Best 8 bit computer ever made hands down. came out in 1979 and was way ahead of everything for years.

Corrections: You do need to remove the BASIC cartridge to use a game cartridge, as they both use the left cartridge slot; the right cartridge slot is for special utility cartridges and was rarely used. And the cable coming out of the back is RF to a TV, not composite video. Also, the key caps falling out is due to the plastic clips in the key switches cracking due to age and use; they weren't like that originally.

@mikemckee6583

3 жыл бұрын

Exactly right about the keyboard. The 800 keyboard was solid when new. The whole machine was built like a tank. I originally bought a 400 because the 800 was a little too pricey for me at the time, and I replaced the membrane 400 keyboard with a “B-Key” keyboard, and upgraded the RAM to 48K as well. Internally, the two machines were identical, except for the 400 only having one cartridge slot, and lacking the slots for the operating system cartridges. That was the best era in the history of personal computers, before IBM commoditized everything and the industry got boring. The Atari 8-bit computers were far more advanced, especially graphically, than the Apple II, and even outclassed the IBM PC in that regard for quite a while. What I loved most about that era was that when new machines were released, since there were no standards, they were heavily custom-designed, and it often took years to fully explore their capabilities. I later owned an Atari 130XE, a Mega ST2, and an Atari Falcon 030. I still have all of them. The Falcon, in particular, is highly collectible today and I regularly see them selling for more than I paid new in 1993. I also worked for an Atari dealer at that time, while going through college, and later worked in a different store, where I sold everything from IBM, to Apple Macs, to HP, etc. To me, nothing was ever as exciting and interesting as the Ataris (except for the Amiga, which was in reality an Atari design).

@ozmond

2 жыл бұрын

You’re the best

@louistournas120

2 жыл бұрын

@@mikemckee6583 Maybe Atari could have made some IBM clones like Compaq and who else did. Looks like they had the people to design a motherboard, case and everything. They had the desire to make home computers. It's too bad the Jaguar (The Atari 64 bit game console flopped).

@mikemckee6583

2 жыл бұрын

@@louistournas120 Atari actually did make a line of PC clones in the late 80’s. They never took off, though. I think they just waited too long, and other brands were already more well-known as PC manufacturers.

@rbrtck

2 жыл бұрын

There were actually two suppliers of the 800's keyboard. The one that was by far the most common has held up just fine for decades, while the far less common keyboard tends to become brittle and crack over time, specifically the stem that holds the key caps. The bad keyboard was never as good as the other one to begin with, although they weren't quite as easy to break back then as they are now. By the way, at least this situation is pretty simple. For comparison, the 600XL and 800XL have at least five different keyboards, and one type has an almost 100% failure rate over time (although it can be fixed).

When I was a kid my computer lab teacher taught us on the Atari 800 while most of us had a C64 at home. Being a kid in the 80s was so much fun.

@stanleymasterson1135

Жыл бұрын

I had you both beat.... i owned a Coleco Adam. Today I have one of the only new in box, never used Adams left in the world

I wrote a BBS from scratch and ran it with 24x7 reliability for years off my Atari 800 with 1 floppy drive. It was a very popular BBS that was online practically every min of the day. I was 12, and that was around '82. At almost 55, I think I could rewrite that BBS and set it up and get it running again if I sat in front of an Atari 800 with a Basic cartridge. The code is practically burned in my mind. I remember clearly the crazy things I had to do for creating the message boards writing directly to the sectors on the floppy, and how I had to put the parts of the code that needed speed toward the top. Fond memories. I wrote all sorts of apps and games back then. I would program from the moment I woke up until I fell asleep day after day, and just for fun.

@CarsandCats

Жыл бұрын

What was the name of the BBS? I ran one back then as well.

@chitlitlah

Жыл бұрын

With FujiNet being available, there are Atari BBSs accessible today over the internet from an Atari 8-bit computer.

On release in 1979, the Atari computers had a chip called the "CTIA", or "Coleen" Television Interface Adapter, which worked alongside the "ANTIC" chip to produce the screen graphics. By late 1982 (when I bought my 800) this had been upgraded to the "GTIA" or "George" Television Interface Adapter which included a couple of new graphics modes. "Coleen" and "George" were simply codenames, used by Atari internally to name their custom-designed chip hardware. All the info about the Atari computers is contained in a superb document called "De Re Atari" (Latin for "All About Atari"). I still have my copy (somewhere)! And blessings to Lance A. Leventhal for writing the "6502 Assembly Language Programming" book! After reading that, I was poking machine code routines into page 6 (0x0600) and making the 800 do amazing things that you could never do from Atari Basic alone! Those were great days.

Jay Miner's genius brought a suite of custom graphics chips to the market in 1979 that were so good they lasted until the demise of the 8 bit computers in the early 90's and formed the foundation for the excellent Commodore Amiga.

@bjbell52

3 жыл бұрын

Ture. I heard he passed away in 1994. He was the genius behind the graphics on the Atari 800 and the Atari...(opps, I mean the Commodore Amiga).

Great vid! I went ‘online’ to Compuserve in ‘82 using my Atari 800. I was only 10 and it blew my mind!

"Sitta" chip. I've never heard anyone say the name. Originally it was "C T I A", but most computers had the improved "G T I A" that provides alternate color interpretations. The "hardware sprites" are called "Player/Missile graphics", not "Missile Graphics". The memory differences were mostly about marketing. Games on cartridge ROMs would work for Ataris with 16K or less memory. Most user's experience was through BASIC. A "64K" C64 running BASIC gave the user only about 1K more usable memory than a 40K Atari 800 running BASIC (and the Atari's BASIC provided commands supporting graphics and sound beyond the C64 limited to peek and poke.) The build quality of the Ataris is light years beyond the C64. Even when Atari cost-reduced it for the XL line they still wouldn't bring themselves down to the low quality, high-DOA rates the C64 enjoyed.

@MichaelRBrown-lh6kn

3 жыл бұрын

Ditto

@rbrtck

2 жыл бұрын

Well, to be fair, the "64K" Atari 800XL didn't give you a single byte more in BASIC, either. That's because, like on the C64, the additional RAM occupies the same address space as the ROMs. The ROMs can be swapped out to use the RAM, but not in BASIC, obviously. So is the 800XL equally lame as the C64 because it doesn't offer more RAM for BASIC? And actually, if we take this farther, the stock 800XL can only access 62K of its RAM (can't swap out its I/O map), while the C64 can access all 64K of RAM (plus another 0.5K for the color map). As for Atari BASIC's graphics and sound commands, while it's nice to have even a few of these, they are very limited--a token effort at best--and player-missile graphics aren't handled at all (speaking of which, you actually have to shift data to move them vertically and change their appearance, while on the C64 all you have to do is change some registers and pointers). I still find myself making numerous POKEs for various reasons in Atari BASIC, not that I use it much because, frankly, the only way to get the most out of either platform is with 6502 assembly language. You're not wrong that the C64 suffered from poor reliability for a while, but it got better as well as cheaper to make as time went on, while the Atari 8-bit got cheaper but worse with the XE series.

Star Raiders in 1979 was something else. Competing with the Commodore Vic 20 not C64 :)

Just found my 800 during a recent house move. Still has the manuals!

To show poeple exactly how good a 1979/1980 Atari 800 STILL was as a home computer in 1985 all you had to do was load up Rescue on Fractalus for them and let them get on with it :)

The 800 was my first computer and I still have it in storage somewhere.. I was just 10 in 1980.

Wow, this was my very first "Home Computer" because Personal Computers (PC's) had not come out yet. Got mine new shortly after leaving college with a degree in Electrical Engineering. Back in the day remember that, the top two home computers were the Apple II and the Atari 800. This was a workhouse system and, I used mine through the 1980's and early 1990's. I was also able to go on-line using a slow 300 speed then later a 1,200 speed modem by subscribing to "The Source" and "Compu-serve" which were both prior to American On-Line's (AOL) dial up service and the World Wide Web.

@MessalineApghar

3 жыл бұрын

Dont forget Prodigy and Chemical bank's custom banking network called Pronto

@gurujaketube

3 жыл бұрын

@@MessalineApghar Prodigy came along later.

@gurujaketube

3 жыл бұрын

I, too, had an 800. Got it 2 years after getting my 400 for Christmas 1981. Gorgeous machines. I knew every peek and poke of the Atari memory map. Programmed the hell out of them in BASIC and assembler. I stored player/missile data in string variables, thereby enabling high-speed movement using string manipulation commands in BASIC. Then I used strings to store the entire screen to manipulate that. And who can forget character set redefinition? So much fun. So many delightful hours spent exploring those machines.

@MessalineApghar

3 жыл бұрын

@@gurujaketube yes it came later but it was an evolution of pronto. it was a joint venture of chem bank, ibm and radio shit. and I think MCI telco too. it came out not long after the 835 was introduced.

@transitengineer

3 жыл бұрын

@@gurujaketube Great reply to my post on the Atari 800 system. I only had the tape recorder deck and modems but if, I could have seen into the future would have saved more money. So, I could have picked up every Atari branded input and output device for this system (i.e color display, floppy drive, interface hub, printer, etc.). Today a complete system would make for an outstanding collection.

I have quite a few 400s. They were easy to upgrade to 800 level. For all currently Atari computers, the old 400/800 is the one to collect. they are built like tanks and will last longer than the other 2 lines.

Great video. Many fond memories using that computer. Thumbs up!

Instead of “fresh off of the success of the 2600” I would have phrased that as “riding high on the success of the 2600,” since the 2600 still had its best years ahead of it at that point.

Great video overall thank you. One mistake not already mentioned here in comments is that the reason your key caps fall off so easily is because the plastic plungers holding the key caps are old and cracking. Not all 800's have this problem. Yellow plungers are the most problematic for this. The other 800 keyboards either do not have this problem at all or much less (white plungers). Watching your video showcase a dirty 800 was cringey because a clean machine is very attractive. Your price of $150 for an 800 *WITH* an 810 disk drive is about right, if maybe $50 under what one can expect. The Atari 800's, 400's and 810's are very fragile in shipping and should be packed with at least three layers of large bubble wrap in a sturdy cardboard box. Any extra space needs to be filled with crumpled newspaper. Otherwise it's likely to be smashed in shipping due to the heavy rf shield and the case's thin plastic. Request the three layers of large bubble wrap in your buyer's notes when buying off ebay!! Be willing to pay some more for shipping (after you receive it) if the seller asks to be sure the 800 doesn't arrive smashed but a good seller should realize the risk to avoid a ruined product refund. The XL's are much stronger with thicker plastic and the XE's, while thinner than XL plastic, are pretty good but are not as sturdy as XL's.

The Atari 400 was my first computer!!! I still remember to this day when I took the computer home from the computer store!

The best computer on the market, left out in the cold for games.

I loved my Atari's but I got burned twice. When I bought the Atari 800, it had substantially more software than the Commodore 64. About a year later, it was reversed. The entire computer store was filled with C64 software whereas the Atari 800 was down to one shelf on one isle. Then later, the exact same thing happens when I bought the Atari ST. At first, it had way more software than the Amiga but soon Atari software was nowhere to be found.

@rbrtck

2 жыл бұрын

People have suggested numerous theories about why this happened, especially since the C64 was the newcomer in 1982 while the Atari had been around for 3 years, already had thousands of software titles available, and technically stood up to the C64 rather than fell behind (they're about equal overall, with different strengths and weaknesses). One that I haven't heard or read about yet, though, is that Atari was in financial trouble, especially after the video game console crash of 1983, and this was all over the news. Perhaps people, both consumers and those in the business, instinctually feared that Atari was on the way out and would orphan the Atari 8-bit computers before long, while Commodore was the rising star and a sure bet to receive stronger industry support over time. While this turned out to be true, I'm suggesting that it might have at least partially been a self-fulfilling prophecy, given the bad financial vibes Atari was giving off. Simply put, Commodore was in the position to ride a wave of momentum, while Atari was perceived to be in decline, even though that didn't have to be true.

Great video. I had the C64 but I really liked the Atari 800. The circuit board is actually quite beautiful with all those resistors.

@GORF_EMPIRE

Жыл бұрын

An absolutely meticulous design. Very reliable machines.

The rear cable was for TV-RF, not Composite Video. Second there were many hardware expansion for the 400/800 to have 32, 48, 64 and even 512 KB of RAM in the system. Problem was such RAM cards were very expensive. There was even a Z80 card for it to run CP/M but it did not sell. For its time and price it was a very powerful machine. There is even a version of VisiCalc and DBase for it. For years (up to the late 1990s) the NYC Board of Education used Ataris in many schools to tech information technology and computer programming in there elementary and secondary schools. I was one of those who taught on Atari in my school.

This brings back some good warm fuzzy memories for me. My first computer was an ATARI 800 fitted with the 64K-Mosaic memory board and 410 tape drive. Within one year I upgraded to a TRAK AT-1 dubbed density floppy that had a 16k parallel port and used it with a near letter quality 12-pin Epson printer. People would call me a stupid ignorant kid claiming that there was no such thing as larger than 48k option for the Atari 800... When I told them I added a RLL/MFM 10mb Hard Disk Drive most people outright called me a liar. YES, the 64k ram was limited to special software only; however, I was an unusual user whom also made use of the second cartridge slot with custom programs I made myself in a programming language called "Action". There where a few custom BIOS roms floating around out there that had to be used in conjunction with some of the smart advanced hardware, so I had to piggyback three different bios chips with a selector switch set to the chip activate signal allowing me to toggle between normal bias and other biases upon cold boot. This is a very good video I appreciate you sharing it, was wondering if you're familiar with some of the more eccentric mods some of us prioritary ATARI users came up with back in the day.

My machinist father took a gamble and forked over $500 to buy me this beast when I was just 9 years old. I loved this machine. It gave me countless hours of fun and learning until I was 15 years old and my dad got me an ST.

Very nice video. I only have one correction for you. The point made about why commodore could have 64K was not because they owned MosTek. It was through a process called Bank Switching, which was part of the 6510 CPU, specific to the commodore 64. However that process wasn't restricted to this as other CPU's did this "outboard" such as apple when you switched in the extra 16K. Larger business systems did this as well such as the M/PM systems of the day, which used the Z-80 -- also capable only of 64k, by having 256K of ram in 8K pages. Each of 5 users had 48k of private memory and a shared 16K of space for the operating system. M/PM might be a good project for your next video. Keep up the great work!

When I was a kid a Friend of my Father's had an 800. My Father liked it and wound up getting us a 1200XL when it launched early in the SF Area (Where we lived at the time)

@NewsmakersTech

3 жыл бұрын

Did you have issues with the Keyboard in the 1200XL?

@ShinGoukiSan

3 жыл бұрын

@@NewsmakersTech Back in the day no, but I know I'll have to repair any I get now

The video output cable on the back is actually an RF cable, not composite video BTW

@NewsmakersTech

4 жыл бұрын

Thank you for watching! Yeah, we missed that in our script. We even have an RF converter with it.

@OdinsCloud

4 жыл бұрын

@@NewsmakersTech There is a composite video port next to the IO. I miss my Atari 800

@billkendrick1

4 жыл бұрын

@@OdinsCloud It can also do split chroma/luma (aka s-video), which is excellent for high res graphics and 80 column text.

It's not pronounce sit-a. It's simply referred to as the C.T.I.A. (Color Television Interface Adapter). Later models were upgraded to the G.T.I.A. which legend has it is George's Television Interface Adapter. The 400 and 800 did not get a packed in BASIC cartridge. You had to buy "The Programmer" package to get that, or just buy a separate Basic cartridge. Replacement parts are not hard to come by, you just have to know who sells them.. Right now you can buy many replacement parts from Best Computers or from B&C Computervisions. I just ordered a replacement CPU and Pokey sound chip for my dead 600 XL unit. The price with shipping was under $50.

@MattMcIrvin

4 жыл бұрын

When I bought my 400, I remember taking it home and being surprised and disappointed that BASIC wasn't a pack-in; we had to go back to the store and buy that bundle. BASIC as an add-on option rather than a built-in component of the computer was actually kind of unusual for a computer of that era (and the XL series changed that).

@fragalot

3 жыл бұрын

HOLEY CRAP B&C ComputerVisions STILL EXISTS? They are in the bay area right,, yeah El Dorado California. They have been around for like 30 years now. I remember seeing their ads in Antic and Analog magazine. I've even BEEN to the store once in the late 80s after attending an Atari convention in San Jose. good times... check them out: www.myatari.com/

@bjbell52

3 жыл бұрын

@@MattMcIrvin My 400 came with a Basic cartridge in 1979. It also had 16K of RAM. I called Atari to ask them a question about my computer and they asked to type in PRINT FRE(0) and tell them the result. When I said something like 13,384 free they got mad at me and demanded to know how I got that computer since it wasn't available to the public.

@kc5402

3 жыл бұрын

Not quite right: CTIA = "Coleen" Television Interface Adapter, GTIA = "George" Television Interface Adapter. "Coleen" and "George" were Atari's codenames for their custom chips. They were documented in the "De Re Atari" hardware and programming guide.

@michaelstoliker971

3 жыл бұрын

@@kc5402 Colleen was the code name for the 800, not the CTIA chip.

a few errors i noticed, my launch day 400 came with 8k and my launch 800 came with 16k, the ctia chip was only on the first run of 400's the 800's came with the gtia chip (supply issues i guess) atari offered free upgrades for all ctia machines in the usa (but charged overseas importers to upgrade), the right cart slot was for certain utility carts and not so you could leave the basic cart running and since the c64 couldnt remove its basic rom an expanded 400/800 actually had more free ram than the c64, the follow up to the 400/800 was not the 600xl/800xl but the 1200xl, there were a few other things but i forget them now however i will say i've never had an issue with my '79 800 keyboard or the key problems you mention in fact i dont think i've ever seen that issue on any 800 i've seen in fact the only 2 machines i've lost keys for is my c64 (1 key) and my panasonic twin port msx (2 keys).

@rbrtck

2 жыл бұрын

Actually, the C64 can access all 64K of its RAM through bank switching, and it has an additional 0.5K of color map RAM, making it a 64.5K computer. The 800XL can likewise use bank switching to "turn off" its BASIC and OS ROMs, but it can only access 62K of the 64K of RAM it contains. This is because it cannot switch out the 2K of memory-mapped I/O address space, which is where the bank switching is controlled. However, the C64 can switch out its I/O space because its bank switching is controlled by a custom I/O port built into its 6510 CPU (which is a 6502 with this additional port, as well as tri-state data and address bus lines). So the C64 actually has the most built-in memory (not counting the 130XE, of course). The 1200XL might have been the immediate followup, but it had flaws and cost too much, so it hardly ever got anywhere. I think the idea is that the 600XL and 800XL low-high pair are analogous to the 400 and 800 low-high pair, which is pretty apt. Most 800 keyboards, including the one on my 800, are still solid to this day, but it is true that a minority of 800s have keyboards with switch stems that degrade over time and break very easily. I think these keyboards came from a different vendor. This is still nothing like the situation with the 600XL and especially the 800XL, which have rather different keyboards from at least 5 different vendors (some being better than others for sure). Most 800s by far have the good keyboard, fortunately. The C64's keyboard isn't the best, but it isn't particularly prone to breakage or aging, to my knowledge. Any keyboard can suffer from breakage--I've seen broken keys and switches on all computers. It's just that a small percentage of 800s suffer from really bad keyboards that break very easily.

My first home computer was the Tandy/Radio Shack Color Computer Model 1. I then upgraded a couple of years later to the successor of the Atari 800, and bought an Atari 800XL! Absolutely LOVED that computer!

@MessalineApghar

3 жыл бұрын

I loved the coco2's version of tetris

I bought one of these when I was a youngster out of a mail order catalog. Anyone remember the old "4 to 6 weeks for delivery" on everything? Well, not knowing that it didn't have an operating system installed, I had to wait another 4 to 6 weeks for the basic cartridge. Luckily I had bought several game carts with it so it wasn't a complete waste of time waiting and with no computer stores in our rural area it was the best I could do. I loved that computer and though mine has long departed this world, I still have the great memories!

Aesthetics 5/5 - Spot on, it looks amazing. Always great to see people nerding out over old tech, love to see that, so nice one! Gonna have to watch the C64 video now, the king of the 8-bits!

@bjbell52

3 жыл бұрын

While the Atari is the emperor ? C64 - king of the 8-bits that runs 80% SLOWER than an Atari. Yeah, right.

@rbrtck

2 жыл бұрын

@@bjbell52 Unless the Atari is displaying a low-resolution graphics mode or has shut the display off entirely, its CPU actually only runs about 17% faster than the C64's. At the same time, the C64's CPU gets a lot of help from the VIC-II chip's more capable sprite system, as well as the automation built into the SID chip for sound. These functions take more work from the CPU in the Atari, so the difference in practice is nowhere near what you think it is, and depending on the program, the C64 can even pull out ahead.

This channel is awesome, just subbed!

Great video! Thanks for creating this.

@NewsmakersTech

3 жыл бұрын

Thank you for watching! We have more Atari stuff coming soon.

The Atari 800 was a tank. I owned one and the cartridge slots were the sturdiest thing I have ever seen in a computer! Cast aluminum, they weren't messing around. I also had an 800XL that I ran a BBS on back in the mid 80's later moving to a 130XE that I upgraded the RAM to a massive 576k. I used the extra RAM as a RAMdrive to make the BBS very quick.

I got my first computer in 1983. I chose the Atari because of its superior graphics, and never looked back. It taught me everything I ever needed to know about computers. (An internal chassis built like Raquel Welch.) I eventually graduated to the Mac, but I fondly remember drifting to sleep running custom display lists to program the ANTIC chip through my head. Commodore 64 (like the Camaro) was always a wannabe.

It's great to see so many comments from people like myself who are of the same generation who owned one of these things (or similar, like the Commodore 64, VIC-20, etc). I had an Atari 400 (eventually moving to a 65XE) that I got around 13 years old, and it was practically a life changer for me. Suddenly I had the power to create things from inside my room! I also remember buying all the computer magazines out at the time, Antic, Compute, Analog, etc, and reading them from cover to cover, looking for a sense of community, as no one I knew was into this type of stuff at the time. At one point, I was lucky enough to have my game submission selected as Game Of The Month in Antic magazine. As well, I wrote all sorts of other software, the biggest thing was a rudimentary database and query engine (prior to dBase even being available) to analyze horse racing results. That system had canned reports that went to my thermal printer (not the atari one), and it had specialized UI's that designed for efficient / accurate data entry of horse racing results from the newspapers. It's amazing what we did back then.....given the hard constraints of the technology. I'm sad to say, I no longer possess these creative/problem solving characteristics. Over time, I got drawn into being a mindless consumer......instead of a creator, and I feel quite sad about this.

I have an 800 with 810 and 800XL with a 1050 , the best 8 bit computers ever.

This was my first computer , late eighties. I loved it.

"It's a shame that it doesn't have any compatibility with any Atari gaming systems"-the Atari 5200 is basically an Atari 800 (architecture wise). In fact, 5200 games were designed and programmed on the 800!

@fragalot

3 жыл бұрын

I was thinking EXACTLY this when he mentioned there was no compatibility. But obviously he was talking about the physical compatibility of the cartridges. There was a reason for that, since a 2600 is vastly different than a 800 thus the software would never work. Many 5200 games were only released on the 5200 and never on the 8bit computers, but some good hackers were able to port those games over as binary files on floppy you can play on just about any Atari 8bit.

@nickpalance3622

3 жыл бұрын

I would think that part of the process to port would be changing the I/O addresses that the software code uses to access the custom chipset. As I recall Antic, GTIA, and Pokey are (or at least one or more) located at a different place in memory. And let’s not forget the analog joysticks of the 5200 with their two distinct fire buttons and numeric keypad AND the Start, Pause, Reset keys. Can you imagine what it would’ve been like if Atari (while Warner still owned it) had brought out the XEGS (XLGS I suppose in those days)? What might have that meant for Coleco and their Colecovision and ADAM. And what about the rise of the C64? Hmmmm...

This was one of the first computers I used for any length of time. My first was the 400. I used both at my local library. Both were donated by some foundation I don't remember the name of. The library made them available for people to sign up to use. I made frequent use of the 800, mostly for programming. I liked the keyboard a lot. It had a very nice, solid feel. Unlike the 400, it had the 810 disk drive, which was much faster, and less of a hassle to use than the 410 tape drive. Even though the software library wasn't as impressive as on the Apple II Plus, another computer I used frequently at that same library, and at school, I liked the Atari better, mainly because of its operating system. I loved the fact that capabilities in the system were divided up into device drivers, and that you could expand those capabilities by loading other drivers. The Apple II had a better version of the Basic programming language, though, in my judgement. Atari's Basic lacked some capabilities that Applesoft had, but this was only because Atari wanted to cram Basic into 8K of ROM, and made the best of it. They were one of the few computer companies that didn't use Microsoft Basic as standard. It turns out Atari *wanted* Microsoft Basic to be the standard on their computers, but there was a mismatch between the capabilities Atari wanted in the language, and the amount of memory in which it had to fit. So, they got their version of Basic from Shepardson Microsystems, instead. Atari spent a lot of money working with Microsoft, though, trying to get their Basic to work on their computers. So, Atari sold MS-Basic as a separate product for the 800, first on disk, and then in a cartridge-disk combination. This version was compatible with other versions of MS-Basic on the Apple II and the C-64. I've talked to a lot of Atari users over the years, though, and I can't recall anyone using it. I became a fan of the Atari 8-bits early on, and when the price finally came down enough, I bought an Atari 130XE.

Thanks. Excellent description of the Atari 800

I loved the early days of computing. I still have 4 Atari 800s the only computer you can play 4 player in the same room M.U.L.E. on. Definitely my fav 8 bit computer of all time. 48k of ram was HUGE back then.

Subscribed! Keep up the good work. :)

I still have mine. I got in '86. *Many fond memories of playing on it. Good video.

Atari 400 was my first video game machine. I was 5 years old. I had Pac-Man and Basketball. When I got it the end of the rf cable was cut. So, I had to disconnect the Coaxial cable everytime I wanted to play. Unless Dallas was on tv. At that point my mom pulled rank everytime.

Great video, thanks! Looking forward to your 800 XL video as that's the 8 bit Atari I used. Still have it and bring it out occasionally to play games. :)

@infinitecanadian

4 жыл бұрын

I have one as well, although it has faults that I have yet to fix, and the disks are probably mostly blanked by now.

@fourthhorseman4531

4 жыл бұрын

@@infinitecanadian I've been pleasantly surprised by how well my old 5.25" disks are holding up. I've had a few bad ones, but so far most are working. I should probably play the hell out of them now before they all go bad. :)

@infinitecanadian

4 жыл бұрын

@@fourthhorseman4531 Mine were in a garage for years.

@NewsmakersTech

4 жыл бұрын

We have some Atari disks that we have not tested yet. Hopefully they work!

I used to love My Atari 400. Got an 800XL and 65XE now.

Fabulous machine. I’ve always wanted one since I first saw it advertised in 1979 but it was far too expensive for my parents to consider. I’ve got an 800XL but this is the model I want! Great video. Stay safe. :)

Great video!

I had the 800 in 1982 and I loved it! I had subscriptions to Byte and Analog, both of which published Basic code that you could (painstakingly) type in and produce your own games and programs. Ours had the cassette but later we added a 5 1/4 floppy and a Star dot matrix printer. Good times. I took that computer with me to college in 1988 even!

I've had an Atari 800 for a long time. There are so many good memories associated with it that I still look back to the fun with it to this day. I learned programming with this machine and how to optimally deal with scarce resources. Something that today's programmers don't understand anymore. ;D

You got a fantastic deal regarding the computer and drive. Regarding your repair rating, it should be 5/5 since these machines were built to last and have a massively low rate of failure compared to a C64. The Atari 800 was super pricey at launch, but it was built like a tank and chips did not easily overheat, thus they do not easily break down unless one is using a failing Power Supply.

the Player Missile graphics are amazing. I am truly amazed.

Atari 800 was my second computer. While I liked the 800 a lot, the computer I gotten after it is my all-time, a Commodore 64. I wasn't as well built, but since I was into music, the Commodore 64 s SID chip was perfect for me.

Had one for a year, my grandfather let me borrow his. Loved it!

I had on of these. I was so confused. I loved it.

It's a amazing computer ! The first gaming micro-computer :D

That chip you were calling SIDI or something. That is the GTIA. The 2600 had the TIA (Television Interface Adapter). I think with GTIA the G stood for Graphics. The rest was the same.

@nickpalance3622

3 жыл бұрын

Think he meant the CTIA. That’s how I heard it (or imagine how one might attempt to pronounce it if not articulating each letter). As much as I find the videos on this channel to be sloppy (or at least rushed... or some reason for being too off the mark for subjects that have so well documented and covered so well by sooooo many others) in the QA department (if there is one) I give these people credit for knowing that these computers came with a “CTIA” before there was a “GTIA”.

The keyboard just feels so nice (aside from the right shift button situation)

1979 - years ahead of its time.

Thanks for watching! any guesses on our next first look video?

The Atari 800 was my first computer in '83, after seeing on it playing Ultima II. I payed $500 for it with 48kb. Another $500 for the 1040 disk drive and $50 for Atari Basic. Bc the xl series was coming out which included basic, the Basic cartridge dropped to $,50 and I bought a few. I loved it bc not only being able to play games, I learned to program in Basic. I used my 800 for many years. Still want to get another, or an 800xl.

I wanted one of these so bad when I was a kid in 1979. It’s crazy how much you had to pay back then to get laughably limited computers.

I timed the pumpkin face program in Atari arcade and graphics design 501 seconds! Atari BASIC is SLOOOOW

I always wanted one of these as a kid. I loved my VIC-20 and C128 to death, but there was something about the charm of this computer that just screams class.

The POKEY chip was what handled the keyboard, which is why it is called the PO-KEY.

A wonderful early home computer. I loved mine. Never understood what they were thinking when they put the Return key on the "Q" line, though.

I used to write programs for my Atari 800 using the assembly cartridge and publish them on the local Pixel magazine...

owned mine for 25 years, never once knocked a key off or tried to close the lid from the edge like you did.

Is the note about compatibility with consoles accurate? I thought XE games worked on 800 / 400 and vice versa.

I just realized that's basically the same keyboard in the Vic 20 and Commore 64.

My first computer in 1981.

Still have a 400 and an 800. The 800 has a ROM card, and two RAM cards. Have never played with either one, as I never had the power supply’s. I believe I still have a game cart somewhere, as well as the cassette recorder……

We bought a 400 and later added an after market keyboard that brought it closer to the 800. PacMan was awesome on this model. You needed an adapter to print to a dot matrix printer.

The right cart. port wasn't actually a way to keep two carts in at once, and swap between. That would've been quite convenient, though! The right cart slot was barely utilized. The 3rd party "Monkey Wrench" debugging tool is one of the few.

@MessalineApghar

4 жыл бұрын

It was intended to be but they never made it work , aside from a few diagnostic carts. And by the XL/XE they gave up in favor of cost cutting

@fragalot

3 жыл бұрын

@@MessalineApghar the 400 never had one either. But the XL/XE technically did not abandon the "right cart" since it's built-in BASIC became that, which is what was supposedly intended for the 800 right cart slot.

@MessalineApghar

3 жыл бұрын

@@fragalot i lived thru the Era. I have about 15 atari computers . i know the 400 didnt have one. It was intended to be a cheapass entry computer. The 800 2nd slot was promised to be for many features including dual carts. Esp for debugging and homebrew coding your own eeproms in-place. Aside from a couple of carts like the monkey wrench mentioned it never went anywhere because their dev team was redirected into the XL and XE lines.

@MessalineApghar

3 жыл бұрын

@@fragalot im wondering if the new wdc6502 conversion subboard system will work on atari.. Its intended for commodore.

@fragalot

3 жыл бұрын

@@MessalineApghar I'm not familiar with whatever project that is. If it's FPGA chip you can physically program it to be anything, assuming there's enough room for the 6502, and all the microprocessors the Atari had. The Antic, GTIA, Pokey, PIA, all it's RAM, and maybe FREDDY? lol

Actually, while the 2600 has a custom graphics chip known as the TIA, it was the CPU that had to generate the display by "racing the beam" to feed the TIA data for each scanline, so no, the 2600 was very hard on the CPU and gave it very little help. The 400 and 800 added another chip known as the ANTIC to generate the display instead, which did take a load off the CPU. However, the POKEY chip requires the CPU to do more work than most every other sound chip, and the 400/800's sprites require a lot of CPU work to move vertically, unlike other sprite systems. For comparison, the C64's CPU got a lot more help from its custom chips than the 400/800 did.

Fantastic. And just discovered the game I was always waiting to play, since I was 7 or 8 (I'm 48 now ;) ): Star Riders... On the magnificent XFormer emulator!!!

I still have my 800. I learned how to code on it and spent hours and hours on it.

The first real computer I used, back in elementary school, was the Apple ][. Not being able to afford the Apple, mom bought me a Timex Sinclair - a useless computer that I exchanged the next day for a Commodore Vic 20. I used that for over a year, but it was always lacking in memory & graphics resolution. So what I consider to be my first "real" computer was an Atari 800XL. I loved that machine. It's operating system/disk operating system was FAR less buggy than the Commodore 64 - faster too! Years later, I sold the Atari and got a C64 - I consider that a mistake. The *only* thing the Commodore excelled in is that it had more games/software available, but I always felt the Commodore's system was inferior to that of the Atari!!!

It was a pretty amazing computer, but the price was insane!

The C64 was a great computer but the Atari 800 was the machine I wanted. I was an Atari fanboy (still am) - had a 2600 and drooled over this with its cartridge format, 4 controller ports and proper keyboard. Really nice looking machine too. :) Never owned one - one day. :)

My first computer, I remember being disappointed it wasn’t an Atari 2600 lol when dad brought it home!

At the end of the decade, the Atari 800 is _The Seventies’ Computer,_ only lacking the wood grain they pro’lly avoided, to distinguish their computer line from their console line, which was already a hard sell, which is why the 800 is the next-gen computer that was easily _the best computer_ available-especially for but not as a function of the price-that paved the way for a “third party PC,” such as Commodore’s C64, as beyond IBM and Apple, computers to be viable PCs, to release their 64. That’s not to mention (some of) the same engineers who created the ideas of graphics sound cards and sound cards literally designing specialty the C64’s own brand of them. I never ran into a problem, with 48K and Iiked my 800 better than my 800XL, especially when it came to Ultimas II-IV...

The C64 is actually capable of doing the ANTIC's tricks by using raster interrupts. You can display multiple modes on the same screen, change character sets and color registers on the fly, multiplex the sprites, and all that good stuff on the C64, no problem.

@wadexyz

2 жыл бұрын

I recall reading tons of magazine articles on this exact subject, back in the day : ) There was a great rivalry between the two platforms (sound familiar, lol) but I recall it being super fun and healthy.

Commodore owning their own chip fab, MOS, had nothing to do with how memory was handled. Yes, the C64 does have a customized 6502, called the 6510, that allowed it to switch out ROMs and the I/O memory map for RAM in order to access all 64K of RAM, but the Atari 8-bit also has a customized 6502 that the ANTIC chip can halt for longer than a normal 6502 can take (because it has to sometimes). If Atari had wanted to, they could have included memory management, but they didn't (until the 800XL), while the C64 and Apple II computers did. You don't need to have your own chip fab in order to have custom chips (although it is convenient and cost-effective for that).

Still have mine. And games.

I always wanted to get the Atari 800, but when I went to the only store in town that had it in stock the manager refused to sell it to me at slightly above the announced sale price. Thus I went to a different store and bought the Atari 400 instead.

Pokeys are pricey today ($45 each) some other arcade games uses pokeys too. Exidy venture and mouse trap have dual pokeys. I believe jay miner (an Atari guy) was one of the designers I believe.

I had that computer since new. The keys never came off. The person who cleaned it may have caused the key issues.

A great review and great machine. Considering it came out in 79 it is not that far behind the c64. None the less it is my prefferred machine over the two, though the 600xl 64k is the best being more compatible, nice and compact.

For the record: mine also has the keycap issue. It's a late model with yellow stems.

it does have compatibility with 'any of ataris game consoles'. it is software compatible with the 5200 (although that uses different cartridges and as such you'll have to move the roms over ;) and it's 100% compatible with the xegs (although none were ever sold without the keyboard but technically it's a console - with a seperate keyboard ;). as for you not getting the basic cartridge with it. well. they didn't get the basic cartridge with the 400 and 800 when they were new. those sold seperately in the 'educator' and 'programmer' add on packs. they did not come with the computer itself.

Was my first computer (if don't include the Mag Odyssey). I don't recall my keys ever falling off my 800.

@rbrtck

2 жыл бұрын

A small percentage of 800s have keyboards from a different vendor that have stems that age very poorly, becoming brittle and easy to break after a few decades. Luckily the vast majority of 800s have the other keyboard, which has held up very well over time.

"shared" should be "pioneered". The Atari 8-bit pioneered things that were copied in the C64 which was introduced 3 years later. The C64 was designed looking back at the Ataris and TI computers.

@rbrtck

2 жыл бұрын

Of course, everyone looks back at what has been done before. Atari got the idea for _Pong_ from Magnavox, and the CTIA and GTIA chips were based on the TIA in the 2600. The Atari 8-bit's default graphics characters took some ideas from the Commodore PET, and Commodore then "returned the favor" by copying the Atari's lowercase font for the C64 (their uppercase fonts are different, though). And the C64's sprite system is an improvement over TI's and especially Atari's, to which it bears little if any resemblance. No has copied the Atari's player-missile graphics because they can't even be repositioned vertically. It looks like what it is: something designed for a system that "races the beam" with the CPU to produce the display (the 2600).

On the back is the RF output, not composite.

Hated that membrane keyboard on the 400. Never had problems wit the keyboard on the 800. One of the big sellers for the systems was "Star Raiders".

@wadexyz

2 жыл бұрын

I got used to it, and I did a ton of programming on the 400.

@daversj

Жыл бұрын

@@wadexyz yup. My fingers got crazy sore on the 400 but had to keep going. LIST…..fix the bugs and…. RUN….Repeat

Good luck finding one of these for $100-$150 these days, particularly including an A810.

I always wondered what that “DOM” sticker on the inside cartridge slot stood for.

@elfenmagix8173

3 жыл бұрын

The DOM sticker was for the Domestic USA market. There was an INT, UK and JP stickers later on. The DOM and JP machines were the same however.

@rapscallion3506

3 жыл бұрын

@@elfenmagix8173 many thanks...

great video...but I was hoping to see the computer in action.