A few general newbie 8-bit questions

[Blackjack]

I was thinking of adding an Atari XE system to my collection and have a few questions about it and the 400/800 systems.

 

1) I want to play carts and not fool with a hard drive, do the 400/800 machines play carts too?

 

2) Does the XE lightgun work with any of the other systems?

 

3) Does the XE use the db9 style joysticks like the 2600?

 

Any general advice about the system is appreciated.

[mr-atari]

1) I want to play carts and not fool with a hard drive, do the 400/800 machines play carts too?

 

2) Does the XE lightgun work with any of the other systems?

 

3) Does the XE use the db9 style joysticks like the 2600?

 

1/ Yes

 

2/ Yes, but be aware. 100Hz TV-sets are not compatible!

I have no experiance with Plasma or LCD.

 

3/ Yes.

 

Later XE's have the buggy GTIA chip. Especially the 800XE-range.

 

Cheers,

Sijmen.

[Blackjack]

Cool, thanks for the info. 100hz TV's....... is that the standard television here in the US (like I have)?

[Gunstar]

I'm not postive, but I think maybe the new HDTV's are refreshing at 100hz, which would mean stay away from anything but a regular NTSC TV (60hz) or Pal TV (50hz) with the light gun. But, I think it would be possible to MODIFY the lightgun to work at 100hz.

[DracIsBack]

I was thinking of adding an Atari XE system to my collection and have a few questions about it and the 400/800 systems.

 

1) I want to play carts and not fool with a hard drive, do the 400/800 machines play carts too?

 

Correct, though 400/800's cannot play all the XE carts.

 

2) Does the XE lightgun work with any of the other systems?

 

The XE lightgun also works with the other XL/XE computers as well as the Atari 7800 and (I believe) the 2600 ... though I can't remember if any 2600 light gun games were commercially released.

 

[qupte]

3) Does the XE use the db9 style joysticks like the 2600?

 

Yes. in fact, it shipped with a white version of the original 2600 sticks.

[Blackjack]

No HDTV here, so I should be fine... great!