Untested, only £10,000, Rare!!

We've all seen the seriously overpriced eBay/Gumtree/Anywhere-that-sells listings for our beloved retro computer and games systems. For some reason people who don't know anything about them, seem to think because it's old that is it rare and worth a fortune. So they'll slap a silly high price on them. Yeah sure there are a few systems out there that are worth something but I'm talking about the usual suspects.

In my experience it's mainly Commodore computers I deal with. 64's and Amiga's to be exact. I've seen 64's that are untested, have the badge missing and only a tape deck in terrible condition for sale for well over £100!

Here's a list of the usual things to look out for that make me suspect somethings not right. Or to quote Bill & Ted:

• “The light comes on so working” - Just because the light is on doesn’t mean anyones home. There could be no video or audio. It doesn’t mean any of the tape, cartridge or joystick ports work either.

• “Showing only the home screen” - Again this doesn’t mean it’s working properly. It doesn’t mean any of the tape or joystick ports work either. The sound could also be faulty.

• “Worked when I put it in the loft 20 years ago” - The capacitors in C64’s don’t like not being used. Extreme temperature differences in storage also aren’t good for them. Expect swollen or leaking capacitors. Powering them up after many, many years can also further damage them.

• “I don’t have the time to test” - But have time to take pics and write a description for eBay. Which takes considerably longer than plugging in a power supply, video cable, tape deck and joystick. Probably something wrong with it the seller doesn’t want to take responsibility for.

• “I don’t have the correct lead” - A very common excuse and again they’ve probably spotted something wrong, so if you buy it and it arrives broke then they can say “I told you I didn’t have the lead to test”. Check their other items and see what else they’re selling.

• “I don’t have an old tv to test” - My 40” Samsung 3D Smart TV can tune in a C64/Amiga by manually tuning in using the £1 aerial cable I got from Poundland.

• “Rare collectors item” - According to the Guinness Book of Records the Commodore 64 is the highest selling home computer of all time with around 17 million sold. These are not rare. Yes people collect them.

Here's a little list of things I bought over the last few months. All of which added up totals just £110.

So you see they're not all worth hundreds of pounds of your hard earned money. Stop these overpriced seller bell-ends and be patient. You WILL find a bargain at a proper price!!!

Commodore 128 RetroBrite and 6581 replacement.

So I bought a Commodore 128 from eBay listed as the same old crap "tested & working". Of course when it turns up at your house, you set it up, and there's a problem. We'll get to that in minute.

The case wasn't too bad but the the keys looked like they were made from cheese!



Motherboard was nice and clean though.



I popped those ugly keys off on the next free day I had and give them a good clean and then a two day soak in some H202 that I got from eBay.



Couple of days in the sun from 7:00 to around 17:00 each day, giving the tub a shake every hour or so and this is the result I end up with :)



They look so good it's now made the case seem more yellow than it actually was! Damn!! I'll have to wait until I get a bigger tub to do that.



Anyway when I got this beast I plugged it in to see how it was I noticed there was no sound. Now I was told that this was working and tested. After bugging the hell out of my friend Paul who knows a shit load about these computers we determined the 6581 was toast. I tested it on pin 14 and 28 with the multimeter and got a reading of 11.97v which meant the right power was going through it so it must be the 6581 right?



After a couple days wait I got hold of a new 6581 from a top bloke on Facebook and swapped it over. Voila! Sound was booming out.!Yay win for me! Removed the RF shield and added heatsinks on the chips that had thermal paste left on them.



Keep an eye on this post for the final RetroBrite stage of the case complete with nice pictures of it all setup and working :)

Update- 27th May:

So I picked up a tub big enough to hold the casing for RetroBrite'ing :) Right now they're having a soak in some water with OxyClean in it to remove all the stains & dirt.



As you can see from the gallery above I've given it a clean ... then a soak in H202 (about 9hrs) then give it a good rinse with clean water and let it thoroughly dry before attempting to screw it back together.

The result is awesome but for now you'll have to wait as I have a new badge on order. Once that's here I will update the post with a "final result" picture!

Update: 3/6/16

The badge arrived today and that was all I needed to finish off my 128! She now looks beautiful! Click the image for a bigger version!

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