WTB Paperboy PCB

I know, I know. Sadly it looks like my board is beyond saving due to corrosion. Hugely disappointing as the cab has buffed up beautifully.

Sooo; does anyone have a spare (ideally) working Paperboy PCB they might be willing to let go, or leads on one for sale?

Which board has corrosion? Both CPU and Video?

They are stupidly expensive these days. I reckon got to be £400-500 for a working boardset

Edited by Purity - 14 Sep 2021 at 1:29pm

As Ben states is it one or both PCB that have had it?

I think I have one or two which I picked up when I got 720 as the boards are the same.

Purity wrote:

patloz wrote:

As Ben states is it one or both PCB that have had it?

I think I have one or two which I picked up when I got 720 as the boards are the same.

I don't think 720 boards are the same fella

Arent they both System2?

Intrestingly just looked on System16 and they have info on there of a couple of prototypes on the same hardware, Accelerator and Gremlins.

http://system16.com/hardware.php?id=769

It looks from that thread that the CPU boards are the same, although Champ Sprint vs Paperboy needs additional chips e.g. the Speech chip

The video boards are different Champ Sprint/Paperboy Vs 720//APB. 720/APB requires additional eproms space which the Paperboy board does not have

Thanks for all the ideas guys, gives me a shred of hope. I've been after another Paperboy since I sold mine from the Lass O'Gowrie many years back, so when one came up in a raid earlier this year I jumped on it. Cab is all restored, handles rechromed and looking gorgeous. Board, however was another matter.

I sent it to Mark Haisman, who has pretty much declared it beyond economic saving. Gere's what he made of it;

"Ok, I decided to make a start tonight, to strip it down and start cleaning the IC legs. Every ROM I pulled had at least 1 leg that has disintegrated. That’s not a major issue, just an expensive one.

However, the killer is the T-11 is also rusted away, see photo. This is how it came out. I’ve tried to clean what’s left of the legs up, so they can be soldered on to in an attempt to rescue it, but they’ve just disintegrated further.

This CPU is one of the hardest to get hold of. I’ve got no spares. You can sometimes get spares out of the US, but the cost is in excess of £100.00 each, and there’s no guarantee they will work in these boards, as the ones used on these boards are all marked Atari.

I think it is prudent to stop here and call it a day. Even if I did source another CPU, it looks like it’s going to need every ROM, and associated socket replacing. That’s doable, but then there’s the T-11 to replace, and potentially the RAM, POKEYs and anything else that may have succumb to the corrosion. It’s clearly been stored in the damp for a long while.

I'll post pics when I get it back. Ideas welcome!!

Oh I've no doubt Mark is giving a straight read on it. But it does still leave me a Paperboy headache.

Thanks Patrick, let me get some pics up and I'll be welcoming all and any views on the salvageability!

Great tips. I'll be back with photos this week.