Funkmaster V Posted October 5 Report Share Posted October 5 I bought a cheap Atari 5200 off of Marketplace last night but it seems like the controllers are 100% dead- nothing seems to be registering. Everything else seems to work. What’s the best plan of action now? Send them in for repairs, try to fix them myself, buy new controllers or try to buy an aftermarket controller? Justin, RickR and DegasElite 3 Quote Visit Atari 7800 Forever online: https://www.atari7800forever.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CrossBow Posted October 5 Report Share Posted October 5 This post was recognized by Justin! "Outstanding Technical Support!" CrossBow was awarded the badge 'Great Support' and 10 points. Well the issue is most likely the internal mylar on them is corroded and not registering any button presses. I think the easiest solution is to buy a set of the new rebuild kits from Atarirepairparts.com and retrofit them in yourself. It isn't too difficult to do. The only part of the process you need to be careful of is when removing the piece of bezel plastic around the top buttons for start,pause,reset. That is now getting to be brittle and it is easy to force it too hard when removing it and causing one of the plastic nubs on the side that holds it in place to break. Heck, I even had one where the plastic on the side on the controller top shell broke off when removing that piece. Aside from that, the rest is pretty simple. The kits are only about $24 for a complete set of new mylar and buttons that are all gold plated to help prevent corrosion build up on the controllers in the future. Atarirepairparts.com RickR, DegasElite, tbs123456 and 3 others 5 1 Quote See what I'm up to over at the Ivory Tower Collections: http://www.youtube.com/ivorytowercollections Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RickR Posted October 5 Report Share Posted October 5 100% agree with @CrossBow. If doing this yourself is not in your wheelhouse, my suggestion is to contact Best Electronics and trade your controllers in for a set of refurbed controllers. That is the easiest way. socrates63, DegasElite and Justin 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CrossBow Posted October 5 Report Share Posted October 5 4 hours ago, RickR said: 100% agree with @CrossBow. If doing this yourself is not in your wheelhouse, my suggestion is to contact Best Electronics and trade your controllers in for a set of refurbed controllers. That is the easiest way. Might be easier overall, but it will cost quite a bit more! Best kits are nearly 2x the cost per controller as the ones on Atari Repair Parts and you still have to cover the shipping of the controllers vs some small parts that fit in a small envelope mailer. I do think that replacing the parts inside the 5200 controller is something @Funkmaster V is able to do so again, I would go with the lowest cost option. I'm also not wild about the fact that Bradley puts hot glue into one of the screw holes with a 'warranty void' sticker over it so you can't get in there to do further repairs afterwards. Might not seem like a big deal, but I've actually had to go in and clean off the mylar and pads from 2 such controllers that Bradley did a few years ago for one of my clients. So the gold helps to prevent corrosion, but it doesn't prevent other debris and stuff from getting inside and still causing some issues in the future. Justin, socrates63, RickR and 1 other 3 1 Quote See what I'm up to over at the Ivory Tower Collections: http://www.youtube.com/ivorytowercollections Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RickR Posted October 5 Report Share Posted October 5 Also of note are the "new" options available, such as the 5200 sticks from RetroGameboyz or Edladdin. Justin, DegasElite and socrates63 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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