YSG2020

Perhaps this has been asked before, but I haven't see it... Is it possible to port and graphically improve this even more for an 8-bit computer/5200 version? In the works? Thx.

Looking to buy a working cased RAM320XL if you have one you’d sell. Thanks.

Obviously. The commodores outsold the Atari’s because they were cheaper and far better marketed. The RAM320XL is exactly what I’m looking for. Thx.

Yup. Sorry. I’m not looking for a diagnostic tool, which I’m sure Syscheck works well for. Only interested in purchasing a 320XL from somebody who would sell theirs. Thanks.

Perhaps someone who has one but then upgraded to 1mB and is not using nor needing the 320 any longer?

I remember a place here in the early 80s called ToyCity and it was a big box warehouse retailer similar to ToysRUs. Had a long wall of extensive new Atari 8Bit hardware and software new in boxes stacked to the high ceiling. When I was a kid I used to just drool at it all in contemplation. Big bucks for Atari back then though, so I had to limit and strategize my purchasing requests from my parents. It’s fun collecting it all now though as an adult and sharing it with my kids. They think playing ‘Pictionary’ on the Touch Tablet with AtariArtist is a lot of fun. My daughter submits AtariWriter created school reports printed on our 1025 dot matrix and her teacher is confused and bewildered by the retro-vintage print and fanfold paper. We dialed into a BBS last week with the 1030 modem and I showed them text based adventure games - They thought that was “retarded” compared to Fortnite. Lol.

Totally agree. Those new Atari Package bundles, ram carts, and company oem blank diskettes are neat to see again. Last time I saw those was 35 years ago in the store retail Atari display booth. Not mention the stack of new 400/800s still in their boxes!

Just came across this vid on YouTube this morning. Thought I’d share for those who might not have seen it. Ultimate Atari 8-Bit hoarder? There’s some rare stuff (NIB) in this terrific hardware collection. Not sure why or point of so many duplicates though? Besides Best and B&C, can anybody on this forum beat this collection? Lol.

If anybody has one of these in a case and working and would sell it, I’m interested. Thankyou.

It’s clunky, not elegant and poor aesthetic design. Does that clarify for you? Lol. The ENTIRE reason for the computer and video game crash of the mid 80s was because of a lack of quality and control in the flood of 3rd party software and hardware that hit the market. I’m not saying the Syscheck is junk - It probably works great. It’s just poorly designed and engineered from a visual standpoint.

Adding the +5V is easy and quick. Syscheck is a messy piece of hardware. I like the 320xl - Simple, easy, and small. Perfect solution. If anybody would like to sell theirs, I’ll buy it. Thx.

Anybody have a working RAM320XL they would sell? That is exactly what I’m looking for. Thx.

If only we had known in 1983 that the XL line was obsolete and effectively cancelled by the time we bought them. It explains a lot about why so little after 1984 was produced for them and virtually nothing from Atari. Atari did develop a lot of great stuff for the XLs, all of which went into the trash.

I was thinking something more simple and elegant like the Commodore had with the RAM Expander cart, to just plug into the PBI on the back of an XL. That Syscheck looks like a fugly convoluted contraption and the Rambo requires soldering. No wonder the Commodores outsold our Ataris so immensely - The 3rd party hardware support for the Commodores was much better and more available.

It’s a shame the PBI port on the back of the XL’s was never fully adopted and utilized by developers as an expansion port like it was on the Commodores. Backward hardware compatibility concerns to the 400/800 seems to have been a major strategic architecture error and downfall for Atari. The Atari was a better computer than the C64 in many ways, but was not competitively priced until too late, and was marketed horribly to a confused public that thought it was a game machine.

I’m sure this has likely been covered infinite times before somewhere in these forums, but I searched and couldn’t find a straightforward answer. What is the simplest way to upgrade my 800XL to 128kB of RAM? Something tells me it’s likely not just as simple as replacing my eight RAM chips with ones twice their capacity. Thx. Also, why was the XL’s Parallel Expansion Bus Port on the back of the machine rarely utilized for things such as RAM, 80 col, and peripheral expansions? I can’t recall ever seeing anything made to plug into this seemingly very potentially capable expansion port. Seems like Commodore 3rd party vendors made much better use of this port in their machines back in the day for a multitude of cool expansion accessories and upgrades. I guess everyone just used SIO, cart, and joystick game ports on the Ataris instead? A plug in RAM expander seems like an ideal no-brainer cart for this port if possible.

Yes, they are backwards in the instructions for the 800XL. Need to be swapped around.

Does Last Word support the XEP80 for editing or only for print preview or not at all? Also, yes those gas plasma displays are super rare now and very collectable. They are the same screens used in pinball games but nobody makes one anymore as a computer monitor display. All of the old ones are either TTL or proprietary connections - Very hard to hook up to them without an array of adapters and video processors to match. I’d buy a P70 just to rip the screen off it though if I could find one cheap and working! Other than the IBMs they came only on a few select Toshiba and Compaq ‘portables’. Prone to burn in, but essentially a miniaturized Nixie tube monitor. There’s nothing vintage-retro computing cooler than that.

This is an interesting thread. I also just installed the UAV and finally got it working properly on my Rev D 800XL (Display quality looks amazing now)... However, I am having intermittent booting on the Atari now. Sometimes it boots up fine and into Basic. Other times it mostly just crashes on boot up and the screen freezes or goes black or displays junk. Cartridges all work fine. Could this be a problem with the ROMS (ROM check says they OK), or an issue the UAV is causing? I'm starting to wonder what I fried on my motherboard during my UAV install. Anybody else had this issue?

You know what would look awesome... An XEP80 with the TTL mod done, and then adapted to an ominous looking TTL orange/red gas plasma display like on the IBM P70. I'd love to see someone figure this out. It would be the ultimate super rare holy grail vintage monitor setup on the Atari XEP80. If someone can do this, please post photos and a how-to for the TTL adapter to the IBM gas plasma screen.

I was thinking to use a powered converter box and feed the improved composite or svid signal into an SVGA crt. Possible?? Or is there not enough native video circuitry in the XEP80 to work with?

Yup. It’s because of backwards instructions now printed and distributed in the UAV pkg. I let them know so they can correct or this will keep happening. Lol. Glad it’s fixed. The SVideo out to my SVGA crt monitor looks incredible now. Super sharp and clear.

Yup it’s fixed. Lol. Thankyou! So either the UAV manual is incorrect or the wiring needs swapped for a rev d motherboard in an 800xl.

Wow Flassjazzcat, if that is seriously the problem, then it means UAV’s printed instruction installation manual is incorrect, as my connections are exactly per their guidance.

Does anybody know if it’s possible to improve the XEP80’s composite video output? Does it have a 4050 chip inside it? Would installing a UAV make any improvement? Or is the XEP80 completely limited to its existing poor quality composite out? thx.