Atari XL/XE vs ZX Spectrum... And the winner is...

[Mazzspeed]

15 minutes ago, Mclaneinc said:

I worry when we start making Frankenstein machines ie machines that never saw the light of day bar far from finished design proto's. I just look the add on's for real machines that fail to get the support they deserve and then wonder who is really going to invest in one of these new / old creations let alone develop for them especially at the expected prices..

There are video's of a working C65, it's actually quite impressive, however it's not really doing anything as there's no software for it in C65 mode. Hardware 80 columns was nice...

 

However the real C65 has a 'go64' mode like the C128, I assume that's fairly compatible with existing software.

 

The one I saw working cost the guy around $200.00 when Commodore went under, he sold it not long ago to a guy in Italy for $15,000. Lucky bugger.

[Mclaneinc]

Nice money...I liked the idea of the C65 but it was too close a hybrid...

 

But more on the topic I think the real winner here is US, we get to enjoy all these weird and wonderful machines, there's gold standard stuff on all of them and also a load of old rubbish too but that's why we love this hobby.

[Mazzspeed]

27 minutes ago, Mclaneinc said:

Nice money...I liked the idea of the C65 but it was too close a hybrid...

 

But more on the topic I think the real winner here is US, we get to enjoy all these weird and wonderful machines, there's gold standard stuff on all of them and also a load of old rubbish too but that's why we love this hobby.

The fact that you can build a C64 almost from scratch using brand new components is mind blowing, the only thing you can't get is the keyboard. If you had have told me in 1986 that would have been the case I would have looked at you like you were crazy!

 

I want to buy an A8, but I refuse to do so until I find one that isn't $500.00. If I can't fine one I might treat myself to an Ultimate 64 motherboard and check out the 48Mhz mode.

 

But there's also that FPGA VIC-II being developed with hardware 80 columns...

 

...decisions.

[Faicuai]

11 hours ago, Mazzspeed said:

The other thing you're failing to consider regarding the C64 is Ultimax mode, this is the mode exploited for freezer carts. It's the reason why the 1541 UII+ can run a cartridge, two REU's, and two emulated cycle accurate 1541's along with a replacement kernel all at the same time. You're also failing to consider the interleaved nature of the C64's bus using the AEC signal allowing the VIC-II to steal CPU cycles only when absolutely needed.

 

Both platforms (A8 and C64) are very impressive for their time, I consider the Sinclair devices and Apple II series devices in comparison very simplistic.

Well, on a 1979 A/800 loaded with Incognito, you will run a multi-scheme, multi-bank RAM and ROM address space hosting the most powerful 8-bit DOS in existence, a true PBI Hard Drive that can transfer up to 105 KB/sec, then your choice  of another concurrent HD (also bootable!)  or banked-cart plugged into Left-Cart port, multiple 110-120 Kbps floppy-disk emulation via SIO, run the 6502 at full tilt whenever needed or applicable, and all of this without ever leaving the system bus or its extensible 1983 OS (!) The PBI port, Right-cart port and Slot-3 are still untouched! ?

 

As for Apple / II's simple, ROCK-SOLID, stable and expandable HW design, that is precisely what allowed us (back then, with existing silicon manufacturing process, density and power consumption) to build systems that even today are wet-dreams in our platform's domains. How do we know? We only need to look at the plug-and-play hardware developed for it (just a wake-up call sample):

 

http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/Apple/Cards.html

 

SCSI interfaces, fast Serial interfaces, video-Terminals, gFx/sprites, RAM expansions, CPU accelerators, you name it... and all that without the artificial life-line of decades-later CPLDs, FPGAs and all the stuff our platforms require for their second lease in life. Just imagine what kind of power could be built into an Apple-II with its stability, massive expansion potential, and today's technology...  The sky is the limit there...

 

Edited February 21, 2021 by Faicuai

[Mclaneinc]

3 hours ago, Mazzspeed said:

The fact that you can build a C64 almost from scratch using brand new components is mind blowing, the only thing you can't get is the keyboard. If you had have told me in 1986 that would have been the case I would have looked at you like you were crazy!

 

I want to buy an A8, but I refuse to do so until I find one that isn't $500.00. If I can't fine one I might treat myself to an Ultimate 64 motherboard and check out the 48Mhz mode.

 

But there's also that FPGA VIC-II being developed with hardware 80 columns...

 

...decisions.

 

Don't blame you for not wanting to pay stupid prices, its ruining the hobby..

 

I like the sound of the Ultimate board and knowing its from the same people as my Ultimate++ cart says it will be quality...Must admit I did not know of the 48Mhz mode, how smooth the 3D titles would be, possibly unplayable

 

I'm happy with my breadbin, I'm in familiar territory and if I want a burst of speed then Vice will do that, as always, can't justify the expense (also helps I don't have spare money like that or a random impulse buy could happen)

 

Good luck in finding a fair priced Atari over there, keep your eyes peeled they do come up sometimes here and there, auctions I can understand, they sell for what someone is willing to bid up to but these 'Buy it Now $500.00' things are just ruining it because so many are trying the same thing.

[Mazzspeed]

7 hours ago, Faicuai said:

Well, on a 1979 A/800 loaded with Incognito, you will run a multi-scheme, multi-bank RAM and ROM address space hosting the most powerful 8-bit DOS in existence, a true PBI Hard Drive that can transfer up to 105 KB/sec, then your choice  of another concurrent HD (also bootable!)  or banked-cart plugged into Left-Cart port, multiple 110-120 Kbps floppy-disk emulation via SIO, run the 6502 at full tilt whenever needed or applicable, and all of this without ever leaving the system bus or its extensible 1983 OS (!) The PBI port, Right-cart port and Slot-3 are still untouched!

Both the A8 and C64 will bank switch, the 6510 was designed for bank switching. The C64 also has a great DOS implementation that's existed for a long time now and is basically 100% compatible with all software. As I've highlighted, it's also fast. The days of BASIC V2 open/close commands disappeared a long time ago along with factory IEC serial implementations that were very slow. The theoretical maximum transfer rate, which is not what you're going to see in the real world unless you transfer raw unformatted data (ie: video transfer straight off CF card, meaning the CF card cannot be used for any other purpose) is most likely going to be higher on the A8 assuming ANTIC doesn't steal cycles (which it will), as the C64 runs an interleaved bus design with the AEC pin on the processor halting the CPU to prioritize the VIC-II only when necessary. Both implementations have their pro's and con's with no one design being a clear winner - Everything is a compromise. Whether such high speed data transfer really translates to anything useful in the real world is a point of speculation on an 8 bit machine, as it is I can load games and software straight over the system bus to ram in less than a second running S-JiffyDOS and the transfer rates are more than adequate for very high quality video as I've demonstrated. The Commodore's serial IEC port will sustain similar speeds to the A8 if cycle accuracy is not important, as demonstrated by SD2IEC devices.

 

Any system can run it's processor at full tilt when necessary, usually by disabling the video subsystem so it doesn't steal cycles. In today's world full tilt is very slow.

 

The C64 also has a very versatile cartridge port with the full system bus available as well as the Ultimax mode previously mentioned. I can jump into cart mode and back again without loosing any data whatsoever.

 

Both systems are outstanding designs and a credit to the engineers that designed them. More advanced than both the Apple and the Spectrum devices. Bear in mind that I'm not interested in some pointless competition over 30+yo designs, however some users seem fairly misinformed when it comes to the C64 architecture and hardware advancements as of late.

Edited February 21, 2021 by Mazzspeed

[Matej]

Actually I like 320x192x2 Atari games looking like from ZX. Atari was better. Anyways ZX had Turrican, Lotus, Golden Axe, Dizzy, ShadowOfTheBeast etc games we never had and dreamed. Similar to C64. I think Atari should do more with gaming studios also marketing. On hardware side we was better. I own Zx128k +2A and some games are actually good!

[_The Doctor__]

The C128 is the only Commodore that remotely was worth the space it took up from a technical stand point in my book. The Atari was always the better machine, and was the one I always went back to, the one that has always been in use... so S-100, Atari, sometimes Apple, and every now and again TI/TRS.... Commodore was always because we had to, not because we wanted to, with the exception of the 128 which was interesting. As for the next gen... only the TT/Falcon/Amiga had any interest or character... the STe was because we had to and it was a better Mac than a Mac.. go figure...

 

[Mazzspeed]

5 minutes ago, _The Doctor__ said:

The C128 is the only Commodore that remotely was worth the space it took up from a technical stand point in my book. The Atari was always the better machine, and was the one I always went back to, the one that has always been in use... so S-100, Atari, sometimes Apple, and every now and again TI/TRS.... Commodore was always because we had to, not because we wanted to, with the exception of the 128 which was interesting. As for the next gen... only the TT/Falcon/Amiga had any interest or character... the STe was because we had to and it was a better Mac than a Mac.. go figure...

 

Personally I think the C128 tried to be more than it should have been. I don't consider it to be a replacement for the C64.

[_The Doctor__]

• It's the only one to keep a place with me... I tossed all the cord wood 64's

[Mazzspeed]

Well, that's all a matter of personal preference. I remember when I was young, everyone with a C128 used it in C64 mode. CP/M was too slow to be really useful and by that stage CP/M had been dead for a number of years anyway.

 

If I could find a C128 for a good price perhaps I'd grab one for prosperity, but aside from that it really doesn't interest me as it doesn't really offer me anything I actually need.

[Mazzspeed]

10 hours ago, Faicuai said:

As for Apple / II's simple, ROCK-SOLID, stable and expandable HW design, that is precisely what allowed us (back then, with existing silicon manufacturing process, density and power consumption) to build systems that even today are wet-dreams in our platform's domains. How do we know? We only need to look at the plug-and-play hardware developed for it (just a wake-up call sample):

 

http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/Apple/Cards.html

 

SCSI interfaces, fast Serial interfaces, video-Terminals, gFx/sprites, RAM expansions, CPU accelerators, you name it... and all that without the artificial life-line of decades-later CPLDs, FPGAs and all the stuff our platforms require for their second lease in life. Just imagine what kind of power could be built into an Apple-II with its stability, massive expansion potential, and today's technology...  The sky is the limit there...

 

I see you edited your post.

 

What you have to consider is certain A8's and even the C64 have the full system bus available for expansions, that's really what you're describing regarding the expandability of the Apple IIe (not IIc) - So basically you can achieve exactly what's being done on the Apple devices of the era, just in a way that's not all contained on the one motherboard. In a way we already do by transmitting data via the system bus as opposed to serial implementations, in fact we actually have more flexibility due to the fact our devices used smart peripherals as opposed to dedicated FDD controllers.

 

Considering the PC, the only reason it became the platform of choice is because it's actual design was technically fully open in nature, it was only IBM's BIOS that locked it down. Once that was cracked using clean room reverse engineering techniques the platform evolved into what we have today (for better or worse).

Edited February 22, 2021 by Mazzspeed

[Gury]

Back to the topic. Still missing Atari port is Rainbow Islands, which is great on ZX Spectrum.

 

 

[carlsson]

On 2/20/2021 at 4:53 PM, x=usr(1536) said:

Americans had more disposable income to spend on things like home computers than people in Europe generally did.

^^ This!

 

Nowadays many people may overlook this fact, but back in the 80's it was quite often related to in various internal memos, magazine articles and documents. Europe was (and perhaps still is?) quite a bit behind America in terms of disposable income. Of course different tax systems and size of the state apply to this, but then again if you need to settle your own health insurance etc, that is an expense that probably gets sorted before spending money on a home computer anyway.

 

For that matter, I wouldn't call the ZX-81 obsolete when it was launched, just that it played in a completely different price segment than even the Atari 400 did. Obviously as price wars brought down the respective prices, at some point the difference was no longer significant so possibly the lower end systems had a shorter lifespan not because of their capacities but because competition packed the field. See for example the Tandy MC-10 which just about everyone however would consider obsolete and overpriced when it was launched. However some 9-12 months earlier when I suppose the project was initiated, there was a small market slot for a computer of its capacities and price. Unfortunately for Tandy, that market hole quickly closed in the first half of 1983 which effectively left them with two choices: cancel the project and write off R&D losses, or release the computer and hope that someone would be curious enough to buy it.

[Mclaneinc]

Never had any love for the Tandy computers, always saw them as not so cheap wannabe's but the Tandy UK trend was box shifting with little knowledge of what they sold as the staff were commision based. My Maplin branch had a Tandy opposite and I'd stroll over to see what their shop had, I even brought some speakers from them which were actually very good but the computer range just felt bolted on. Mind you, Maplin made a mess of the computer market with only the Atari 8 bit range fairing well. At least if you came in to us there was 1 or 2 people in each branch that were on the ball re the Atari's. Personally as much as the computers were the reason I worked for them I was glad when they finished, the notion of having a great big list of computers with our buyers not having a clue what to get would have been a disaster. We had the high street placement and the staff but we were trying to be a jack of all trades.

 

Shame, I'd have chosen a small set of big names, got the support and the stock and I feel we could have done well but as the sales people were not listened to it could never have happened..

 

The money was out there, I think there was a bit more disposable income out there than thought, not as much as the US but it was there...

[Gury]

It's The Spectrum Show...

by Paul Jenkinson

 

 

[Hwlngmad]

Personally I think the A8 is a better machine the ZX Spectrum.  However, that is not to say that ZX Spectrum is not a great machine.  It truly is. 

[Gury]

I agree with that. I have absolutely no intention to use my energy for flaming debates which machine is better, because it is really pointless for anyone doing that as everybody has his/her own personal favourites.

I am hardcore A8 user (and developer), for all times, the ZX Spectrum is my second choice of 8-bitters. It is unique in its own way, by the looks, graphics and the feeling of using it. C64 is out of this comparison for me, because it is so similar and so different compared to Atari 8-bit, so it has no place in my list. Never had!

 

[zbyti]

25 minutes ago, Gury said:

Never had!

You break my had... ehkm... heart :]

[Ely]

As I have said on other forums in the past, the best machine was the one you had. My Dad was never going to buy an Atari in 1982 when we go our Dragon 32 for £200, a 400 was £250 + a dedicated tape drive for another £50 and had that keyboard, the 800 with 16K was £500. I loved our Dragon 32, I used it every day, I knew it's limitations but it didn't matter it's what I had access to. I learn BASIC on it, played games and generally lived the mid-80s kid with a computer life.

 

Eventually I bought myself a 130XE in 1987 for £99 and a 1050 for £129.

Edited February 22, 2021 by Ely

[Mazzspeed]

The BBC Micro still had the best DOS I've ever seen in an 8 bit machine, both back in the 80's and now. With Econet fitted it was full multi user, allowing for nested directories as well as multiple user accounts with passwords - Even remote screen sharing/monitoring and the ability to send messages over the network was possible.

 

I think the BBC version of Elite is still the best there is.

[Gury]

2 hours ago, zbyti said:

You break my had... ehkm... heart :]

 

[xxl]

Atari XL vs ZX Spectrum? which is better? better to have both.

 

 

I wonder if the Atari 48K could make such cool games as on the ZX Spectrum 48k.

[_The Doctor__]

35 minutes ago, xxl said:

Atari XL vs ZX Spectrum? which is better? better to have both.

 

 

I wonder if the Atari 48K could make such cool games as on the ZX Spectrum 48k.

You know it can... You'd be one to do so just for the fun of it!

 

[Doug_in_NC]

11 hours ago, carlsson said:

^^ This!

 

Nowadays many people may overlook this fact, but back in the 80's it was quite often related to in various internal memos, magazine articles and documents. Europe was (and perhaps still is?) quite a bit behind America in terms of disposable income. Of course different tax systems and size of the state apply to this, but then again if you need to settle your own health insurance etc, that is an expense that probably gets sorted before spending money on a home computer anyway.

 

For that matter, I wouldn't call the ZX-81 obsolete when it was launched, just that it played in a completely different price segment than even the Atari 400 did. Obviously as price wars brought down the respective prices, at some point the difference was no longer significant so possibly the lower end systems had a shorter lifespan not because of their capacities but because competition packed the field. See for example the Tandy MC-10 which just about everyone however would consider obsolete and overpriced when it was launched. However some 9-12 months earlier when I suppose the project was initiated, there was a small market slot for a computer of its capacities and price. Unfortunately for Tandy, that market hole quickly closed in the first half of 1983 which effectively left them with two choices: cancel the project and write off R&D losses, or release the computer and hope that someone would be curious enough to buy it.

It wasn’t just the differences in disposable income, it was the prices charged. I always remember the comments in the computer press that the prices in USD for computer peripherals, memory etc was roughly 1 to 1 with prices in British Pounds when the actual exchange rate was 1.6 to one, ie a lot of peripherals, especially disk drives and memory was way more expensive in Europe. I still remember GBP80 or $135 for a 16k RAM expansion for a VIC 20.