I went to buy a Commodore Vic 20 also for only $20 (unknown state) and the seller offered to sell this to me for “whatever.” Currently it has a bad power supply, so I’m in the process of figuring that out.
Did anyone else have a teacher that would tell everyone not to power off their computers and then flip off the breaker to the computer lab? Speaking of bad power supplies…
I used to run the tech for a middle school and had to cover/sub for a lot of classes one year, which also was the same year we were getting deployed new equipment. Anytime I subbed in one of the computer labs, this is exactly what I’d do. It felt so deliciously naughty.
It’ll be the caps. Best of luck! Even for the other parts it is worth a packet more
Unfortunately it has a vintage aftermarket power supply in it. I found a bad transistor so far, the caps seem ok.
Ooh, I’ve blown up some transistors in my time (crack!), but never seen one go bad. But it is quite old!
This one is on the high voltage side it’s an NPN transistor p/n C3679. It’s showing connectivity through the collector and Emitter in both directions meaning it’s bad. I ordered several in case I pop the first one since there could be more bad components. If I can’t fix this one then I really need to get ahold of some kind of PSU that has -5v so that I can test the computer itself before I go spending $50+ on a good factory PSU.
$50 sounds a bargain for the amount of time this may take! Order today, you’ll be booting by the weekend
The keyboard doesn’t seem to be feeling that great either.
