ST without a disk drive

[jhd]

In about the mid-1980s, a local computer retailer that I frequented switched to the new Atari ST line.

 

I was intrigued by the possibilities (I had a Coco at the time), but I was put-off by the price.

 

If memory serves, the ST was priced at about Cdn$500. The external floppy disk drive was about the same price, so the total package was about Cdn$1,000!

 

I was told by the salesman that I had to purchase both units together; the system could not run without the disk drive. (I was still using a cassette tape on the Coco; I never did buy a floppy drive for that system before its retirement in 1989.) I always thought that it was disingenuous to sell these as two separate parts, as well as to advertise the computer at a price that did not reflect the practical reality.

 

Has anyone ever purchased (by accident or otherwise) an ST without a floppy drive? Is there anything that it can actually be used for in that configuration?

[spacemanrocks]

If it's one of the very early units with TOS on disk, then you wouldn't be able to do much without it

[Zogging Hell]

Imagine that would be the worst Chrimbo ever (almost as bad as my folks buying me an ST for Chrimbo with games that needed a joystick and then not giving me a joystick.. I spent a month staring at the boxes and imagining what they were like to play!)

 

Back in the early period you could in theory insert one of the tiny number of software cartridges that were released (one of which was a programming language, which might help a little), but even they probably need GEM.. so if you are running one of the TOS on disk numbers you would be stuck. If you do have have GEM they could work, or if someone gave you a preformatted hard drive with some modem software you could run off that and download what you wanted. Nowadays my STs pretty much operate off the hard disks, with the floppies just used to copy software or run floppy games. Once the stuff is on hard disk though I would not notice not having the floppy drive.

 

I suspect Atari thought the cartridge option would be more popular and games would be released that way, so in theory the diskless ST would be like the 8bit, where the floppy was more of a luxury.

[zzip]

In about the mid-1980s, a local computer retailer that I frequented switched to the new Atari ST line.

 

I was intrigued by the possibilities (I had a Coco at the time), but I was put-off by the price.

 

If memory serves, the ST was priced at about Cdn$500. The external floppy disk drive was about the same price, so the total package was about Cdn$1,000!

 

I was told by the salesman that I had to purchase both units together; the system could not run without the disk drive. (I was still using a cassette tape on the Coco; I never did buy a floppy drive for that system before its retirement in 1989.) I always thought that it was disingenuous to sell these as two separate parts, as well as to advertise the computer at a price that did not reflect the practical reality.

 

Has anyone ever purchased (by accident or otherwise) an ST without a floppy drive? Is there anything that it can actually be used for in that configuration?

 

The original 520 did have an external floppy, and it loaded the OS from floppy, so it would be completely useless without it (well unless you had a hard drive, but at 1985 prices? bwahahaha) I thought they only sold that model as a complete system (computer + floppy + monitor) for US$799? (that model would have been useless without an Atari monitor too)

[jhd]

 

I thought they only sold that model as a complete system (computer + floppy + monitor) for US$799?

 

That's partially my point. The shop advertised the computer itself at a competitive price point, but it was useless without the mandatory accessories, which significantly increased the total price.

 

Radio Shack did a similar thing a few years later -- they sold PC's with no hard drive and minimal RAM. These additions were all considered "upgrades" and priced accordingly.

[Zogging Hell]

You could also get one without a mouse (which was optional in some packs), which while you can use the keys, seems awfully stingy! A ST with no mouse, floppy or ROM chips would be the computing equivalent of a chocolate tea pot

[Mostro]

I suspect Atari thought the cartridge option would be more popular and games would be released that way, so in theory the diskless ST would be like the 8bit, where the floppy was more of a luxury.

 

As far as I'm aware, the cartridge slot was limited to 128K. Granted, that would have left the RAM free, but it would still have been a serious limitation for games.

[Mostro]

almost as bad as my folks buying me an ST for Chrimbo with games that needed a joystick and then not giving me a joystick.. I spent a month staring at the boxes and imagining what they were like to play!

 

I know it probably pales next to some childhood traumas, but that's still pretty sad- if only because I can imagine how I would have felt in that position.

 

I mean, I appreciate it was probably an oversight and not intentional sadism on their part (since they bought you an ST!), but wasn't it possible to get even a dirt-cheap joystick from somewhere?

[Zogging Hell]

They did get me a Cheetah 125+ for my birthday a month later. The nearest store was twenty miles away, which is somewhat of a distance for a ten year old to cycle, and with £1 a week pocket money I might have been struggling I suspect their intention was for it to be used mainly for 'educational purposes' Although to be fair my undergrad dissertation was eventually written on an Atari compatible (Milan) so it wasn't entirely wasted on that front .

Edited March 22, 2017 by Zogging Hell

[+rdemming]

 

As far as I'm aware, the cartridge slot was limited to 128K. Granted, that would have left the RAM free, but it would still have been a serious limitation for games.

 

Indeed, the cartridge addressing range in 128KB but using bank-switching techniques (as used on the 2600) the capacity of a cartridge can be extended almost indefinitely. In fact there were ROM-disks available that had far more than 128KB capacity.

[Mostro]

 

Indeed, the cartridge addressing range in 128KB but using bank-switching techniques (as used on the 2600) the capacity of a cartridge can be extended almost indefinitely. In fact there were ROM-disks available that had far more than 128KB capacity.

 

Ah, good point- I should have thought of that.

 

Though if that was the intent, was it really good design to have required it to use bank switching for more than that minimal 128KB in the first place?

[+davidcalgary29]

I have an external 5 1/4" drive for the ST. Perhaps some users wanted to opt for that...ahem...option instead of the standard 3.5" ones?

 

I also remember standalone ST units being offered for sale in the GTA area, but they were something like $399 CAD at the time. I thought that these lowball deals (Look! A 16-bit machine for $399!) were sucker deals to pull in traffic and undermine the competitors (before the full system price was mentioned to the mark).

[+rdemming]

 

Ah, good point- I should have thought of that.

 

Though if that was the intent, was it really good design to have required it to use bank switching for more than that minimal 128KB in the first place?

 

I think 128MB cartridge range is indeed quite small considering the 68000 has a total address range of 16MB.

The ST chipset is limited to 4MB of RAM and later expanded to 14MB of RAM (Falcon). The last 2MB is reserved for ROM and "hardware-registers". Strangely Atari initially only allocated 192KB for TOS rom [$00FC00000-$00FEFFFF] while in the STE they moved TOS to another range [$00E00000 - $00EFFFFF] spanning max. 1MB. The hardware registers only have a range of 32KB [$00FF8000-$00FFFFFF]. If they had the TOS area from the beginning at the STE range, they could have used the range [$00F00000-$00FF7FFF] (992KB) for cartridge space (lets make it 512KB to have some spare free range for hardware registers).

 

I think the cartridge was never intended to be used for game cartridges and was only intended for small utility cards (Atari had a diagnostic card to test the ST). Adding extra address lines to increase the cart address range would have required a bigger connector and it would not surprise me if the cartridge connector used was the cheapest they could find.

 

What I find a bigger problem of the cart port was the lack of a R/W line thus you could not write to the cartridge space. This required that for output (e.g. for bank-switching or audio output for sampling carts) you needed clumsy methods like reading from certain locations to select the value to write.

 

Robert

[Lynxman]

Has anyone ever purchased (by accident or otherwise) an ST without a floppy drive?

Yes, i did. I modified a Commodore 1581 to run with the ST.

[Zogging Hell]

 

I think the cartridge was never intended to be used for game cartridges and was only intended for small utility cards (Atari had a diagnostic card to test the ST). Adding extra address lines to increase the cart address range would have required a bigger connector and it would not surprise me if the cartridge connector used was the cheapest they could find.

 

What I find a bigger problem of the cart port was the lack of a R/W line thus you could not write to the cartridge space. This required that for output (e.g. for bank-switching or audio output for sampling carts) you needed clumsy methods like reading from certain locations to select the value to write.

 

Robert

 

Most of the early magazines seem fairly convinced games would come out in cartridge format, so I'm pretty sure that was part of the idea behind its inclusion. I suspect a lot of the very early ST games may have fitted into that space, with some minor compression at most. After all most fit on a single sided disk which has only double that space, and I can't imagine all of them are using all that storage. It is a short sighted design, but as a lot of games fitted on a tape or 16k/ 32k cartridge at that time I guess it was a reasonable design decision to make. The main reason it didn't get used has to be the price, ROM cartridges were way more expensive than floppy disks.

[kimchipenguin]

 

Has anyone ever purchased (by accident or otherwise) an ST without a floppy drive? Is there anything that it can actually be used for in that configuration?

 

I did actually - received the floppy drive a few weeks later. I think it was usable, but you can't do much with it other than opening a few dialog boxes and switching the resolution.

[+rdemming]

 

Most of the early magazines seem fairly convinced games would come out in cartridge format, so I'm pretty sure that was part of the idea behind its inclusion.

The main reason it didn't get used has to be the price, ROM cartridges were way more expensive than floppy disks.

 

Atari designed the ST as a competitor to the MAC so it seems it was more intended as a business machine that as a games machine. The usage of GEM and hi-res 640x400 graphics mode points to a business machine role and the lack of gaming features in the hardware (no hardware scrolling, no hardware sprites) does not seem they intended it to be a games machine. Of course history proved the ST was (at least in the first years in Europe) used more as gaming machine (the processing power of the 68000 made it possible to do things in software were the 8-bit computers needed hardware support chips) but still had some great business applications. So I'm not convinced game cartridges were part of Atari's plan.

 

As you said, the high price of cartridges that could store the same amount of data as a floppy probably also caused the lack of carts. For the 8-bit, in Europe there was much more software available on tape than on cart. For example Bounty Bob Strikes back was AFAIK only released on cart in the US while in Europe it was only released on tape. Also the C64 supported game cartridges but the actually C64 cart releases in Europe are only a handful. Since most Atari ST games were from Europe, it could also be "cultural" that very little was released on cart.

 

Robert

[Zogging Hell]

 

Atari designed the ST as a competitor to the MAC so it seems it was more intended as a business machine that as a games machine. The usage of GEM and hi-res 640x400 graphics mode points to a business machine role and the lack of gaming features in the hardware (no hardware scrolling, no hardware sprites) does not seem they intended it to be a games machine. Of course history proved the ST was (at least in the first years in Europe) used more as gaming machine (the processing power of the 68000 made it possible to do things in software were the 8-bit computers needed hardware support chips) but still had some great business applications. So I'm not convinced game cartridges were part of Atari's plan.

 

 

To a degree I would agree, but coming where Tramiel had come from the with the C64 etc, and the fact that unlike the Mac, the ST had colour resolutions; gaming has to have been at the back of their minds if not the forefront. The blitter was planned from nearly the start, which wasn't really a lot of use for business apps (although ironically it does help their response more generally than games, which don't take advantage of its presence unless specifically programmed for it), and there was a interview with one of the designers where he seemed to suggest the included sound chip was intended as being little more than a bleeper - the real deal never seems to have materialised, however (Amy presumably). There is also talk in one of the early Atari users of a further graphics chip (different from the blitter) being development. although that might be hearsay. I suspect the STs limitations as a gaming computer are more a result of the development timescale and cost bracket, rather than a deliberate aim to position the ST as a business computer. Custom chips take time to develop, which Tramiel didn't have, and they all add to the overall cost, which would have defeated the point.The machine looks like it is designed to be a all rounder, good for graphics, games and business, but not really excelling at anything (well apart from the overall package). This was always the attraction of the ST for me over the Mac and Amiga. It really is a jack of all trades (and master of none!). The cartridge port seems to be an odd thing to add if it isn't included for gaming, as for other uses it isn't as good, or even as easy to implement as a straight forward bus connector

 

I believe you are entirely right that the ST is meant to compete with and best the Mac though. All the ST line generally seems to react to developments in the Mac world, The Falcon for example is a bit like a poor mans NeXT computer, or a super powered LCII (thanks to the DSP, though the basic spec is the same), the TT is a bit of a Mac II. If I were to guess I would actually say that the Tramiel doesn't even consider the Amiga in the STs lines specs generally (bar the half hearted attempt with the STe), presumably as overall sales of both it and the ST paled next to the Mac.

[zzip]

 

The blitter was planned from nearly the start, which wasn't really a lot of use for business apps (although ironically it does help their response more generally than games, which don't take advantage of its presence unless specifically programmed for it),

 

I'd argue that Blitter was actually a big deal for business apps, since it made everything text-based and GEM base feel much snappier. Using text-based apps even on a slow PC felt faster than doing the equivalent on an ST because PC still had fast character modes, while all text on ST is bit-mapped. Adding blitter helps close that gap

[+DarkLord]

I'd have to respectfully disagree with the "master of none!" statement in at

least one area... MIDI.

[Zogging Hell]

 

I'd argue that Blitter was actually a big deal for business apps, since it made everything text-based and GEM base feel much snappier. Using text-based apps even on a slow PC felt faster than doing the equivalent on an ST because PC still had fast character modes, while all text on ST is bit-mapped. Adding blitter helps close that gap

 

It does help a lot, Microsoft Write is almost useable with a blitter (grin), but it is more of a byproduct of the design than the goal I personally would say. As NVDI/ Turbo ST etc showed a few tweaks (understatement of the year!) to the OS can produce the same or greater effect for GEM apps, so if that had been the only goal Atari could have probably tweaked GEM/ TOS rather than develop a whole chip