktektak:
I actually owned three systems in my Intellivision career and two of them died on me just from one day on the other. I think that those systems just are built extremly crappy maybe and snap anytime. ;D
Brandonh1091:
Haha, yeah, that's pretty much what I gathered too.
I found a video on youtube of someone completely gutting an Intellivision and explaining what each component was. He mentioned that usually if you're getting just a black screen, it's probably the CPU chip. Not hard to replace at all, but actually finding one is proving to be a pain in the ass.
I really hate to just give up on this one considering that's probably all it is, but aside from buying a broken system for parts, I don't know what to do. Even then, the broken system might have the same burned out processor chip, and then I'd have two busted systems, haha.
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