Fairchild Channel F?

That would be amazing, thanks so much! I would greatly appreciate that kind sir.

 

Hello everyone,
I just received a Fairchild F that I purchased off ebay, and I can play the built in games, but none of my carts seem to work.
Any suggestions?

Thank you

 

I'd start basic and clean the pin connector and then open it up and see if the ribbon is connected, etc etc.

Funny thing is..I think you beat me for that very same Fairchild..lol. It came with 3 games if I remember correctly.

 

I think you are correct. It did come with 3 games. Box is in good condition, only a couple of small minor blimishes.
I think I got it for $44. (Sweet!)

I may have found a mint Fairchild in box, on craigslist, but the seller seems a little iffy to me right now.
I have been trying to get her to send me a few extra pics, but have not been able to do so.

I did find and purchase a beautiful working KIM-1 with all white ceramic ICs not displayed here.

[MODERATOR NOTE: PLEASE KEEP TRADES TO THE MARKETPLACE AND WANTS TO THE WTB FORUM - OBSERVING FORUM RULES. THANKS]

 

Thanks, but i'm good, I was just thinking that between the problems with mine and that one, maybe I could make a perfectly functioning one. I may have found the problem, (see above).
So hopefully I can fix it without a "donor system"

I'm just really into the fairchild because it was the first Video game system I ever played (yes, I'm that old..lol). That and the Atari 2600 (already have) are the only first gen systems i'm really into.

Thanks again and good luck with yours!

P.S. I see Conkers Bad Fur Day in the box! Nice find!

 

What??? No Atari PONG's ??? I think the Atari Supper Pong is the first one that I ever played with as a kid, so who is old here?
LOL !!!
I do not think we had anything after that, I joined the Air Force several years after that and was introduced to the Apple II, TRS-80 and the Atari 800 then eventually the Commodore 64. Although I did not own any of them, but I do now... Better late than never... LOL !!!

Surprised you saw the Conkers as it is hiding behind Mario Cart. The N64 reminds me of my kids childhood. Everyone of my kids and me and my wife all have our favorite N64 game, so I have collected one for each of us.

That is why I am collecting both, Computers and Games Systems. Without Games Systems there would be no Computers and without Computers we would still be playing PONG.

In fact the Atari 2600 and the Fairchild F are actually 2nd gen as both have 8bit CPU chips. The Fairchild F being the first one to sport
a proprietary CPU and to use ROM cartridges to play different games. All Computers and Game Systems followed that model for many years after that. So, the Fairchild F is a really important game system in the history of Computers and Game Systems a like.

Three Cheers for the Fairchild F !!!

 

Don't advertise trades outside the Marketplace... which has strict rules on who may post.

Is that a TV or a monitor? Nice to see someone actually using a CRT for old consoles if so... often, LCDs don't like them! (OP - use a CRT to rule out any issues as your first port of call. Old gaming on LCDs is generally not good, anyway.)

 

Sorry, us Retro guys have to stick together. Who else loves these old systems more then we do?

The CRT you are probably looking at is the TRS-80 monitor. No way to get around that one. You have to use this monitor
as it has a 5 pin din connector that connects directly to the TRS-80 keyboard for video. No RF Modulator on this one.

 

Ahh, of course it is! The TRS-80 was extremely scarce in the UK, hence I didn't recognize it. I did think the keyboard text matched that on the monitor, though!

The Channel F, in its original guise, wasn't released here either... so maybe you could shed some light on how well it plays with LCD TVs? Is there something essentially wrong with the way the OP is trying to hook it up, or should that work?

(By the way, let's try and keep this thread on topic re. the repair. Nice collection, but you'd be better off posting it in the collection forum... probably get more attention there, too! )

 

Yeah, I am a noobie here. I have been looking around at some of the other forums, like the Market Place you mentioned earlier.
It seems a little hard to follow, as there are way too many archives. Some one selling something in 2004, is probably not available today. Is there a way to limit searches to one month or just one year?

Anyway back on topic, It seems to work fine on my large flat screen TV, with a simple adaptor. (IYou do have to be on channel 3)
I still have not taken mine apart yet, to find out why my carts are not working, but I will get to that eventually and post it here, for future Fairchild F users.

On a sour note, the Fairchild F was not a very entertaining asystem as far as I can tell at this point, but a better opinion on this would be Ashevent, as he grow up with it. It does have color and it was the first to give us games other then PONG/Hockey although it does have PONG/Hokey as the two free built in games.

 

What made th Fairchild cool was that is used Carts for games..the first system to ever do that, and ..you could pause the game! another first! Plus, the it came out it had the best Pong. It had 4 paddles instead of two and you could actually changed the angle of the paddle..what craziness!..lol. and the tic/tac/toe game actually insulted you and would say "you lose turkey" if you lost. "turkey"..this game had cool 70's slang!

Hey, for 1976 all that was a huge deal. Of course, it never really found traction in the U.S. but as a young child who didn't know any better, My sister and I loved that thing and played it for hours. Admittedly the next year when Atari 2600 came out, the fairchild had no chance. The games were much better and they had a HUGE library in no time.

 

Now I have to get my carts working, so I can play Tic/Tac/Toe. Like I said, the Fairchild F was definitely a game changer.

 

Right now I have carts 1-4 all in the box, (and an additional cart 1,still sealed) with manuals and cart 9 by itself. Since there's a pretty small library, i'm hoping to have them all eventually (26 or 27 if you count the Pac-Mac home-brew). Only 3 of them are pricey from what i've seen so far.

 

Wow !!! Do you remember that I mentioned a craigslist dealer who was selling a near mint Fairchild F? It included 21 games...
with manuals no game cart boxes.
I hope that works out to be a legitimate deal, that would be really sweet !!!
Currently I have 6, 7 and 12 no boxes.

Thanks for the info on what to look for, in regards to fixing my cart problem. I am sure that it will help me get started. I will
keep you posted, once I open it up.

 

Sounds good, and if no else else does first, when you do open it up please take a picture of your board. I'm missing two items (see earlier in this thread) and am trying to figure out what to buy for replacement. There's only 2 of the original 3 schematic pages ever found so far btw.

 

Quick question. How do I remove the keys without damaging them?

 

OK, an easy wiggle and the keys come off. Here are the pics you were looking for. I am surprised that they are not all ceramic ICs

 

OK. I got 2 of the 3 carts to work. The 2 Math quiz games YEAH !!! Of course the Baseball game gives me the green screen of death.
Maybe now I will go out and get the Tic/Tac/Toe game and see what all the hype is about..

 

Well damn, you're board looks a lot different than mine..wtf? They are both Model 1's yet I seem to have a much more complicated set-up.

P.S. The "hype" for Fairchild is only from me..lol. Seriously, I'm the only guy on any forum i've ever seen excited about playing the Fairchild and..mine doesn't work

But that's because i'm the ONLY person i've seen here, Atariage or anywhere that had the original model 1 when it came out and played the hell out of it. Remember, PONG was only released in homes in 1975 so when this came out a year later it blew that away.

 

That is not true at all. I found out that one of the guys on my Commodore 64 forums is tottally into the Fairchaild and has his own website dedicated to it.

http://channelf.se/

I think this guy has you beat... LOL!!!

I still had a problem with the carts, once I put the thin metal shielding back on. It makes it harder to get the ribon cables in
correctly.