Urchlay

K-razy Shootout is a Berzerk knockoff, and Berzerk has been ported to everything. Not sure whether we're counting clones, knockoffs, unlicensed ports or not. Space Dungeon was an arcade game first... I dunno about Zybex.

Gauntletak! Were Alley Cat or Necromancer ever ported to any other system? I know 2600 and ST versions of Star Raiders were made... how about Star Raiders II, aka The Last Starfighter? (Yes, there was an unreleased "The Last Starfighter" for the 2600, but it's a totally different game, eventually released as Solaris) Rainbow Walker? There was an arcade version, but the arcade cabinet actually had Atari 8-bit hardware inside... ROTO? Does Drop Zone count? AFAIK it never existed on anything but the Atari, but it was a clone of Stargate, which has been ported to lots of platforms.

Someone who's already downloaded the zip files should create a bittorrent, to avoid eating up Bill's bandwidth and making it take everyone 3 days to download 3 files... any volunteers?

The keyboard drawer in a typical desk will fall out of the desk if you put anything as heavy as an 800XL on it... it probably won't happen right away, oh no, it'll wait until you least expect it, and then drop your vintage computer on the floor... Seriously, I wouldn't trust a keyboard tray even with a modern lightweight keyboard, I've never used one that didn't fall out. It's not just modern ones that have this problem: my 800XL really did get dropped on the floor in about 1987 (and it was then that I found out I'd forgotten to put the screws back in after taking the XL apart, so it split in two pieces... no permanent damage tho)

By any chance, is the 800XL board socketed? (I know the 130XEs never are...)

If you look at what the competition was when the PET 2001 first came out... its main competitors were the KIM-1 (later bought by Commodore) and the SYM, which had "keyboards" that were more like the keypad on a home security system, with 16 hex digits and maybe 4 keys to do things like break the running program, advance to the next address, single-step... the PET keyboard was light-years ahead, since it had a full set of alphanumerics, punctuation, shift, spacebar... Of course, its other big competition was the original Apple II, which had a decent keyboard. The PET was supposed to be the less expensive alternative... The pre-Atari home computer era was pretty interesting, been reading old issues of Micro magazine here: http://6502.org/documents/publications/micro/

I seem to recall the H: device not supporting wildcards... you tried copying a single file, typing its full name, instead of just *.DCM?

Compiles and runs fine on Slackware Linux 10.2 and FreeBSD 6.3. One minor feature you might add: use "DROPZONE_corrected.atr" as the output filename, and/or take a 2nd argument to set the output filename.

Short answer: it doesn't make any difference to you, as a user. Long answer: it's a custom chip that replaces several other chips from earlier revisions of the 800XL... which brings the part count down (and presumably the per-unit cost). It doesn't add any new features, but it might mean you have to use a different 256K RAM upgrade than a non-Freddie XL would use (not sure about that, but if you're ever considering doing a RAM upgrade, you might want to find out).

Something like the FujiBoink demo? http://www.langesite.com/atari/Holmes/Holm.../f/FUJIBOIN.COM You'd want to get rid of the checkered background and the sounds though...

A 1200XL Fuji logo wouldn't make a very good screen saver... the whole point of a screensaver is to, well, save your screen (from having an image burned in). You'd end up with a permanent Atari logo burned into your screen... actually maybe that's not such a bad thing

I tossed out a couple of old 820s last year... they had gotten wet when the basement flooded, and I thought about trying to restore them, but realistically, even if I got one working, would I *really* be patient enough to sit and listen to it grind through program listings at 20 characters/second (or whatever the speed was)? Damn dude. Back then, $1200 was real money. You could have bought a nice used car... paid your rent for a few months... actually I dunno what $1200 was really worth in 1979/1980, I was just a kid.

That, and I couldn't get rsynth to sound even remotely like the Speakjet... I tried again with a different speech library (flite, "Festival Lite"), but it bloated the executable even more, and still sounded nothing like the Speakjet. My third attempt was to take samples from an actual Speakjet chip. Unfortunately that didn't work out, because the Speakjet has a wide range of settable parameters (pitch, speed, etc). To emulate it properly, I'd have to either take a sample of each phoneme at each possible setting (*lots* of samples), or else figure out exactly how the settings affect the sounds, and do real-time digital signal processing in Stella to do the same effects (I don't know enough about DSP programming, I was in the middle of researching it when real-life stuff intruded on my world in a major way...) I've still got my Atarivox + its USB adaptor. I might take a crack at coding this... been thinking about Stella lately, maybe it's time to get back to working on it.

Don't be insulted if you already knew this but... You did actually hook it up to the Atari and try to CLOAD or something? I know at least one person who didn't know he had to do that, and threw away a tape drive that (probably) worked fine, because the Play button didn't do anything... he wasn't aware that the Play function is under the control of the Atari, and the Play button doesn't do anything unless the Atari tells it to... Probably you already knew that, but if you didn't, well, it's an easy mistake to make

Well, all 800XLs have the Luma output. Some 800XLs (later models, not sure if they're all XLFs or not) have the chroma output hooked up. If you get an 800XL that doesn't have chroma, it's a one-wire modification (literally, solder one wire to a point on the motherboard, and the other end of it to the chroma pin on the video jack). Alternately, you can do what I used to do years ago on an 800XL: hook the Atari's composite output to the monitor's chroma input. It works fine on a Commodore 1702, and I never noticed any degraded picture quality (maybe I'd notice it now, I've become much more picky over the years).

Yep. Here's the pinout of the Atari monitor connector: http://www.atariarchives.org/mapping/appendix15.php I don't have a 130XE, but I do use a Commodore 1702 (with rear S-video connector) with my 800XLs and 1200XL (same connector in back), and it works great. I made my own cable, but you can buy one (someone on this forum will know where and chime in, I hope).

Good question. I haven't found a CX4008 yet... though Space Invaders for the 800 was released as CXL4008. Were there any instances of two actual releases with CX and CXL part numbers, but with the same number? It's hard to tell from the compressed JPEG, but in the PDF version of that ad, the part number CX4008 has a little (d) next to it, which I'm assuming means "disk"... which makes sense, since it has a CX part number instead of CXL. It's probably a safe assumption that the game was planned to be bigger than 8K... back then, Atari wasn't making 16K carts, only 8K, and I'm betting that any game they could have released on cart, they would have (since the 810 was so *expensive* back then). I wonder how close the game was to being completed... Unfortunately, if it's a disk, there won't be any proto/lab-loaner carts of this one surfacing (and disks are less durable than carts, even EPROM carts). Maybe Joe DeCuir hung on to a copy of his work-in-progress on disk, or possibly it's in Curt Vendel's archive o' Atari somewhere...? Or, maybe someone reformatted the disk, not knowing/caring what was on it

Here's an old ad from Micro magazine, issue 16 (Sep 1979)... it's probably not the first ever Atari 400/800 ad in print, but definitely the oldest I've seen. (Full issue of the magazine is available at 6502.org's magazine archive: http://6502.org/documents/publications/micro/ ) Seems the 8-bit line was plagued with vaporware right from the start. Take a look at the part I've crudely drawn a circle around... CX4008, Super Bug. Since I'd never heard of this game, I went searching and came up with this interview with Joe DeCuir: http://www.digitpress.com/library/intervie...joe_decuir.html It's well worth reading the whole interview, but here's the bit about Super Bug: For those who don't know it (I didn't), Super Bug is an early Atari/Kee Games B&W arcade machine: http://www.system16.com/hardware.php?id=758&page=1#2950 Also of interest: CXL4005 is listed in the ad as "Life", but was actually released as "Video Easel" (though it does still play Conway's game of Life).

I've come to the conclusion that Atari got it right the first time, with the 800, and everything else was downhill from there. The 800 has enough memory to run most stuff, and can play 4-player games, and has *gorgeous* composite and S-video output. Everything else is "close, but no cigar": 600XL - needs RAM upgrade and (in the US anyway) lacks composite/s-video output 800XL - most of these are missing the chroma signal, so s-video doesn't work 1200XL - *horrid* video unless you mod it (clearpic/supervideo), plus it's missing the chroma signal XE series - cheap construction, crappy keyboard (but decent video) But really, the 800 isn't perfect either, because too much software is out there that only runs on XL/XE machines. Maybe warerat's XL-compatible 800 will be the One True Atari... but it's still a mod. There never was a definitive "best" Atari 8-bit computer IMO, they all have annoyances.

...not having to hold down Option at boot is one of the best things about using a 1200XL, though...

There's no built-in BASIC, but the 1200XL still uses the same PORTB bits as the 800XL does for enabling/disabling the self-test ROM and the main OS ROM (to get at the RAM under it, since the 1200XL has 64K like the 800XL). Two of the other bits control the L1 and L2 LEDs that only exist on the 1200XL... a lot of 256K memory upgrades for the 1200 leave the LEDs connected, so you can actually watch the LEDs and see when extended RAM is being accessed. If you have the revised edition of "Mapping the Atari", Appendix 12 explains exactly what PORTB bits the 1200XL uses... I'd point you to the web version at atariarchives.org, but it seems to be down at the moment. It's short enough I might as well paste the relevant stuff here... So in the 1200XL, bits 0 and 7 work the same as in an 800XL. Bit 1 does nothing (no BASIC to disable), bits 2 and 3 are the LEDs, and 4-6 do nothing.

If you get nothing else, get an SIO2PC cable. This allows you to download disk images and run them (using your PC to emulate an Atari disk or tape drive), and to connect your Atari to the internet (telnet BBSes, IRC, even text-based web browsers), and Atari programs can print to modern printers with it, too. If you're looking for original stuff, you probably want at least one disk drive, probably a 1050, preferably with one of the upgrades (Happy, US Doubler, Speedy). There never was an Atari-branded monitor made for the 8-bits, but you probably do want a monitor with s-video (separate chroma/luma) inputs, for best picture quality. I use a Commodore 1702, though these are getting hard to come by. An 850 (or clone, like the P:R: Connection) will give you standard serial and parallel ports, but an SIO2PC cable can double as a regular serial port, too. You probably won't find many of the old Atari-specific printers still in working condition, these days... I don't know whether you're interested in hardware mods for the 800XL, but if you are, the first thing you'll want to do is either the Clearpic or Super Video 2.1. Both are pretty easy if you know how to solder, and both result in a dramatic improvement in video quality. Other useful mods: 256K (or more) RAM upgrade, 32-in-1 OS, internal SIO2PC, internal MyIDE... of course there's something to be said for keeping the Atari in its original condition, too. Better get two of them

True. In fact the first ever Atari hardware mod I did was to remove the internal speaker from my 400, 'cause I got tired of hearing keyclicks.

A few more carts to add to the list: Defender Millipede Star Raiders In fact, Star Raiders was so amazing back when I first saw it, it convinced me (and my parents) I had to have an Atari computer...

Maybe you're remembering using a 1200XL? On the 1200XL, if you boot with no cartridge/disk/tape, you get an Atari logo screen. To run the self-test, you press Help while the logo screen is showing.