Justin Payne Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 Anyone recognize this switchable ROM for an ol' 800?Also, why would an 800 have RAM without it's protective, and cool looking, cases? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joey Z Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 (edited) Anyone recognize this switchable ROM for an ol' 800? Also, why would an 800 have RAM without it's protective, and cool looking, cases? 800-656002115153432er.JPG not sure about the ROM, but the RAM is missing the case because cases caused overheating, especially when you have a fully loaded 48K 800. EDIT: the ROM thing, is kind of interesting in construction. Are the original ROMs still there, or are they replaced by the ROM mod? I'd assume then that they left the original FP ROM, and changed the 8K OS instead. The other question then is why there are two 4K ROMs and one 8K ROM? maybe the two 4K take place of the two original OS ROMs? and then what is the other 8K ROM for? maybe an internal cartridge? or just another OS? if you could get better pictures of the board, and take pictures of the bottom, and all the wiring, maybe someone can trace it out, if nobody recognizes it. could have been a homemade board. Edited October 16, 2015 by Joey Z Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rybags Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 I'd tape over those windows - it's Eprom and having it exposed like that risks bits being erased back to 1s. Not sure when they stopped using cased Ram modules, might have been at the same time 48K became standard fitment (around when C64 was released?) With 48K standard and Atari not really bothering to upgrade the OS beyond the fixes in Rev B there wasn't really need for the user to access the memory or personality slots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyle22 Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 Justin, do you have an EPROM burner? If so, you can dump the contents of those chips and post them here. I'm sure one of us will be able to help identify them. And, we also like dumps for the cause of preservation in case you have something unusual. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rybags Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 In returning to the original question, my guess would be a switchable OS. In that case no need really to pull anything apart, a dump could be made with a Basic program to disk. As for the OSes my guess there would be stock Rev B and probably OmniMon + Newell Fast FP on the Eproms. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Larry Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 There are two story versions about the ram cases. One story is "heat," and the other (more likely, IMO) was cost reduction, especially when Commodore got into the act with the C64. What do you suppose that eliminating those three cases saved -- $1, $2? Cost reducers would do a lot to save a dollar per unit, and it was free -- just stop adding the cases. No assembly labor, no screws (IIRC). It also didn't affect compliance with RF emissions requirements. -Larry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rybags Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 The last year of production they really had to get their act together. The 400/800 was way more complex to make than a C64. Just pull either type apart. C64 you can strip down to case halves, shield, keyboard, motherboard in seconds. An 800 you have probably 4 times as many major pieces and 3 times as long to pull it apart. My guess would be cost and convenience with any cooling benefits as an added bonus. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Larry Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 Looking at the complexity of the 800 vs. the C64, I would "guesstimate" that the C64 cost much less than 1/2 to make than the 800. I can remember that every time that Atari announced a price reduction on the 800, Commodore just pulled the 64 lower, and IIRC it started out at something like $600 vs. about $900 at the time for the 800. I bought a C64 about two years later (1984?) and paid less than $200, although that was an exceptional price at that time. No doubt about it, Atari needed the 800XL desperately to help stem the bleeding. -Larry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoundGammon Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 It would have been interesting how the Commodore 64 would have been had they built it in 1979 with all the tight FCC regulations at the time! Lots of shielding to pass FCC approval! They later relaxed their standards and that made it poosible for Atari to lighten up the 8-bit line! Look at the first 2600...the tank version! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
a8isa1 Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 Anyone recognize this switchable ROM for an ol' 800? Also, why would an 800 have RAM without it's protective, and cool looking, cases? 800-656002115153432er.JPG About the heating issue. It was real. My 1980 800 overheated after about an hour of use and I only had one cased RAM module and the OS board. Analog Computing (at the time "A.N.A.L.O.G.") ran a story about the issue. I pulled my boards out of the cases and to this day no problems. I can run the 800 for hours, even days (by accident only), and it has never again overheated. I kept the cases because they do look cool. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+mytek Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 About the heating issue. It was real. My 1980 800 overheated after about an hour of use and I only had one cased RAM module and the OS board. Analog Computing (at the time "A.N.A.L.O.G.") ran a story about the issue. I pulled my boards out of the cases and to this day no problems. I can run the 800 for hours, even days (by accident only), and it has never again overheated. I kept the cases because they do look cool. I would think that if it can run for a day without overheating, then longer certainly shouldn't change anything, with external ambient temperature rise being the only concern. I used to run my 48K Atari 400 24/7 for months at a time without issues (similar to your 800 hour run). - Michael Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sup8pdct Posted October 16, 2015 Share Posted October 16, 2015 There was a service directive from atari to remove the ram cases because of over heating. I have the service bullion here somewhere. James 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenjennings Posted October 17, 2015 Share Posted October 17, 2015 Yes. It was the overheating problem. My system would scramble the screen and crash by 9:30 in the morning in the summertime. (we had no air conditioning) Freaked me out since the computer consumed the entire years' worth of proceeds from a paper route. But then again in the evening it would start working and keep going fine all night. I saw an article in a magazine about some other system and their description of overheating seemed similar to mine, so I figured out I could air the system out by opening the cases. I also bypassed the cartridge door interlock allowing it to run with the top off. That was good enough to make it run all day except on the hottest days. Those days taught me the value of designing programs on paper before touching the computer. In winter it was never an issue -- I grew up in Wisconsin.. (Figure that :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justin Payne Posted October 17, 2015 Author Share Posted October 17, 2015 Thanks for all of the info.My first 800 had the case over the RAM/ROM so I was surprised to see it "naked". As far as the eproms, yes, if I had the board I would cover those things up ASAP. In fact, I've even heard that eproms can loose their memory even with the window covered. The 800 was for sale but when I saw it all like that I was a bit worried I found some sort of hack job. It looks like two boards were revision F's and one, revision 3(?). Here's another shot of the boards inserted. If you look at the switch, it looks like there might have been some sort of sort and some crispyness but since the images aren't that great, it's hard to tell. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sup8pdct Posted October 17, 2015 Share Posted October 17, 2015 The latter 800's had those black plastic holds down either side of the boards was not installed and a single black plastic spacer went over the center of all boards. As for the rom board, it could be another os like omnimon or smilar. James Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caterpiggle Posted October 17, 2015 Share Posted October 17, 2015 (edited) Hello Justin, did you ever turn it on the display and what is there on the blue screen ? Edited October 17, 2015 by Caterpiggle Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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