TankedThomas

Off the top of my head, the 2200U should be a bit more powerful. Both it and the 1606G are using AMD's 14nm Zen architecture, so even though the 1606G is newer, the 2200U should be more powerful - same architecture but one is Embedded and one is Mobile. The latter is typically better. Also, to make matters worse for Atari, AMD just announced their Ryzen 4000 mobile chips at CES. I haven't cared enough to look through all the CES news but I assume they're Zen 2 7nm chips... which means they'll be pretty darn good. Something Atari could have planned ahead for. If they knew anything about hardware. Which they obviously don't. I don't remember the exact details but I don't believe OtherOS was used for obtaining the PS3 keys. I think they just wired it straight up to a computer and tinkered from there. Hackers were indeed trying to use OtherOS to gain access to the rest of the system though, but I'm not sure if they ever made much progress, since OtherOS was essentially sandboxed and it didn't have access to the dedicated GPU. I'm still annoyed that Sony decided to nuke [email protected] from the PS3. Oh, but that permanent Singstar icon is much better, obviously, especially now that it has been discontinued. Even PlayStation Home lasted longer than the Folding app, and that's to say nothing of OtherOS... Also, regarding price, the Blu-Ray drive contributed significantly to that. Not sure how much, exactly, but it wasn't cheap. I heard they couldn't even make enough and had to delay the PS3's release, at least in European territories, in order to meet demand. Good decision long-term but they didn't start really making a profit on the PS3 until about 2009. Other than it being "easier", my only other guess would be China. Sure, they've eased up on game consoles now, but I doubt it'll last, and there are still limitations. A computer should theoretically be easier to get to market over there. Something else to consider is that Atari seem to more or less have the factory designing parts of the VCS for them at this point, and if they do indeed intend to go after the Chinese market, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that they've struck a deal with some Chinese company to basically just pump out a bunch of off-brand VCS systems. In other words, Atari might make a (small) profit off of selling what little they do have (basic board design, steel moulds for the cases, etc.), and then we'll see a bunch of mini PCs on AliExpress, Taobao, eBay etc. that are literally the VCS minus the Atari branding. That, to me, is the most likely outcome for this product at this point (after they hopefully supply backers with branded units, even though they'll undoubtedly suck). I assume it's the one button on the left side on the back. It's a tactile switch though, which is a weird/dumb choice for a power button. There's a second tactile switch on the right-back side but the case appears to obscure it, so I'm not sure what it's for. I'd normally assume a reset or clear CMOS button, but I think that's giving Atari too much credit at this point...

Agreed. I was going to go into more details but I thought my post was long enough as it was. And here I've been feeling like my RX 590 is too limiting for me (because it is) - trying to play anything on the VCS would drive me crazy.

It's worth adding that Atari said (or at least implied) that you NEED an SSD to install other operating systems. I'm sure there's a way to use the NAND, whether intentional or not, but it's not even enough space to install Windows 10. Even if you get a cheap Windows 10 key (despite what people say, you can get a legit key for about $20 - the dodgy ones are usually about half that and below, and chances are you have access to an old machine that you can take a Windows 7 or 8 key from to get Win10 free), that's still an expense. NVMe storage often costs more than a regular 2.5" SSD. Even if you pay only $100 extra in total, that's still a lot of extra money. Plus the SSD sits on the top of the board, which means you're going to have to disassemble the whole machine just to add one. And after all of that, you'll be lucky to run even Fortnite at 1080p 60fps. I haven't looked at the Fortnite gameplay video on a big screen yet but to me, it looked simultaneously smooth and choppy. Hard to really tell what the frame rate is doing. The textures looked to be very blobby and undetailed too, but that could just be the fact that it's Fortnite. Plus I would assume that, if it's not a fake demo, that VCS ALSO has the extra RAM that the clear model has. Which means better specs than the final product. So it'll run games better. But you'll have to pay extra to upgrade it manually. Which is ultimately misleading. Best case scenario, they have a turd on their hands (or stinky cheese, perhaps?); worst case scenario, they have a plastic shell and some (probably working but probably not great quality) controllers.

Doubtful. It's not all that simple to run Windows 10 from an external drive. It can be done, but I doubt these goons would figure it out. Plus it should have an internal SSD, so an external drive shouldn't be required. Look in the mirror at the beginning of the first video - they appear to be holding the controller with no wires attached, and it seems like they turned the machine on with the controller. Maybe once they launched Fortnite, they plugged it into USB, or were just using the mouse and keyboard we see. Which is a great selling point for a console - optional features are fine, but requiring a mouse and keyboard in the living room has never proven popular.

It's got Bluetooth. They showed the wireless card in the factory images. It being wireless isn't why we're saying it's fake. If it's wireless, then what's the alleged USB cable for, going around the left side? I think that's more likely the power cable. I have some other thoughts about it being fake but I'll get to them later when I'm awake again.

@DurradonXylles summed up what I was thinking. I know not everyone agrees but I'm thinking there's at least some fakery going on here. Not like they've earnt the benefit of the doubt either way. Especially considering those videos - I've seen people in their 80s or even 90s take better bloody videos. Hell, I've seen home videos from the 60s with better clarity. I'm not even exaggerating. And even if it works, it's still one of the worst PCs I've ever seen. PC hobbyists and "tinkerers" don't want this shit, and the Switch is a better platform because the NVIDIA Tegra X1 is a more solid chip than AMD Ryzen Embedded (sorry AMD; still love your other CPUs). The NVIDIA Shield TV is a better set-top box than the VCS, too.

(Oh, the Atati thing was a joke, now I feel really dumb).

I can't believe I missed this. How embarrassing... They can't even spell their own damn company name correctly. Well, Kingston also gave them a 240GB SSD to put in it, according to a close-up photo. So that they could run Windows. And it's on the lock screen so we don't know how stable the hardware and drivers are. Maybe their Easter Egg is Mike Farzt cowering in a bathroom stall. Honestly, I hope you're right, because if I'm right, then we have an even bigger mess on our hands. Surely they're not that incompetent... is what we all keep thinking and are then proven wrong. Here's hoping, I suppose.

Thanks, I really appreciate the extra information!

You forgot Feargal Mac, multiple fake prototypes, the big summer update we never got, no game announcements, about a dozen lawsuits at any given time, and tacos. HOW COULD YOU FORGET THE TACOS, MAN?!

I don't suppose you could elaborate? I'm curious as to what you found so wanting with THEC64. I mean, that was the impression I got but I haven't owned either, so I'm not really in a position to speak on the matter. I'm also curious about SID chip emulation, since nobody has really discussed that. I imagine it's not running the latest version of VICE, for starters.

Which one are you talking about? The first one is more than likely just a looped cable. It doesn't look like two separate cables, especially since that'd be an extremely short HDMI cable (not that such cables don't exist, but they're not as common, and if you look at Atari's drug smuggling table, you can see the length of the HDMI cables they brought). It's also thicker than USB cables tend to be. Of course, I could be wrong, but I doubt it. The second one already has two USB cables plugged into the front, so I doubt that one either. Besides, the controllers are meant to be wireless, so it shouldn't matter either way.

Speaking of Kieren McCarthy, I really hope he writes another article about this disaster of an event. As for the "Atari VCS 3200 Crystal Ghost" (what are they, school children?), that thing looks like a disaster. Even if it works (which it appears to, to my surprise), that fan won't do jack. It's pointing upwards into a solid block of plastic, and the fan is piddly to begin with.

True, I didn't consider that, but the fact that they have everything on the "Home" screen makes those tabs redundant. I still doubt they'll actually have this UI on the final product. Assuming the final product comes out. Might be wise to change your "when" to an "if".

I'm still doing some digging, but I can't wait to post this. Atari's faking it again. I know, I know, what a shock. But let's have a look: What's this? It has a power cable plugged in, but the HDMI cable... doesn't plug into the system. It loops around and then goes down the left side. Hmmm... Oh, I know, it's actually attached to the VCS and the other cable is just a network cable! Maybe, but the angle that the HDMI cable goes in at makes no sense, and keep in mind that the HDMI cable would plug in where the supposed network cable is (i.e., if that was a network cable and not a single, looped HDMI cable, the middle and right-hand cables would have to have their positions swapped). Notice where the HDMI and Ethernet jacks are. The wrong way around for this CES video to be legit. Okay, so the VCS unit isn't the one display the video on the GAEMS portable display (seriously, fire whoever came up with that name). What about the rest we've seen? Ohohoho, you haven't seen ANYTHING yet. I was surprised just how every bloody frame of their Twitter video gets shadier as it goes. Here we go: Sandbox being its own app? A bit weird, since it's meant to boot into it when an SSD is plugged in, but it's technically possible to do it this way. Apparently they have a YouTube app though! Nobody tell Google. It's a secret from them. Wait a minute, once they scroll across twice, they get back to the same screen, but with... a slightly different arrangement? Is this a poor man's copy-and-paste job? As others have pointed out, Breakout's image is just the Google "Image Breakout". Come on Atari, why haven't you sued Google over this yet? Surely your lawyers can win THIS case! Next up, we have... repetition...? Sandbox, YouTube, Chromium (at least they got this part of their fake demo right), Redbox and Facebook. Wait, Redbox and Facebook have VCS apps too? Hot damn, this sounds amazing! Just don't tell Redbox and Facebook about them! They're also secrets. Or... wait, are these the secret partnerships that they couldn't talk about but quietly revealed in this video? AND they've got the first Redbox Linux app ever? Say it ain't so, Atari! But wait, there's more! Centipede is FREE, guys! FREE! Just in case you weren't happy with the copy that comes with Atari Vault. This one's just the regular Atari Vault though, not the Mega Vault (I thought Mega Atari Vault was previously something else, but I can't find reference to the previous name they gave their "enhanced" version, so I'm not sure on that one). Apparently, Asteroid and Antstream are free, too (I guess the Anstream app being free would make sense, but still). Not only that, but we also get Tempest 4000 for free! And... Hoops Clash? Which I earlier confused with Basketball Classics, the game they've been using in promo images, because I'm dumb. FYI, they're not the same game. Just in case anyone else was confused. Different basketball game. This one (Hoops Clash) is exclusive to iOS (there's not even an Android version - well, okay, there was, but it seems to have been removed). But it's now on the VCS too, guys! From the same company that brought you hot diarrhoea such as Star Trek Trexels (if you haven't played it and you love Star Trek, save yourself the trouble - it's another piss-poor mobile game and an insult to the franchise). Oh, oh, I know who the camera man is! It's MIKE KENNEDY! You can download Windows, Ubuntu AND Debian for free, as apps. Sure, the last two are free, Windows 10 is sort of free, and you could theoretically run them on this hardware (if this was actually running on the VCS hardware, which it isn't), but... Well, you get the idea. If there aren't at least a dozen red flags that have been risen by now, well, I'm sure we'll find more amongst these disaster to discuss. And with that, I'm going back to scrutinising all their photos and videos again, because I have nothing better to do. EDIT: Forgot to add this one. Apologies that it's crappy - it's the best I could do with the toaster-quality videos and images they've given us (probably on purpose) so that the cables can be "clearly" seen. It's hard to tell, but considering the HDMI cable is the "thick" cable, it looks like it might be connecting to something inside the cabinet instead of the machine itself. Like I said, hard to tell, but given the GAEMS one is BS, this probably is too.

Though I agree, that's not a quote from me. (But I can see how that happened, since I quoted @Lodmot). I'd like to think nobody is using Flash any more, but I know better...

Keep in mind that we don't know for sure that this is it booting up yet. Along with the probably fake UX display (the UX design being something they didn't even make, as we've already discussed), we don't know for sure that these machines are working and that, if they are, Atari's own hardware is inside. That, and I'm still expecting Mike Kennedy to pop out from behind the curtain.

I didn't realise Hoops Clash was on mobile. Would explain the simplistic controls. But to be fair, it's also on Steam and it does support Linux (not sure if it's a native port or just uses Proton). But yeah, their continued ignorance of their own properties is embarrassing and, indeed, shameful. Oh, and one other thing I wanted to add that just came to mind: Since nobody (sane) makes Linux GUIs in Unity, it seems likely to me that their Unity-made GUI is what they're showing at (their hotel room near) CES. In other words, what they actually used Unity to make was a glorified tech demo featuring what the GUI might look like if they ever make real software. Which I doubt they'll do.

Seems like they're further behind than even us haters thought. What an hilarious shitshow this is. I couldn't stop laughing at their new update. I lost it when they mentioned they're demonstrating "Sandbox Mode" with Windows. Congratulations guys, you brought a Windows PC to your hotel! On a somewhat related note, I got my first experience with a PowerA controller recently. My brother bought two wired controllers for his Switch - one from PDP and one from PowerA. The PDP controller is okay - a bit cheap and ultimately not as good as the official Pro Controller, but it's not horrible, and the stick design seems like an improvement over the official one. The PowerA controller is horrible. Feels like one of those cheap and nasty third-party PlayStation controllers from a couple of decades ago. Even if their Atari controllers are real, I wouldn't even pay $5 for the misfortune to use something of that non-existent quality. So anyway, who's up for reporting Atari to the CTA for outboarding~?

Unless you're a filthy vegan, and then you get no meat nor meaty updates at all. 😉 Oh, so he replied to my comment. Haha. What a twit. I realise I just ousted myself on reddit (in case I hadn't made it obvious in the past) but I don't care, and I doubt most others care either. If I post something there, it's usually just to wind people up. And I only check my notifications about once a month because I really can't be bothered seeing all the whiny replies, such as the guy who tried to tell me the Atari XT is real by using literally the only source on the web that says so (outside of a homebrew project name, I found nothing after looking for about an hour, so unless I'm missing something obvious, he's wrong). Besides all of this, I'd rather build an Atari machine from scratch for John Phelan than give a crap about what some loon - with a split tongue (see his Indiegogo avatar) and tattoos almost literally covering his whole body which he then uses as a dick-measuring contest on reddit (you can look at his post history - he seems to believe that more tats make you a superior person, or something like that) - thinks. Again, I feel sorry for the people of whom Atari took advantage, but NOT the Lucas Dingleberries and Werner Bros. types. Those guys are just... mean-spirited.

That sucks man. We've had neighbours like that in the past so I feel you. Just infuriates me how obnoxious people can be. Wouldn't kill them to reel it in a bit. Our current ones are also borderline animal abusers (long story, but in short, they are bad pet owners), which doesn't help. Unless you want to know what a depressed and possibly suicidal dog sounds like... "Sega has filled my mind with Pong." Welp, I guess Atari has found their next lawsuit victim! I haven't spent time looking into it in any great deal yet but the TL;DR is that Zotac's machines are more powerful than the VCS. The Ryzen 3200U is a mobile processor, so it's a tier above Ryzen Embedded.

Happy New Year from the future, taco lovers! Now I should sleep. It's almost 4am here. But of course, idiots down the road want to party. At least the neighbours finally went to bed. But not before I swore at them for the racket they made. I hate bad neighbours. What's everyone doing for New Year's Day? We have a family get-together every year (and it's an excuse for me to eat cheesecake - I know, it's not tacos, but I swear it's just as good). I love building PCs. I wish I could buy lots of DIY kits to make my own from scratch, like the various 6502 kits and various replicas, but most of them are way out of my price range. Heck, if anyone knows some good, cheap DIY kits I can grab and solder, please let me know (I'm thinking no more than $20 or $39 because I'm super-broke at the moment). But I'd never trust Atari SA to make a DIY kit. Maybe if they put out a build-your-own 2600 replica, I'd be interested. If it's good. And if it was, that would be infinitely more interesting to me than the tacobox. Yep, that looks pretty normal to me. Also keep in mind that, unless a company owns a factory (Atari obviously doesn't), bigger companies/orders are the priority, so when producing product before closing for CNY and upon restarting, smaller companies typically have to wait. Meaning, in this case, don't be surprised if it adds at least an extra month of a delay. Not that they'll be ready for production by April anyway. They're still way too far out from that. I guess I misunderstood, because I've been pronouncing his name correctly the whole time - I thought the cheese jokes were related to him being French, not a mispronunciation of his name.

Not wrong, per se, but I wouldn't give these goons money, especially for this... thing. The VCS specs are garbage for the price, frankly. Get a 3D-printed VCS case instead, and modify the CAD file to make it fit standard components (ITX) if necessary. Unless a poorly-designed system with worse cooling than a modern MacBook (i.e. BAD) and a cheaply-made plastic case are worth what's almost NZ$600 before shipping to you.

I agree - I was being facetious, in the vain of the avid VCS supporters.

I'm still slowly catching up with the ten pages or so that have popped up in the last week (busy time of year, you guys know how it is), but it looks like we're at 1000 pages already and still no sign of the VCS. I guess we won. Personally, I hope the prize is a lifetime supply of tacos. Or several lifetimes, because I'd probably finish a lifetime supply in a week at the rate I've been eating this week... Maybe someone should give John a lifetime supply of tacos. Poor guy seems like he needs it. I almost feel like we should do something nice for him, but I dunno. With all the crazies going on about murder and suicide, it's probably only a matter of time before the start trying to dox people, and I hope people like John aren't targeted (or anyone, for that matter). Gonna go see Star Wars with a friend tonight. I hear it's bad, but I'm doubtful that it can rival Atari's shitshow.