Cartridge Production

[JetSetIlly]

I have a contact who is looking to produce a small run of 4k cartridges. I've never even thought about how a cartridge is made so I'm unsure what to advise him. What options are there out there?

[alex_79]

Is that person looking for someone offering the service or wants to build the carts him/herself?

If the latter, the traditional way to do it is to use an eprom and an inverter chip. There are some free pcb design for that floating around, such as this one, which was used for AtariAge homebrews. It consists in a 2732 type eprom and a 7404 inverter.
An eprom programmer compatible with the type of eprom used is needed, and an UV eprom eraser too.

Larger eproms are easier to source and cheaper than old 2732 types, so it might be better to find (or design) a board that takes a 28 pin eprom and use a 2764, 27128, 27356 or 27512, by connecting the unused high address pins to a fixed level (+5v or gnd), thus making only 4k accessible by the 2600.

There are surely ways to build a cart using more modern tech (smd components, flash memory chips or microcontrollers), but I think the eprom board is still the easier method for the DIYer who wants to build a small batch of carts.

[JetSetIlly]

That's great information. I might make use of that knowledge myself in the future!

I doubt my contact will want to produce the cartridge themselves however. So I suppose I was asking about what service options do people know about. He's given himself a deadline of the beginning of April so I'm guessing the options are limited.

[Al_Nafuur]

I am using Sikor's injection molded cases for the PlusCart:
https://forums.atariage.com/topic/297172-pluscart-an-inexpensive-diy-wifi-multicart/?do=findComment&comment=4987066

There are a few PCB designs for simple 4K ROMs available on the internet.

AtariAge member vcsrocks has sent me two PCBs he had designed for (E)Eproms which support banking up to 64K (AFAIR) and SARA RAM !

[DrVector]

If your contact is looking for a service to create cartridges, I have created my own 4k, 8k, 16k and 32k. I could produce a small quantity for him, with the binary file already loaded. The plastic cover part I currently print in PLA with the 3D printer, the cardboard box and manuals I cannot make.

[JetSetIlly]

If your contact is looking for a service to create cartridges, I have created my own 4k, 8k, 16k and 32k. I could produce a small quantity for him, with the binary file already loaded. The plastic cover part I currently print in PLA with the 3D printer, the cardboard box and manuals I cannot make.

That would have been perfect. He was looking for a small run of bespoke cartridges for an exhibition.

Unfortunately the moment has long passed but I might ask again if a similar event arises. Thanks for the reply :-)