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Need Help Repairing Vic 20

yoshi3322

New Member
Joined
Nov 16, 2006
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2
I don't know if this is the right section but it looks like it is, if I have posted in the wrong board it is unintentional.

Ok. So the problem I have is this, I have a vic, it powers on, it shows the cbm basic v2 bla blah then the ready message. The problem, no cursor shows up, and when I try typing nothing happens. I was thinkng maybe there is a problem with one of the chips that contols the input. I have tried putting in game cartriges, and they work fine with a jojstick. I have also tried plugging in a datasette drive and pressing play to see if it works, but it doesn't. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
I would say "open her up and check all the cables. Make sure the chips in sockets are in the socket well." Most of my computers have these very thin flat cables for the keyboard and other board connections. These frequently get pulled half way out so they are not making contact anymore. Most of the chips have tin leads on them. These get a layer of oxidation on them and stop conducting. I'll get out my trusty #2 pencil with an eraser on the end and use the eraser to clean the dark oxide off the pins and/or connections. Obviously, don't overdo it. (I did on one ribbon cable and found out that the contacts were just plastic with some metal film on them, the eraser treatment managed to destroy the metal film. End of that cable :( )
 
Since the cursor doesn't blink, the fault is something more than disconnected keyboard cable. Perhaps it is one of the two VIA chips that is bad, if joystick controlled cartridge games work, but not the other. Or the error might be on a finer level.

Ray Carlsen has a document on faults and how to fix them:
http://personalpages.tds.net/~rcarlsen/cbm/vic20.txt

You might want to ask in other places as well, if nobody here can help you. I'm good with VIC software, but not so good with hardware.
 
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