KirkEnterprisesTARDIS

About the ROMs in the Atari XEGS, could I replace the ROM in an Atari 65XE with that from an XEGS and have Missile Command built-in? Could I put the ROM from any Atari computer onto a cartridge and plug it in, running it that way? What about transplanting a cartridge ROM onto the mainboard?

Yeah they look pretty fun. I just watched all the Atari commercials, and my dad wasn't surprised when I told him "a guy from Mash did Atari commercials". The other stuff like GTIA and ANTIC display lists sound complicated but I will endeavor to learn - programming for an Atari might be fun.

Yeah these SIO devices that allow for modern storage devices seem nice in addition to a real disk drive, but as a collector, I really wouldn't want any carts besides homebrew games, no multicarts or flashcarts, yet anyway. The Ultimate 1MB isn't really on my want list as 64K is plenty for my purposes - I need no more out of the machine than a 16K Atari 400 would provide - BASIC and cartridge games. But even for disk games that I plan to get too, 64K should be fine. I don't need to run all the latest demos.

Yeah thanks. I have a copy of Gyruss that I forgot to mention along with two other Parker Brothers games including Return of the Jedi: Death Star Battle that I didn't mention as they don't work - Return of the Jedi boots to a self test. Donkey Kong, Centipede, and Mario Bros are serious considerations but as for Pac Man it looks more primitive than Ms Pac Man, having come out earlier, but I still might want to try. Dig Dug, Joust, and Blue Max sound fun too. I guess I've never experienced any of those games (except for Donkey Kong and Mario Bros on Nintendo systems) but my dad had a 2600 so he might have played the more primitive (or arcade where applicable) versions of many of these games. I have been considering an SIO2SD but they are kind of expensive. Yeah I do enjoy a lot of arcade-style games and stuff like Star Raiders (space-Star Trek-like stuff, these kinds of space shooters are in the same vein of something like Star Fox on Nintendo systems that I enjoy as well). Cool that you had an XEGS. Did you have the basic bundle with just the system and joystick or did you also have the light gun, keyboard, etc.? What about disk drives? And what kind of games did you have? What was your opinion on the keyboard then, and now. Either way, thanks for the recommendations!

For my birthday last year, at the top of my birthday list was an old computer. And boy did my parents deliver! I got an Atari 65XE, complete with several games, mostly earlier ones - Ms. Pac Man (my personal favorite of all the games I got), Space Invaders, Galaxian, Missile Command, and Star Raiders. Now I hear most of the 8-bit love for the 800 and 800XL and many people say that the 65XE is unreliable and has a bad keyboard but it worked just fine for me and the keyboard is not great but fine for BASIC. Besides, coming from my dad, who grew up with a Timex Sinclair 1000, the 65XE's keyboard is fine - so to all the haters of the 65XE keyboard, try a Timex Sinclair! Anyway, I love the 65XE and hope to expand my Atari collection some, with a disk drive, plus some disk games, and even more cartridges and hopefully more systems - an Atari 400, 800, 600XL, 800XL, or XEGS - any of them would be great, except the 130XE - while nice, it's basically the same as the 65XE. One thing I'd like to note is I'm not a super hardcore Atari user into the demo scene where I need 1MB of memory; 64K is plenty for me, playing games and programming in BASIC, I am a more casual Atari user. Any suggestions for future hardware (peripherals, other computers) or games? And what do you guys think of what I got?