We all know that Chris is one of the nicest guys on this forum.
He's so nice.....he actually gave me a very very nice present during the last Eurocade in Oldenburg.
It was a very familiar console which most of you will recognize but....in a slightly different version which makes it pretty special for Europe.
It is a Sears Tele-Games Video Arcade. This was a rebranded Atari VCS of course.
The relationship between Atari and Sears began when Atari was trying to sell their home Pong console to various companies, but no one seemed interested. Even at Sears, the electronics departement nor the toy department were interested.....however.......the SPORTS department (!!!!) WERE very enthusiastic about it and placed a really, really large order.
So that was how that started...Sears was probably the big launch that Atari needed for it's home products.
Anyway, naturally, here in Europe we had never heard about Sears, nor this version of the Atari VCS (Note that I am NOT using the 2600 name, the machine was _note_ called the 2600 yet then....).
So I only learned about it's existence much much later, only when the internet bloomed and there were lots of sites with Atari info I learned about them.
Sears sold the console from the very first day. So there were "heavy six switch" Sears machines, there were "light six switch" machines and there was the 4 switch machine. After that, a very special machine came out from Sears: the Video Arcade II. This was actually the Atari 2800, which was the 2600 version Atari tried to sell in Japan (without a lot of success). Sears really liked the design of the 2800 and so they got that one going. That was also the last one.
Now....the one Chris gave me is a light 6 switcher. This is actually more common than the 4 switcher Sears. With Atari machines, that is the other way around.
However this is the first 6 switch "Atari" I had ever seen up-close, let alone own

6 Switch Atari's bring me back to the days that I was walking the same route to my school every day....and there was this home where a 6 switch Atari was standing there on a small table in front of a television. The whole set-up was lined up exactly at a straight angle with the large window of the living room, so you could see it very well, but yet, it was quite a bit down the room....so that it also felt out of reach.....which was what it really was for me at the time. Very much out of reach with a retail price of DFL 599,- it was WAY to expensive.....
The way that that console stood there....unattended by the owners which were probably already out to work seemed like they did it on purpose. To show off. To make young boys like me drool in front of that window.....wasting time staring at it, imagining how it would be to own one of those space-age, hyper hi-tech machines (which they were in those days !!!).....
Only when the 4 switcher had arrived and the price was cut to DFL 450,- my brother (who already worked a bit) wanted to invest the biggest amount in it. I put some money in and my parents too, and man-o-man do I remember that day when we went out to buy it !!!
OK....so back to 2016.
The machine was a bit dirty and Chris said "you receive this unit fully untested of course" which I had to smile about (because Atari products of that era are usually fantastic quality and so usually WORK).
I had to wait a couple of months for a lazy sunday at home so I figured I'd do this gift some justice and hooked it up to my main TV. This is not capable of displaying NTSC signals (of course this is a NTSC machine) but I could see the picture in Black and White (and without sound) when I hooked up the 4-swtich NTSC Atari I had bought a few years ago.
So I dug up my replacement power supply, I opened the machine to replace the antenna cable (the US unit has an RCA plug at the end, we need our usual European style RF connecter), inserted a cartridge, hooked it up and let the TV scan for analogue signals.
Sure enough after a bit of time I was greeted with the attract mode of Demon Attack (my favorite VCS game) !!!!!
Now, I did notice that the power jack was pretty loose, and sure enough the machine powered down- and up when I jiggled the connector. The solderings had become loose so that was an easy fix by renewing the solderings.
Next I totally disassembled the machine to give the shell a good bathing. Also cleaned all switches with some alcohol and the cartridge slot too.
It's easy to see why Atari changed the system to the 4-switch system. The 6-switch system has a pretty complicated set-up and a VERY thick metal shielding. It really reminds me of the Atari 800 machine I have. The 4-switch system went to only one PCB which is of course much cheaper and easier to produce and it went to a much lighter shielding.
Re-assembled the whole thing and now it looks very very nice indeed. The only thing I'd like to resort is that cool silver lining on the edge of the switch bezel (the Atari has a cheap yellow or orange there, HAH

).
Look at that lovely wood-grain front.....doesn't that look MUCH more classy than Atari's ?
Anyway, the next step for this unit will be a video mod done by Mr.Atari, he already modded my NTSC 4-switcher and this has a great picture now.
Now......I really would need to get me a Harmony cartridge to play all those ancient VCS games. I know there's a lot of rubbish on the system.....but there are also plenty of really great ones and.......it will forever be the first REAL video game system we owned....and loved BITD.