How to find out if Famicom is broken?

[The Great Famicom]

Dear Faminauts,

I recently discovered my old Family Computer (bottom says: GA-6000 1989) in my parent's cellar. I immediately freaked out. Now (since I have calmed down a little) I'd like to play. But I can't find the power adaptor. So I just bought one but I don't know if the adaptor works or if my famicom is broken.

Here's the trick: It is basically a Famicon that was sold in Germany so it used to work with a Power Adaptor for Germany (I suppose). The bottom of the Famicom also states: "Computer Game Power 4W AC Adaptor".

I showed the Famicom to some dude in an electronics store and he sold me the following "Amigo AC Adaptor" with:
input: 230V~50Hz 70mA
output: 9V~800mA 7.2VA

Since there was no light indicating its status, we couldn't check in the store if it works or not.

So obviously I tried it at home but:
attached to my LCD-TV I can only see weird black and white bars running from left to right, blinking and doing all sorts of things.
attached to my oldschool Television set I don't see anything but I hear some deep humming noise.

Now it's time for you: can you identify my problem? did I buy the proper adaptor? can the thing be ruined after spending 15 years in my parents cellar (not too moist but hey, it's a cellar!)

I'd love to hear from you, thanks very much in advance.

[untinip]

Is this an official Famicom or a Famiclone?

Sounds like the guy sold you an AC-adapter, which is what the NES-uses, but the Famicom uses a DC-adapter (with the center pole being negative, unlike most other DC-adapters). If you've used an AC-adapter on your Famicom then that may have damaged it. If you're really lucky, nothing has broken, but if you're not so lucky then maybe you've just blown a fuse, or if you're really unlucky, broken something else (perhaps the voltage regulator).

A Famiclone, on the other hand, may have other power requirements. Could you post a picture of your console?

[The Great Famicom]

Alright, this was quick! Thanks!

So I assumed it was a Famicom but see for yourself, I attached pictures.
The reason I bought and tried the AC adaptor was because it says so on the bottom of the device.

Thanks!

[Frank_fjs]

Well the good news is that it appears to be an AC console, so polarity won't matter. In Australia our NES and SNES consoles also came with an AC adapter.

To take a guess, I'd be looking at the RF cable. Try tuning in on an older TV, and when it appears that something may be happening wiggle the cord a little. It's not uncommon for these cables to crumple or break at the connections.

[famifan]

it is a famiclone.

[The Great Famicom]

Hm, so I'm not sure about this clone thing, but it doesn't matter to me.

What I did was I changed the cable, wiggled about a bit and then I found out that
the deep noise seems to have something to do with the ac adaptor. When I toucht the ac-cable, it sometimes stops making that noise.
Either way, there is no picture on the old TV.

Any more guesses?

[untinip]

How do you connect your console to your TV? Are you using the RF-cable or are you using a composite cable? This may seem like a silly question, but if you're using the RF-cable; are you sure you've tuned your TV to the right channel?

[The Great Famicom]

Well so far I only tried the composite cable and I did indeed switch to the correct channel.
But maybe this rf thing is a good idea. I just googled rf-cable and found out that it is the classic old-school cable to connect an antenna to a tv set. The rf exit at the back of the famicom just looks like a regular composite exit. I can't attach what I think is a rf-cable to it. But a composite cable can be attached easily to the rf exit. Why is that? I'm confused here.

Thanks

[untinip]

I'll need an RF-adapter for that, something like this one:
http://images6.images-speurders.nl/images/22/2276/22761376_1.jpg

But composite gives a better picture anyway, so I'd go with that anyway. You're not connecting the composite cable to your console's RF-jack, are you? That won't work (but I don't think it would damage it either, so don't worry if you've already done it). Do you have composite output from your console? If so, then you should have one or two audio jacks as well. You could always hook those up to your stereo or headphones (with a suitable adapter), and if you hear music playing when you turn on your console (assuming you have a game to test it with) then you know it's working.

[The Great Famicom]

OK, so one of these adapters would be handy, but since I have the composite jacks and those don't work, I have to assume the console is broken. If I hook an audio cable to the audio jack of the famicom and try to listen to sound only, I again can only hear this deep humming/buzzing sound. When I turn the famicom off, the sound is gone.

Another thing: my tv sort of tells me when it receives a signal. When attached to the famicom (via composite) it says nothing, when I turn the famicom off, the TV says "no signal". So apparrently, the famicom sends some sort of signal but I can't see anything. The screen remains black.

Perhaps I should open the console somehow and, well, have a look inside? Can laypeople detect faulty parts or can I clean something?

Thanks again.

[untinip]

From your description it sounds like you've hooked up your console correctly. I'm guessing either your console's and/or game's pins are dirty and don't make contact (try cleaning them!), or you have a faulty AC-adapter (do you have anything else you could test the console with?) and if nothing else works then maybe your console is dead. You could try and open it; if you find nothing that's obviously broken then you could always post a few pictures here and let us take a look!

[The Great Famicom]

The AC-adapter can indeed be the problem and I'll try to get another one. Ehich one should I try? This one has 9v and 800mA, I know that there were models in the shop which had 12v. The only information that's on the console says 4w and I have no idea how to calculate these things. Then there is the AC-business. Most numbers I could find on the net are related to DC-adapters. Can I use the same V, mA and so on for both DC and AC?

If the adapter is not the problem, I'm gonna open the famicom but knowing me this will probably be it's end.

Thanks anyways, I'm quite surprised that there is such an active community for a 1983 games console. But then, there are also fans of the comodore c64 and so on so I guess there is a community for almost everything.

Thanks,Bye.

[ericj]

I'd try an adapter that outputs 10V DC, 850mA, center-negative polarity. Most consoles use this adapter.

If you hooked up an AC output adapter, you would have most likely had a small smoke show from your console. Any chance you could post a pic of the label on the AC adapter you used?

[The Great Famicom]

Since the label on my console says AC I doubt that a DC adapter would be of any use. (See pictures above.)
Here is a picture of the AC adapter I tried.

[The Great Famicom]

Let me try a different adapter first.
But what's the basis for you saying it's a clone? There was this red label on the front but I probably removed it, when I was a kid. The package looks pretty similar to me. And I had this adapter for the original NES games which worked perfectly fine.

But then I'm not an expert...