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Atari 8bit is superior to the ST


Marius

Atari 8bit is superior to the ST  

210 members have voted

  1. 1. Do you agree?

    • Yes; Atari 8bit is superior to ST in all ways
    • Yes; Atari 8bit is superior to ST in most ways
    • NO; Atari ST is superior to 8bit in all ways
    • NO; Atari ST is superior to 8bit in most ways
    • NO; Both systems are cool on their own.

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Hi folks,

 

In the thread about the Snow Man demo, metalguy66 wrote this:

 

"The 8-bit ATARI is far superior to the ST in every possible way..."

 

I think that is an interesting sentence to read.

 

I'm really confused about it, because I think metalguy66 has really something to say about atari 8bit. I own both systems a lot and I have around 25 years experience with Atari 8bit and around 20 years of experience with Atari ST.

 

For some strange reason I never had the idea those two systems are related to eachother, except for the name and the XE vs ST design. The systems do not "feel" the same.

 

And to be honest: I like the 8bit (much) more. As said: I own both systems, but I'm still using my 8bit every day, while my ST's are collecting dust.

 

Is this because Metalguy is right? Are the 8bit computers of atari superior? Or is there another reason?

 

Let's talk about that!

 

VERY IMPORTANT: Do not start any dumb flamewars here. Please. But a normal conversation about this, would be fun!

 

Thanks

Marius

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I absolutely LOVE my 8bit computers. I never had any of them growing up and now that I have them I use them daily! I am completely AMAZED at what they were capable of doing with such systems. The games on the 8bit computers are just crazy! I play Ms. Pac-Man constantly on it and it's 99.9% faithful to the arcade, which to me is just astonishing!

 

I haven't really used the ST I have much, but from what I've seen it's more a 'traditional' type of computer and is used for more than just gaming. I just have less experience. I use it maybe once a week to putz around but don't know much.

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I haven't really used the ST I have much, but from what I've seen it's more a 'traditional' type of computer and is used for more than just gaming. I just have less experience. I use it maybe once a week to putz around but don't know much.

 

For gaming I think I agree with you. However: there are a few titles on ST I really WANT on 8bit. Playing a few hours on ST, and returning back to 8bit gives me the feeling like I return home. A good feeling.

 

But the ST can do really fabulous things too! Especially on MIDI ... I have very fond memories of using Cubase and Notator on it. And Calamus.

Yes. For the more serious stuff I LOVE my ST. But those tasks are now taken over by my iMac... so that's why the 8bit is still in charge.

 

I voted the last option. I think they are both really cool machines.

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for me most crucial factor having impact on machine superiority is how fast i can move/fill memory blocks, to have this meaningfull it had to be clock independand, so a good measurement unit would be bytes per clock cycle

 

having to manage 4 bitplanes instead of antic/gtia chunky pixel mode (although 2-4 bits wide still a chunky pixel) won't make things easier for 68k of ST, but i wonder what would be the result if STE blitter would take care of some things

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What FastRobPlus said is pretty much spot on. Having said that and as an owner of several Commodore 8-bit & Amiga machines, I see absolutely no reason to have a functional ST setup. Felt that way since its inception and still feel that way. Although I do have an original 520ST that literally (not kidding and not trying to be an ass) sits on its end and does provide somewhat of a "door stop". Just wanted the ST as decoration to go with my game room, although wish I had a better place for it :-)

 

130XE on the other hand gets used almost as much as my 8-bit Commies and I voted that A8 is superior (a helluva lot more productive anyway) than the ST line.

 

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Edited by save2600
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the A8 was more innovative in just about every way on its release then the ST, i always wanted a ST when they were released and when i finally got one, i was sooo let down... especially when compared to the Amiga, which i (and many others) feel is the next generation/release of the 'line' of machines...

 

 

sloopy.

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Well, I'm gonna buck the trend here... :)

 

I've got a Mega ST (4 megs Ram/16mhz accelerator) that runs my BBS,

complete with a 4 gig hard drive, 2 CD's online, Syquest EZ135 drive,

and available by telnet.

 

I've got a Mega STe that I love to play with - TOS 2.06 (love that OS!),

4 megs of Ram, 16mhz, 1.44 floppy drive, 1 gig internal hard drive, for

games and those oh so lovely STe demos.

 

I've got a STacy, 4 megs, gonna accelerate it soon, with an UltraSatan

(2 SD cards, hot swappable), portable... I take it to work and on the

slow nights fire it up for all kinds of great fun.

 

and my 95mhz Falcon, 256 megs Ram, DVD drive, etc,... but the Falcon is

considerably different than a stock ST, and the OP said ST so I'll exclude

it.

 

I do have an 800XL, 1050 drive, etc..., that I break out every now and then

and play some of those wonderful games on. I love this machine too - the 800

XL was my first computer.

 

Its easy to see though, which is more productive for me.

 

I too voted that both are cool machines. I really can't imagine my computing

life without either one. :)

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post-5822-125883858859_thumb.jpg

post-5822-125883862171_thumb.jpg

Edited by DarkLord
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Well, the ST and 8-bit lines are too far apart to even compare them to each other:

 

the Atari 8-bit line is the successor of the VCS 2600 and the predecessor of the Commodore Amiga, and it shows: it has a chipset with great capabilities for it's time (hardware scrolling, player/missile, number of colours on-screen, screen mode capabilities, etc.pp.), as are the other generations of this family of machines.

 

The Atari ST line is an off-the-shelf-parts computer constructed in 5 months, built to compete with Apple and IBM compatible computers of it's time and to replace the 8-bit generation of home computers through it's price tag alone. It was useful for both home and (not so) small office use, but never was a hardware masterpiece. It's advantages over the 8-bit line are obvious, though: raw CPU power, screen resolution and the amount of RAM, plus a mouse-driven GUI. By this alone, it can easily provide the users with more advanced software of any kind, including games (esp. 3D titles, but even 2D titles if properly programmed - just have a look at games like Goldrunner, Ghost Battle, Anarchy, Bio Challenge, etc.) than the 8-bit line.

 

So, are we going to compare the newest Ferrari F1 car with the Leopard 2 main battle tank next?

Edited by Thorsten Günther
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So, are we going to compare the newest Ferrari F1 car with the Leopard 2 main battle tank next?

Exactly. My ST can play tons of games my A8 could never have dreamed of, but what do you expect? The A8 being more innovative certainly from a hardware perspective than the ST, doesn't make it 'superior' it just makes it more innovative in its period than the ST was in its from a hw perspective.

 

People can bag on the ST all they want (and it's not undeserved in some cases) - but the STs main innovation was that it was an affordable reasonably powerful entry into the 16 bit world for many, many people who didn't have trust funds or wealthy parents to buy Amiga setups.

 

A broadly unqualified comparison such as 'superior' doesn't really make any sense.

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I grew up on, and still own, both 8-bit and 16-bit atari computers. There's just a certain 'feel' to the 8-bits that I never experienced with the 16-bit.

 

I think that 'feel' was called 'not cheap.'

The 8-bit was a pretty advanced way to game for its time, and has some of the best versions of a lot of old arcade games. Way more advanced than coleco, intellivision or 2600. And in my mind, that quality has lasted. My XL is still my favorite way to play games from that era.

 

With the ST you can't put a dress on 'cheap.' No matter how advanced ST claimed to be, it felt like a milk jug, "me too, but I'm cheaper" system. It never felt more advanced than anything. Today (since price is no longer any kind of barrier) I look at the games from that era and see no reason to play the ST versions, because the other systems of the time did those games as well or better and didn't have that feeling of cheap that the ST did.

 

The systems are polar opposites. I respect the 8-bit because it's got a nice quality, high-end feel, but the ST was just a bargain box. The ST was aiming for a pretty different crowd.

Edited by Reaperman
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I always felt the ST was a task oriented computer with the ability to play some decent games, and the A8 was a gaming computer with the ability to do some decent tasks.

 

As others have pointed out, they're different beasts. A shark is not superior to a camel in the desert, and a camel is not superior to a shark in the ocean.

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In the context of how they stood up to the competition of the time, the 8-bit is far superior.

 

The ST, aside from the usual things we criticise it for, is essentially a modern computer at least so far as the user interface removing the user from the bare bones of the machine. So, you sit at your ST and are confronted with what feels like a poor crippled relative to Windows.

 

The 8-bit though is old-skool, possessing many of the positive traits which many people used to like about PCs such as the command-line type interface.

 

Of course the ST has advantages like much quicker disk access and proportionally much more RAM on base machines. But on the other hand, the 8-bit can still perform productive functions with much less RAM.

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People can bag on the ST all they want (and it's not undeserved in some cases) - but the STs main innovation was that it was an affordable reasonably powerful entry into the 16 bit world for many, many people who didn't have trust funds or wealthy parents to buy Amiga setups.

 

Acknowledged. Let's not forget that the ST was offered at an initial price (e.g. DM 2,998.- here in Germany for a 520ST with SF354 and SM124) that was less than half of what Apple asked for their Mac (at least here in Germany and presumably also in the rest of Europe Apple surely ripped off their customers). Later, the price of the 520STm with SF354 dropped to DM 998.- while at the same time a C=64 with 1541 still sold for DM 898.-. So, due to the fact that many people bought them, the programmers started writing good, sometimes even innovative software for it (Signum, Cubase, Tempus, ErgoDent, Calamus, Technobox CAD, Notator, Creator, Chagall, Phoenix, to name a few titles). This turned a fast and cheap, but otherwise less than spectacular, computer into a great buy for many households and offices.

 

Thorsten

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So, do you walk to school or carry your lunch?

 

You can't really compare the ST and the A8s, different machines for different times.

 

On the shelf behind me is my 30 year old Atari 800 (purchased new all those years ago!), which will always be my favorite computer. The games were (and in some ways still are) awesome, and my A8 was where I learned to program, and truly understand what was happening inside the machine. The hardware was revolutionary for 1979, sporting design genius that, sadly, is rarely evidenced today. The A8 chipset was a masterpiece of its day.

 

While I no longer have my 1st ST, I do have a bunch of it's kin (1040s, MSTe, a pair of Falcons, a TT, and a hades060). The ST's were 'real' iron, with 'modern' CPUs (The 68k was so much nicer than x86), oodles of memory and connectivity. They are where I honed the programming skills that feed me today :cool: I *loved* Laser C. Hardware-wise, not as revolutionary as the A8s, but it was fast, cheap, and did have some innovation of its own. The Falcon was what the ST needed to be, a pity it didn't survive longer. I think in a lot of ways, the ST line helped define what a modern system should be. Many key software tools today trace their roots to the humble ST. Today, my main system is a MacPro, and in some ways, it seems a spiritual descendant of the CT-63 Falcon sharing the room with it.

 

I think they were both exceptional machines measured against their contemporaries, and their target audience.

Edited by poobah
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I think it probably has something to do with which you had first - as in "first love."

 

At the time I got my ST, the 8-bit was (for the most part) "all I knew" in computers, and of course kind of fell in love with it. As I was in high-school at the time and without much money, I had to sell my 8-bit system to get an ST. I later (soon, actually) resented that, and pieced together other 8-bit Atari systems that were never as cool (and equipped) as the one I had to sell.

 

Immediately, I missed all the favorite 8-bit games and stuff that were not available on the ST. Initially, as an Atari 8-bit user in 1985, I was of course SUPER eager to get my hands on a new Atari computer, and that meant ST. As well, the ST offered graphics, the GUI innovation and "standard" interface ports. That stuff meant a BIG DEAL back then, and was territory the 8-bit really couldn't compete with.

 

However, as the years passed, the ST lost much of its luster. By the 1990s it had lost the advantage in price and performance that it originally had. Amigas were available in tons of models and flavors. I bailed out as the STe was allegedly coming, and I have never seen one. While I knew several people who had STs, I never met a person with STe (but many with Amigas, of course). It must have been around 1990 or 1991 that I finally moved to the PC. I had "Windows/286" and initially and VGA. After years of ST graphics, VGA (640x480x256) seemed like a dream. It was also dirt cheap (relatively speaking, for the time). PC stuff was available everywhere, software was available everywhere, ISA cards were everywhere. There was NOBODY dealing in Atari (STe or any other) around that time where I was. I was always curious about the STe but since it seemed there was little-to-no software to support the STe features [correct me if I'm wrong], I felt a VGA PC was the right move and I've never felt sorry.

 

The ST, while innovative for the time, subjectively seemed to lack the "character" of the 8-bit. As the ST aged and cheap 286/VGA machines stole its thunder, they seemed like "the next ST" for me as they offered (1990-1991) exactly what I thought the ST did in 1985 - great graphics, standards (ports, disks, etc), and great price. From then on, the many PCs I have just seemed like "the next ST" for me. In my nostalgia, I seem to categorize personal computers in 2 categories: (1) The 8-bit Atari (first love), and (2) NOT 8-bit Atari (ST then, my current PC now). PCs just seem pretty much to me now like the ST did then. Hence, I don't really miss the ST because everything I liked about it is duplicated and bested not only in my first PC but in the one I am typing on now.

 

Once in a while, I fire up an ST emulator - but I really don't spend much time with it at all. It seems so crippled - just like if I could fire up Windows 3.0 (or earlier) I'd probably laugh at the time I was wasting, and I have little desire. Things are quite different for me with the 8-bit Atari. Stuff like the SIO2PC (which I got on board with late) are really cool to me because they bring be back full-circle from my modern PC to the 8-bit Atari. I am quite fond of the SIO2PC, the USB version (thanks, Atarimax!!) in particular, for this reason. The 8-bit doesn't seem crippled because it's not even playing the same game; it's a world unto itself.

 

Of course, I respect others' opinions. If the ST was your first computer, you'd likely feel for it as I do the 8-bit Atari.

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I've owned both platforms from the 400 I bought in '81 through the Falcon I bought in '92. The 8-bit will always be my first love and my favorite. However, the ST did get me through University quite well and the games were reasonably enjoyable.

 

One area that I still feel is better on the 8-bit is sound. I always hated the ST's sounds and music. It just seemed like an afterthought. The STe was a big improvement in that department, but not until I bought the Falcon did I feel ST sound had arrived.

 

On the Atari front, the 800xl was my personal favorite 8-bit and the Falcon is my favorite ST. Sadly I sold off my falcon 10 years ago when my son was born and I needed cash. Somehow I doubt I'll ever be able to justify repurchasing one at the rates they go for.

 

Fletch

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I like them both and they are both great in thier own way, I have both setup. I will say that like many many of my customers that after the ST came out I dumped my 8-bit. Was probably 10 years ago I got started with and 8-bit again. There are also major differences in the types of games developed for the machines. I guess I now mostly prefer the 8-bit as it has all the classic games as well as cool new title still being made! The ST library had some of the newer arcade games but some of the more popular RPG titles and sims I never cared for. Just don't like those genres of games. Not enough instant gratification I guess.

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For me there was one very good reason to have an ST: Dungeon Master. Even though it was a "move one square at a time" style RPG it was still quite awesome. :) OK, that and Time Bandits. ;) And Cubase. And Revenge of the Doh... And Starglider... And.. And... :P :D

 

Too bad there weren't any decent development tools for it, tho. I think that was the one thing I really missed about the ST: A quick, easy to use, fast-as-all-get-out language like Action! on the 8-bit... :ponder:

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The Atari 8-bit was the best home computer of its era. The ST was not.

 

When I first heard about the ST in 1986, I wasn't impressed at all. I tried to like it, thinking it was supposed to be the next generation Atari - but it just bored me somehow. The Amiga, however, blew me away. It was the same feeling I got years earlier with the 800XL and 2600.

 

Even now, the ST is one of the few popular 80's computers I don't own and have no desire to get.

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Once I got an ST, I stopped playing games (and just about everything else) on my 800XL. The ST could just do so much more with better graphics. Today they're boxed and I don't play either of them! Both were great in their day though.

 

Just curious: If the XL and the ST both bore you so much you don't play them anymore, then what Atari DO you play nowdays? With so many systems today that do so much more with better graphics than any Atari, are all your Ataris boxed up?

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I got an Atari 800 as my first computer and enjoyed it until I got my MegaST.

 

I prefer the ST over the 8-bit mainly because I love music too. I got tired of listening to computer music with only 4 (or 3 in the ST's case) voices, simple square wave type sounds and scratchy samples. MIDI allowed me to go beyond that limitation and the ST had the best MIDI software that I tried. It also got me through high school, college (including senior thesis), and helped get me jobs by making sharp copies of resumes and cover letters.

 

I did some gaming too, but not as much as I stopped pirating software when I bought the ST after seeing how stealing destroyed the 8-bit market. I learned my lesson. :| I could not buy all the games that I wanted so I had to be picky. I still play games on both systems and both have different style of games too, so it's a tough choice for me to choose one over the other in terms of games.

 

Basically, the ST could do everything and was my main machine for 10 years. How many people can stick with one machine for 10 years? :P 1987-1997. I actually got a Falcon in 1995, but I left it at home, so I would have a machine at home (I lived at school on weekdays, but came home on weekends).

 

Also, I loved the ST case. Dove gray with matching parallelogram vent ports and function keys. Classy! :lust:

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