Joysticks

What seems to be ages ago, we ran out of the Atari CO20561 / CO20192 Fire button PCB's. Well after hundreds and hundreds of World Wide requests, the Atari CX24/CX22 Fire button PCB's are back in good supply. CO20561/CO20192 Fire button PCB's $2.50 each.

Shown above the CX24 Fire button PCB's, the Atari CX24 Joystick X-Y replacement PCB board CB101239 $2.50 each.

Are you one of those Die Hard Atari users who still Like/Love/Use the first Atari Joystick ever made, the Atari CX40? Shipped and Used with all of the Early Atari Systems made (except the CX5200 Model) and still a Classic Bench Mark Joystick today, some 23 years latter!

Over the years Atari made only 1 Major Change to the Atari CX40 Joystick design. The early Pre 1980 version CX40 Atari Joysticks had a flexible white or black plastic plate over the X / Y PCB board with 4 heavy duty Springs that attached to the Joystick Handle (a True Atari Collector item now a days) on the inside of the Joystick. This version Atari CX40 Joystick was soon replaced with the current version with only the Plastic handle and X / Y PCB board. Over the years Atari Engineering made many minor, almost hidden improvements to the CX40 joystick over the Millions and Millions that were produced.

One of the Best and Last improvements Atari Engineering made to the CX40 Joystick was an Improved Replacement CX40 Inner Handle (CX40 Handle bottom on the Right). As you can see the outer ring with the plastic contact points was Beefed up (Thickened) and Stress Relieving slots with Stress Relieving round edges were designed in, where the Older version CX40 Handles always failed CX40HANDLE.jpg (94287 bytes)

The Pro-Stick Joystick is like a standard CX40 Joystick but with a Red Base/Black Top, Red Joystick boot, Left or Right side dual Red Fire buttons on the base (for Left or Right handed People), Molded Plastic Handle Grip with Top Fire button too and Joystick cable comes out of the center bottom of the Pro-Stick!

Best Electronics Latest and Hottest 33.33X Upgrade to an Atari 23+ Year old Atari CX40 Joystick Internal Design!

Best recently sold out of the Stock Atari made CX40 Joystick internal Printed Circuit Boards (PCB) we acquired from the Local Atari Sunnyvale Warehouses when we bought out the Atari parts division.

Best has been selling this basic replacement Atari CX40 Internal PCB board for some 21+ years now. The basic design and manufacturing techniques used to make this replacement Atari CX40 internal PCB board are based on an Atari original 1979 (contact wires on 2 sides of the PCB board) and the latter 1981 Atari Engineering design (contact wires on the right side) and early PCB board manufacturing techniques of the same era, which have not changed much over all of the different designs and production runs of this CX40 Internal part. The basic Idea, was to make the next production run of this Atari CX40 PCB board a little cheaper each time it was made.

Over the years Atari used several Styles / Shapes of this Internal Atari CX40 PCB board (all of then completely interchangeable on the Second generation Atari CX40 Joystick) with many different styles of metal Dome contact internal switches and different types of plating on the internal Circuit Traces from Tin, Nickel to Copper.

Because of Best Electronics 23+ year experience in the Atari business, we are Very aware of all of the different Failure modes of all of the Atari CX40 Internal Joystick parts. The last major Upgrade Atari Engineering did to the CX40 Joystick was the Upgraded / Beefed up Design Internal white plastic handle. Click on the Best CX40 Button below to read up on this Upgraded Atari CX40 Handle.

This Upgraded Atari CX40 Handle helped fix one of the Known problems with the life expectancy of Atari CX40 Joysticks. But unfortunately the Atari CX40 Internal PCB board 1979/1981 basic design was never upgraded by Atari Engineering until Now!

"Your company name is truly fitting. I installed a set of your gold contact circuit boards in a pair of CX40 joysticks. They're fantastic! These boards are the best thing to happen to the 2600 since the creation of the console itself! I couldn't be happier with my joysticks now. They're better than new! Thanks for making such a great product!" Kevin M. of OH

All of the years Best has been in the Atari parts business, we have seen at least 6 to 8 different Atari CX40 PCB boards made by different Atari parts Manufactures / Suppliers. All of them are known to have different Failure rates and type of Failures.

Just some of the different type of CX40 Internal PCB board failures we have seen over the last 23 years:

One or more of these problems on an Atari CX40 Joystick Internal PCB board would mean a failure of an Atari CX40 Joystick prematurely.

Using the same Engineering attitude (make a State of the Art Upgraded Replacement part using State of the Art Materials, State of the Art Manufacturing Techniques and New Tooling) that Best Electronics used on the 5200 Gold CX52 Joystick Upgrade Project, we knew we could produce an Improved / Upgraded Atari CX40 Internal PCB board. Every 5200 owner who Now owns one of these Best Exclusive Lifetime Gold Upgraded Joysticks will tell you, that the Best CX52 Gold Joystick upgrade Cured the 20+ year problems that have always existed with the Old Atari made CX52 Joysticks.

As part of our initial research for this Best CX40 PCB upgrade board project, we contacted one of our Oldest Quality Atari parts suppliers we have been using for 15+ years now and had them run some Life cycle Tests on the Old Design (1981) Atari CX40 Internal PCB board. In the Industry it is know as Mean Time Between Failures (MTF) or basically how many cycles a part would run before it failed.

"The new PCBs are astonishing. I have no regrets about upgrading to this new PCB. It is superior in every way over the original." Jeff P. of VA

We had our Manufacture run a MTF Test on what Best Electronics considered one of the better 1981 designs of Atari PCB boards (pictured above) we have sold over the years. Their Tests showed that this Atari 1981 designed New replacement CX40 PCB board, only ran about 150,000 cycles before it Failed. The original Atari 1981 Engineering Specification on this version Atari CX40 PCB board, called for minimum MTF of 1,000,000 cycles.

The Best New State of the Art New Upgraded replacement Atari CX40 PCB boards, have New Upgraded Glass Epoxy Stronger PCB board base Material, New 100% Hard Gold Plated Circuit Traces with approximately 55% larger Gold trace contact surface area under the dome contact,

Close up view of the CX40 PCB board Under the CX40 dome Contact fire button area

larger Internal contact surface area on inside of the Gold Plated 4 leg Dome Contacts (4 Leg Dome contacts are Hard Gold Plated on the inside of the dome contact surface area and Stainless Steel base material on the Outside surface) and State of the Art 3M Scotch Brand Hi Performance Clear Polyester film covering with escape air channels around the dome contacts. Our Manufacture conservatively Rates this New State of the Art CX40 Upgraded Best replacement PCB board at 5,000,000 cycles MTF or approximately a 33.33X increase in real world MTF cycles compared to the above 1981 Atari designed CX40 PCB board that was tested.

Essentially the New Best Gold CX40 PCB board should be a lifetime version CX40 Joystick PCB board. The Upgraded Atari CX40 internal handle will fail before this New 2005 Designed State of the Art Best CX40 Gold PCB board.

Over the years Atari used many different style of Dome contacts on the old CX40 PCB boards. Round with top dimple, Round without top dimple, ¾ round / D shape, several different styles of 3 Leg Round Dome Contacts with different top dimples sizes, were just some of the different types of Dome contacts used. Many of these Dome contacts had a Tactical Feed back (click sound) when they were activated and some were completely Silent when you used the Atari CX40 Fire button and Joystick handle functions.

"The upgraded 2600 controller insert and gold pcbs are great, using them I got my best score in River Raid in over 20 years!" Ryan A. of FL

Our research on different dome contacts found that the ones with a top dimple were quieter when used inside an Atari CX40 Joystick, but they actually had less internal contact surface between the inside of the dome contact (because of the small square surface area of the extended small dimple) and small circuit trace under the dome contact,

which would mean they would fail sooner. Best choose to go with a larger Smooth 4 leg Gold Plated Dome contact to Maximize the contact surface between the inside of the dome contact and the Newly increased larger surface area on the mating Gold plated PCB trace under the dome contact.

The New State of the Art Best Upgraded CX40 Gold PCB with Gold Plated 4 leg dome contacts, have a Good Tactical feed back feel (Louder click compared to the original Atari CX40 joystick PCBs) on the Atari CX40 Fire button and Very light Tactical feed back on the Atari CX40 handle action.

The Original 1981 Atari Engineering Specification called for a Maximum (Dome / Trace) contact resistance of 150 Ohms or less on the CX40 PCB boards. The New Best Gold CX40 PCB boards have contact resistance less than 2 Ohms!

Joe C. of AZ "The upgraded Cx-40 PCBs are excellent. I’ll begin reordering these in larger quantities"

Another built in Upgrade on the New Best CX40 Gold PCB board, is the internal Atari CX40 Wiring sequence Color Codes are now etched into each connecting tab. So you will never have to look up the CX40 Color Code wiring sequence and never make a mistake and wire up a rebuilt Atari CX40 Joystick wrong.

Because of the High Cost of the New PCB Tooling, New State of the Art Upgraded Materials and Cost for the first 2005 production run of these New State of the Art Gold Atari CX40 PCB boards, Best Electronics will require the following Minimum orders for these New Atari Gold CX40 internal PCB boards and upgraded CX40 Rebuild kits.

Best Upgraded Gold CX40 Internal PCB CO121110G $6.50 each (Minimum 3 Qty per order)

Atari CX40 Rebuild Kit with Atari Upgraded CX40 Handle and Best Gold CX40 PCB Board CB101211UG $9.95 each (Minimum 2 Kits per order)

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This page Last modified: October 31, 2008

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