Atari v Commodore

[Bryan]

Yes, and they had VIC2 and SID.

Please.. the Vic was an utter failure in the US. The main market at the time.

 

*psst*

the video chip in the 64 is called VIC-II

Edited April 10, 2009 by Bryan

[atariksi]

I spent few hours on Youtube comparing C64 and A800 version of the same game.

 

In most of the case C64 games seems better.

 

And to quote one comment put by "sctriplefox" on a video :

 

I love the Atari but I have to admit that the C64 usually looks better in period games....Atari can look better only if the game is designed around the hardware. Good for tech demos and hobbyists, not so good for commercial products with limited time/budget.

 

 

So it tends to confirm that in the "real" life , the C64 is a better machine. More polyvalent, more homogeneous.

..

Err. So you sat around watched some videos and decided the C64 is a better machine although knowing Atari can do better if the software wasn't limited by time/budget/etc. That's mixing software with hardware. That's what I pointed out previously that limited experimental approach won't work. Even Apple had tons of software -- some of which never existed on C64 or Atari. So if most Apple software used it's 6 colors and Atari used 4 colors because they didn't feel they want to put time in to use/learn other techniques to generate more colors, does that make Apple computer better than Atari computer? No. That's an invalid argument.

 

>@Atariksi . Can i see somewhere what you do with your Atari? I'm new to this forums , may be your work is very famous here, but i have never seen what you did.

 

You missed out on everything! Okay, I'll give a brief summary of what I do in relation to this thread shortly...

[atariksi]

Crownland not finished? What do you mean?

 

Anyway, the discussion is pointless because, for one thing, comparing Atari and C64 is ridiculous. Too many hiccups and years lost on the Atari side where NOTHING was happening.

...

 

That's the wonderful thing-- that although practically NOTHING happened to the chipset since the 1978 design, it still is superior to C64.

[miker]

Here's .xex version of that Curtain made by atariksi some 50 pages ago.

 

Thanks, Seban!

CURTAIN.ZIP

[Heaven/TQA]

i guess I know why I do not remember that... it needs real hardware...

[atariksi]

What I meant before was repositioning for display on the next scanline, not repeating on the same scanline.

 

Obviously, we want to do this, otherwise you can hardly call 2 pixels moving nearby on adjacent scanlines seperate objects.

 

It's not as restricted as you are thinking for Xposition motion. You can swap DLI kernels so the xposition changes are such that closer x positions to video beam position get updated first. Taking a probabilistic model approach, you will find that most xpositions will have the full range working. And it's not 1920 sprites-- it's more than 2000. You have 59 cycles/cycles even with all DMAs enabled and using a mode like 320*240, 160*240*4, or 80*240*16. You can update 8 HPOSes that are different in 48 cycles. In 11 cycles, you can replicate one and/or two missiles/scanline without updating GRAFn since missiles offer two bit combinations and you can have all four combinations available as missile data. You can set up one missile and update one during one scanline and update two the next scanline. That's easily 360 additional sprites 8*1 for a total of 1920+360 = 2280 sprites/frame @60Hz NTSC. I suppose emkay's idea of 2880 sprites would work as well if we used narrow mode display and gain extra cycles or interleave ANTIC blank lines and almost double cycle time/scanline. Originally I gave calculation for replicating a player (not missile) in which case GRAFn also had to be updated along with it's HPOS and that gave 120 additional sprites/frame for a total of 1920+120 = 2040 sprites/frame @60Hz NTSC.

[Fröhn]

Please.. the Vic was an utter failure in the US. The main market at the time.

Yeps a real failure on the main market. With 18 million sold units... And with C128 selling another 4 million. May I mention that the entire A8 line sold just about 4 million too?

[youki]

Err. So you sat around watched some videos and decided the C64 is a better machine although knowing Atari can do better if the software wasn't limited by time/budget/etc. That's mixing software with hardware. That's what I pointed out previously that limited experimental approach won't work. Even Apple had tons of software -- some of which never existed on C64 or Atari. So if most Apple software used it's 6 colors and Atari used 4 colors because they didn't feel they want to put time in to use/learn other techniques to generate more colors, does that make Apple computer better than Atari computer? No. That's an invalid argument.

 

That's the problem , you say Atari can do better , the fact is that overall Atari don't do better in real life.

 

C64 software was also limited by time/budget/etc... business law applies also to c64.

 

I just saw the curtain.xex , i guess it needs a real hardware , because on my emulator , i see strange behavior and then a simple image changing its palette.

 

In a certan way the Apple 2 could be considered as better than XL and C64. His extensibility was exceptionnal.

 

 

So you can argue, it is because the C64 is easier to program than the XL. You need more to time to invest in learning to exploit theXL machine etc...etc..

it would just prove that the C64 is smarter designed.

 

A little like if you compare the Sega Saturn and the Playstation 1 . The hardware of the Saturn was better, but so hard to program and badly designed that the Playstation win and can be considered as better. (because better game, more game, more sells). (netherless i prefer the saturn)

[dwhyte]

I'm surely becoming sick of this thread... It was originally about which games were better on the A8 than the C64... If you gentlemen really want to make this an issue then...

 

I'm an A8 person... Through and through... But show me a demo that's better on the A8 than

. Numen doesn't even come close; let alone work within 64 kilobytes. I love my A8's... But face it everyone... The C64 is the better machine.

 

How do you like them apples? I challenge anyone to prove me wrong... Not with words or technical statistics, but with software... Someone or some group please code a demo that will murder the C64 and tie this thread off...

Edited April 11, 2009 by dwhyte

[drac030]

But show me a demo that's better on the A8 than

.

 

dwhyte, almost any demo (even on C-64) is better than "Edge of Disgrace". This already was discussed, the demo is simply boring, and this feature kills it as an attractive production.

 

I see this phenomenon (a boring demo advertised as the best one) as this:

 

1) to the C-64 people, the demo shows the strong points of the coders (open borders and still have something moving)

 

2) to Atari people, the demo simply shows the weak points of the machine (limited palette, and lack of CPU power)

 

To prove the 2nd, just look at the girl's face appearing somewhere in the EoD. To C-64 people it probably looks nice because they're used to this style. But where on earth have you seen a girl, whose face is violet, green and pale? She looks like a dead body recovered from water after a week or so. Etc.

Edited April 11, 2009 by drac030

[dwhyte]

But show me a demo that's better on the A8 than

.

 

dwhyte, almost any demo (even on C-64) is better than "Edge of Disgrace". This already was discussed, the demo is simply boring, and it kills it as an attractive production.

 

I see this phenomenon (a boring demo advertised as the best one) as this:

 

1) to the C-64 people, the demo shows the strong points of the coders (open borders and still have something moving)

 

2) to Atari people, the demo simply shows the weak points of the machine (limited palette, and lack of CPU power)

 

To prove the 2nd, just look at the girl's face appearing somewhere in the EoD. To C-64 people it probably looks nice because they're used to this style. But where on earth have you seen a girl, whose face is violet, green and pale? She looks like a dead body recovered from water after a week or so. Etc.

 

I find that demo simply amazing drac030... I'm sorry that you don't... I must admit that the plasmas are a little boring, but the music is astounding... And about the girl's face appearing green: art is a fickle thing, isn't it... I also wasn't advertising it as the best C64 demo out there... I only find it merely better to watch than Numen... Which, by all standards, is the best demo on our machine...

 

I'll still take an 800XL over a C64 anyday... But it's high time for the masters of our beloved system to code a demo that will make any C64 lover's jaw drop... And have it run on no more than a stock 64 kilobyte A8...

Edited April 11, 2009 by dwhyte

[drac030]

I find that demo simply amazing drac030... I'm sorry that you don't... I must admit that the plasmas are a little boring, but the music is astounding...

 

Funny, but after thinking a little bit on why I haven't managed to get to the second part (the first part was so boring that I gave up after it), I blamed mostly the monotonous soundtrack.

And about the girl's face appearing green: art is a fickle thing, isn't it...

 

An art, IMHO, is when you have 16 mln colors, but select green, violet and pale on purpose. But if you have only green, violet and pale, calling this an "art" is hm... politics.

 

But it's high time for the masters of our beloved system to code a demo that will make any C64 lover's jaw drop... And have it run in no more than a stock 64 kilobyte A8...

 

I doubt that C-64 people can appreciate any A8 demo/effect, simply because it is not C-64 (like: "320k A8 is not a >true atari< anymore", but a modded 1541 is probably still a true 1541 you can be proud of as an user of CBM products).

 

But that's another thing, for now just one question: why does it have to run on a stock 64KB A8? "Stock C-64" is the C-64 scene standard, not ours. Why we have to limit the productions to someone's else standards? Or, why C-64 demos may use full 64 KB if e.g. ZX Spectrum is limited to 48k?

[dwhyte]

Funny, but after thinking a little bit on why I haven't managed to get to the second part (the first part was so boring that I gave up after it), I blamed mostly the monotonous soundtrack.

 

lol... To each their own...

 

An art, IMHO, is when you have 16 mln colors, but select green, violet and pale on purpose. But if you have only green, violet and pale, calling this an "art" is hm... politics.

 

huh? Aren't all demos a form of art?

 

But that's another thing, for now just one question: why does it have to run on a stock 64KB A8? "Stock C-64" is the C-64 scene standard, not ours. Why we have to limit the productions to someone's else standards? Or, why C-64 demos may use full 64 KB if e.g. ZX Spectrum is limited to 48k?

 

Because I know we could do it. And... It would run on a lot more real machines as well...

 

Just a quick question as I view you as one of the masters, drac030... Could custom SIO loading and RMT be mixed together? Or am I "chasing a rainbow" with that idea? Rybags' interlace techniques also seem to fit in 64k... Hmmm.... I better stop myself now before I start sounding like Carmel...

Edited April 11, 2009 by dwhyte

[drac030]

Could custom SIO loading and RMT be mixed together?

 

The SIO uses the Pokey AUDF channels to generate the baudrate. I don't know this, I would experiment if I needed, but it is possible, that a single channel has too low resolution to generate the correct baudrate, so you would need to use a pair, like the OS does (AUDF3/4). Also, the base clock has to be set to a constant value (the OS uses 1,773 MHz), so that the baudrate remains stable.

 

This limits the soundtrack to two 8-bit channels (plus possibly third digitized one). Additionally the 6502 should have enough time to receive the byte from the SERIN (at 19200 a new byte comes from the serial bus every ~920 clocks).

[atariksi]

Err. So you sat around watched some videos and decided the C64 is a better machine although knowing Atari can do better if the software wasn't limited by time/budget/etc. That's mixing software with hardware. That's what I pointed out previously that limited experimental approach won't work. Even Apple had tons of software -- some of which never existed on C64 or Atari. So if most Apple software used it's 6 colors and Atari used 4 colors because they didn't feel they want to put time in to use/learn other techniques to generate more colors, does that make Apple computer better than Atari computer? No. That's an invalid argument.

 

That's the problem , you say Atari can do better , the fact is that overall Atari don't do better in real life.

 

C64 software was also limited by time/budget/etc... business law applies also to c64.

...

But you forgot to say that right? Your msg was supporting Atari but you were making a conclusion against it. It's called biased analysis. I can watch my some applications running on C64 and some on Atari using and say Atari is better. Your sample is biased. You can watch 4000 C64 demos/games that use say wider sprites and higher resolution and watch Atari games/demos that don't exploit it's strengths. How will you know whether you have watched all the hardware aspects of both machines in your sampling and whether they take into account all the hardware aspects of both machines. You are just speculating and blindly following.

 

>I just saw the curtain.xex , i guess it needs a real hardware , because on my emulator , i see strange behavior and then a simple image changing its palette.

 

Sorry, somethings even PCs have a hard time doing things that can be done on Atari like timing things and playing multifrequency DAC channels. But you still maintain your conclusion although you have NOT seen every possible software on both machines nor is that a way to ascertain the full functionality of both machines' hardware. That's only a demo. The real thing is MPDOS which you probably never heard of either along with tons of other Atari software from others. Atari is easier to program but many software don't even use GTIA modes. Here how go try this on C64:

 

10 GRAPHICS 9

20 FOR T=0 TO 79

30 COLOR T/5:PLOT T,0:DR. T,191:NEXT T

40 IF PEEK(53279)<>6 THEN 40

 

>In a certan way the Apple 2 could be considered as better than XL and C64. His extensibility was exceptionnal.

 

There you have it. Existing software does not make a computer better or worse. You need to learn the difference between hardware and software and if you don't care about that then you still have a problem diagnosing an unbiased sample of software.

 

>So you can argue, it is because the C64 is easier to program than the XL. You need more to time to invest in learning to exploit theXL machine etc...etc..

it would just prove that the C64 is smarter designed.

 

I did not state that. The msg you quoted was stating Atari was superior but people did not spend time/budget/etc. to use it to its full potential. I suggest you read the thread-- we have been discussing A8 software which is better than C64 software (as per topic) and we have PROVEN many aspects of Atari hardware being superior to C64-- the opposite of your claim. You are off topic and biased.

 

>A little like if you compare the Sega Saturn ...

 

No it isn't. You misunderstood the very quote you used.

[atariksi]

Here's .xex version of that Curtain made by atariksi some 50 pages ago.

 

Thanks, Seban!

 

But he's running on emulator where even C64 interlaced graphics look better than the real machine and can show 128 colors. Where loading is super fast and bit by bit transfers of the 1541 don't come into play. Where you can do a warm reset easily but doesn't exist on real machine. Where even the 1 Mhz barrier can be broken easily. etc. etc.

 

That demo by the way is showing 23 colors per scanline in overscan mode impossible to do on C64. That demo is playing back audio at various frequencies using DAC output-- something Atari has more of and plays at higher frequencies than C64. That demo was targetted at 16K machines so it runs fine on Atari 400 with 16K. Etc. etc.

[atariksi]

I spent few hours on Youtube comparing C64 and A800 version of the same game.

 

In most of the case C64 games seems better.

 

And to quote one comment put by "sctriplefox" on a video :

 

I love the Atari but I have to admit that the C64 usually looks better in period games....Atari can look better only if the game is designed around the hardware. Good for tech demos and hobbyists, not so good for commercial products with limited time/budget.

 

 

So it tends to confirm that in the "real" life , the C64 is a better machine. More polyvalent, more homogeneous.

..

Err. So you sat around watched some videos and decided the C64 is a better machine although knowing Atari can do better if the software wasn't limited by time/budget/etc. That's mixing software with hardware. That's what I pointed out previously that limited experimental approach won't work. Even Apple had tons of software -- some of which never existed on C64 or Atari. So if most Apple software used it's 6 colors and Atari used 4 colors because they didn't feel they want to put time in to use/learn other techniques to generate more colors, does that make Apple computer better than Atari computer? No. That's an invalid argument.

 

>@Atariksi . Can i see somewhere what you do with your Atari? I'm new to this forums , may be your work is very famous here, but i have never seen what you did.

 

You missed out on everything! Okay, I'll give a brief summary of what I do in relation to this thread shortly...

 

Okay, here's a summary of MPDOS if you are unbiased enough to read it:

 

It's a software that lets you do distributive processing for Atari and Amiga. I'm only going to describe ONE example of software running on 16K A8 w/PC as server for CDROM reads/writes/decompressing:

 

(1) Data is read from CD-- pictures, text, audio, code, etc. and decompressed on the fly and transmitted from PC parallel ports to Atari through it's joystick ports after booting up Atari using SIO. You never have to touch Atari.

(2) Atari reads data through joystick ports (nibble mode or byte mode)

(3) Atari executes the command from PC-- show graphics, play audio, display text, strike a key, execute code, etc.

(4) Atari plays audio at up to 21Khz using streaming audio

(5) Atari shows video frames at up to 2frames/second using streaming video; graphics converted on-the-fly to gray scale (as of now-- working on ANTIC K)

(6) If needed Atari reads on more code from PC side and executes that on the fly.

 

Atari plays back entire 2 GB of multimedia CDROM data originally written for PC. You can't do any of the above on C64--

(1) C64 won't let you boot from external source without writing some stuff like "LOAD "*",8,1".

(2) Joystick port r/w on C64 has to be nibble mode and 1.79X slower even in nibble mode and much much slower if I use BYTE mode on Atari.

(3) OS on C64 too restricted to buffer up keys; in fact keyboard interferes with joystick data i/o.

(4) Can't play back multifreq audio DAC data on C64

(5) Can't display gray scale images what to speak of enhanced modes like ANTIC K

(6) Even if I want to show colored images and play single channel DAC audio, C64 CPU is too slow to be processing data buffering from PC end at reasonable rate.

[Allas]

I'm surely becoming sick of this thread... It was originally about which games were better on the A8 than the C64... If you gentlemen really want to make this an issue then...

 

I'm an A8 person... Through and through... But show me a demo that's better on the A8 than

. Numen doesn't even come close; let alone work within 64 kilobytes. I love my A8's... But face it everyone... The C64 is the better machine.

 

How do you like them apples? I challenge anyone to prove me wrong... Not with words or technical statistics, but with software... Someone or some group please code a demo that will murder the C64 and tie this thread off...

 

Edge of disgrace is a nice demo to view, well worked. But as i can see 95% on it, could be done better on a Atari machine (some of them had been did it), rest of 5% who knows. Really it's not a challenge. Some portion of the demo open the borders, and that a great feature for a C64, but not for Atari.

[Bryan]

Could custom SIO loading and RMT be mixed together?

 

The SIO uses the Pokey AUDF channels to generate the baudrate. I don't know this, I would experiment if I needed, but it is possible, that a single channel has too low resolution to generate the correct baudrate, so you would need to use a pair, like the OS does (AUDF3/4). Also, the base clock has to be set to a constant value (the OS uses 1,773 MHz), so that the baudrate remains stable.

 

This limits the soundtrack to two 8-bit channels (plus possibly third digitized one). Additionally the 6502 should have enough time to receive the byte from the SERIN (at 19200 a new byte comes from the serial bus every ~920 clocks).

There are several A8 demos that play music while loading. They sound like they're using 2 voices. I think Intel Outside is one of them.

 

As far as demos go, I think this is one of the areas the A8 excels at and probably the best way to argue A8 superiority.

 

The A8 can generate a lot of interesting visual effects that aren't that useful for games. I think Edge of Disgrace is a very clean and polished presentation, but doesn't contain anything really shocking.

[Bryan]

>In a certan way the Apple 2 could be considered as better than XL and C64. His extensibility was exceptionnal.

There you have it. Existing software does not make a computer better or worse. You need to learn the difference between hardware and software and if you don't care about that then you still have a problem diagnosing an unbiased sample of software.

*psst*

I believe by extensibility he was referring to it's expandability via internal slots, not software.

[atariksi]

>In a certan way the Apple 2 could be considered as better than XL and C64. His extensibility was exceptionnal.

There you have it. Existing software does not make a computer better or worse. You need to learn the difference between hardware and software and if you don't care about that then you still have a problem diagnosing an unbiased sample of software.

*psst*

I believe by extensibility he was referring to it's expandability via internal slots, not software.

 

That would make his argument worse. I was thinking he's still sticking to the point that software observations make the difference for him. All of a sudden one hardware aspect does in both systems (given the fact that Apple software mostly works with standard Apple hardware).

[atariksi]

>In a certan way the Apple 2 could be considered as better than XL and C64. His extensibility was exceptionnal.

There you have it. Existing software does not make a computer better or worse. You need to learn the difference between hardware and software and if you don't care about that then you still have a problem diagnosing an unbiased sample of software.

*psst*

...

*psst*, your first *psst* at top of this page is in invisible ink.

[atariksi]

Could custom SIO loading and RMT be mixed together?

 

The SIO uses the Pokey AUDF channels to generate the baudrate. I don't know this, I would experiment if I needed, but it is possible, that a single channel has too low resolution to generate the correct baudrate, so you would need to use a pair, like the OS does (AUDF3/4). Also, the base clock has to be set to a constant value (the OS uses 1,773 MHz), so that the baudrate remains stable.

 

This limits the soundtrack to two 8-bit channels (plus possibly third digitized one). Additionally the 6502 should have enough time to receive the byte from the SERIN (at 19200 a new byte comes from the serial bus every ~920 clocks).

 

If you externally clock the SIO, you can still use all the AUDF registers for other things and increase SIO transfer rate as well.

[Fröhn]

I doubt that C-64 people can appreciate any A8 demo/effect, simply because it is not C-64 (like: "320k A8 is not a >true atari< anymore"

I own 3 different A8s and none of them can be used to watch those 320k demos. And when I look at eBay, 99% of all A8s sold there are without 320k too.

 

but a modded 1541 is probably still a true 1541 you can be proud of as an user of CBM products).

What modded 1541s?

 

But that's another thing, for now just one question: why does it have to run on a stock 64KB A8? "Stock C-64" is the C-64 scene standard, not ours.

Stock A8 is also the Atari standard. Only you few active people have 320k, but all those people with their old A8 in the attic cannot watch that 320k stuff. With that 320k "standard" you are locking out a lot of people making your scene smaller than it could be.

[drac030]

If you externally clock the SIO, you can still use all the AUDF registers for other things and increase SIO transfer rate as well.

 

Possibly, but I was referring to the internally clocked SIO and standard storage, like a serial disk drive. There of course could be non-standard storage devices, which allow/take into account external clocking or do not work via SIO at all, so during the transfer you of course can do anything you want with the AUDF registers...