I learned to program on the Atari 600 XL. I was too poor for a disc drive, though, so every game I made vanished the moment I shut it down. I used to have friends come over to try out my games just so it didn't feel like such a waste. "You're this white square. This red square is trying to catch you. Find your way out of the maze." "Awesome!!!"

@callmeishmael5742

2 жыл бұрын

Sounds fun

The Atari 1040ST... I Still miss it. I've used it for years and years in my music studio. Amazing how much you can do with just 1 MB.

I absolutely loved my atari stfm. Still have it.

I was only born in the early 90's, so I don't really properly _remember_ these things. But, and you know when you don't solidly remember something, but you can kind of remember that you used to remember it? I know it sounds stupid, but watching this video brought back a couple crazy memories... like the very earliest memories I actually have in my brain :P

For music sequencing, this machine rocked. With early Cubase software, it's extremely flexible, maybe more flexible than some sequencers in DAWS today. Still us it as backup when other computer goes down.

Let the Atari vs. Amiga flamewar commence!

@DrSteveBagley

9 жыл бұрын

And people think PC vs. Mac debates get heated :-)

@KrzysztofKotarba

9 жыл бұрын

I had atari my best friend had amiga... we never even thought about fighting which one is better. When you're kid you focus on important things like games we played.

@wisteela

9 жыл бұрын

wolpertinger I have both :)

@retrogamer33

7 жыл бұрын

That flamewar began years ago and still hasn't stopped

@daishi5571

5 жыл бұрын

Flame war..... what flame war? War requires two opposing forces, not one vastly superior force and the other being the ST ;-)

Nice, my first computer was an Atari STE; no one seems to remember them much now when I talk about it, great machine.

GEM's older than the Macintosh, or even the LISA as GSX. GEM was inspired by the work PARC, the same thing Apple took and tried to claim as their own and sue anybody else who was inspired by the prior art they used. How things have changed...

@TheUglyGnome

9 жыл бұрын

GSX was a graphics library, not an operating system (like MacOS) or operating environment (like GEM). It was basically DRI's implementation of ISO-standard graphics library interface GKS (Graphics Kernel Sytem). And it isn't hard to see that GEM borrowed features of MacOS not found on Xerox Alto/Star. On the other hand, Apple borrowed more features from Xerox systems than others (GEM, Windows, GEOS, AmigaOS) borrowed Apple's inventions, which makes Apple's lawsuits to look lame indeed.

@MechanicaMenace

9 жыл бұрын

Don't really have much of an opinion on Apple except that they have an habit of suing people over prior art they just claimed and they take credit for stuff they had no hand in until they stop slagging it off and jump on the bandwagon. GEM was written by a guy who worked at PARC and it was started before Apple went anywhere near the place, so GEM isn't based on the Macs OS, they were parallel developments.

@MechanicaMenace

9 жыл бұрын

Henrik Wannheden oh and no Apple didn't pay XEROX, otherwise XEROX wouldn't have sued them when they sued MS.

@TheCreatorJames

9 жыл бұрын

Mechanical Menace There were deals. Apple invested in quite a bit of stock in Xerox. Xerox offered them an opportunity to see what they had in PARC, and told them they had something Apple might be interested in seeing. They communicated quite a bit with Xerox over their "GUI" system. Xerox had knowledge Apple was porting it, and even assisted them. Xerox complained and sued later on, which was weird. Especially after Apple thanking Xerox and crediting them in Magazines.

9 жыл бұрын

Jesse Mitchell Jobs was a crooked Libertarian, he screwed everyone because he was a psychopath.

Very cool, one of my favorite computers. I still recall the day I picked up my 520ST setup, back in the 80's. I was intrigued, but never used the midi capabilities of these machines. I vow to learn to play piano/keyboard, and will toy around with my STs... Awesome video, thanks for the info.

When I was a kid my dad was a musician. I remember going to the computer shop with him when he bought an Atari 520ST for his home min-studio. I still remember him cursing and swearing as he soldered in extra memory for the thing. Ah, memories.

Atari ST computers had fast CPUs so they could do percise timing on the audio chip and make interesting sounds. One of those sounds is similiar to SID pwm.

Yep all the bad boys of electronic music used it. On the cover of EPMD ‎- Strictly Business - 1988 - you can see the 1040st screen glowing in the background in the studio. And that is one of the top innovative sample based albums of the 80s.

I did the CAD reviews for STart magazine. The Cyber Studio for the ST is the forerunner of the 3ds Max 3D system.

Thanks for the series on the Atari ST, as I was involved in them at the time and these brought back some good memories.

With how powerful small PC's are nowadays we should see something of a return of this form factor (PC in Keyboard), but people seem to want them build into monitors in stead. Would absolutely love a modern take on this concept.

@xldkxnewyorker8914

7 жыл бұрын

They still exist

@ChasD

4 жыл бұрын

Check out single board computers such as the Raspberry Pi and Latte Panda etc.! Frightening how much power can be packed into such minuscule units.

I had heard that the Atari ST was used a lot by musicians but never knew why or looked into it. As soon as I saw the midi ports on the side of it in your video I instantly went 'ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!' What a genius stroke at the time.

AtariST for the glory. Atari users renuite!

I like the things this fellow talks about, and his personality. Quite enjoyable all around. Please never stop making videos for this channel. :)

I'm still using this beast to compose music. Amazing computer!

I only ever used my ST to play "Dungeon Master'! Money well spent!

just postet a video of the Atari ST Series on my channel, showing, that especially for musicians its still unbeatable in MIDI timing and also some software is still a nice source for creativity. switching it on after decades was no problem at all and i have a secure feeling of technical stability i need as a musician :-) thanks for posting your vid

It's wild how big the SID music became in the later years.

Only AFTER I ordered my 520STfm on Ebay did I remember I used one back in 2003 in audio engineering school. Yes, 2003. ST's could still be found in recording studios to handle MIDI sequencing duties precisely due to the timing accuracy inherent to the design of the ST. We also fiddled with some basic editing in DIgidesign software, but this was more of a history lesson as Pro Tools was very much industry standard in 2003.

I have an Atari 1040 STFM and I looked into upgrading the TOS ROMS for the STE into my machine but discovered my 1040 STFM had an 1040 STE Motherboard in it with a prototype sticker on the board. Called Atari Australia to see if the TOS could be upgraded to which they replied you cannot possibly have a prototype next gen board in the STFM. Sent some pictures to them at 2400 baud and it was confirmed somehow I had a prototype board in my STFM. It also had the higher spec Blitter chip on board as well. They offered a swap for a new STFM but I kept the board and it still runs to this day. I was wondering if anyone else made a discovery like this and just how many prototype boards were slipped into older machines to move stock for the new ones. Haven't heard of anyone else with on here in Australia but maybe they turned up elsewhere in the world. It would be great to find out these things as it has no real monetary value. Cheers all

@xldkxnewyorker8914

7 жыл бұрын

The only similiar thing Ive experienced is that I have 2 FrankenBoards... My Sega Genesis and Xbox OG are both pretty obv just some leftover parts thrown together at the factory to get rid of parts

@judgewest2000

6 жыл бұрын

Hawke 232 no. The Amiga had a similar thing for a while. Before the A500+ officially came out they ended up shipping those with kickstart 1.3 to look like the A500 - a simple rom swap and you had the latest n greatest (which was hardly any different to its predecessor).

Great many composers used it in their studio. Micheal Cretu as example, or Estonian singing revolution composer Alo Mattiisen

I still have my 1040 STe on a shelf in my closet. I got a MIDI keyboard because of it. ...I think I still have that, too. Ah... memories... I loved that little machine.

@Rhannmah

9 жыл бұрын

I still have my 1040 ST too. It still works, I can play Xenon, King's Quest 4 and Space Harrier on it!

I think you should find some of the people from these stories and talk to them. Like this Eric Smith guy who created MINT.

My father still owns the 140 STE. This is just in case he wants to use his korg m1 from back in the day which he can load sounds onto through the midi ports. there are solutions for windows, but as they are all commercially (at least what i found) the atari is there to stay

Atari ST great computer.

I think I still have the Atari St somewhere in the attic. Brings back some memories.

Nice job using the Dark Side if the Spoon demo! If you're gonna show off Atari ST music, Jochen Hippel's stuff is the way to go!

Wow.... Now I'm interested into hearing full Atari built tracks. Love "vintage" systems and devices that make sound!

I made tracker music with ST and still have 3 Atari Sts. One is Ste

The 1040ST with a monochrome monitor and C-Lab Notator was the bomb. This ultimately became Emagic Logic.

Now a video on the Amiga and the demoscene, please!

@tekk9995

2 жыл бұрын

Nope..

That system is much faster than any pc I have used with a floppy disk... as I recall.. on Windows XP I had to wait between 5 to 10 seconds to open the contents of a floppy disk after I double clicked...

my first computer. man this takes me back

The MIDI port was part of the original design concept for the ST, NOT an after thought.

Man. I had the st. But ended up giving it away in the 90's! :(

Accidental? The ST was made for music, hence why the Midi ports were made to work on hardware interrupts making them rock solid, literally never skipping a beat. Having a high res monitor that ran at 72 Hz. It was no accident. Still love these videos though :-)

Actually joystick/mouse ports were part of keyboard even on first machines (those without a floppy drive). Such STs had physical joy ports connected from the mainboard to keyboard pcb, and then mouse/joystick states were transferred by a keyboard cpu back to the mainboard (it was a serial transmission). So it is quite likely, that they planned STF-type machines from the beginning, but then had to go with split design, because without a floppy drive it looked better on a price list.

GEM for PC was distributed with Ventura Publisher DTP pack. and ... AMIGAAAAAH!!!!!11!

the 68000 processor inside this is IMO by far the most fun to program in assembler. Its pretty orthogonal and has a nice number of registers (8 data, 8 address). My old school books of the time (87 ish) have loads of hand written assembler in them, often with clock cycle counts written in the margin. used to walk around with a pocket instruction set reference and read it trying to find quicker ways of doing the same task. extreme hand optimization!

I lived in the village where Hi-soft were based. They used to drink in my parents pub.

78% of this video is *not* about the musical capabilities of the ST... :(

My father had GEM on pc, 1980 Amstrad PC powered by 8088 AMD chip. Actually it was used every day until 2006 when the power supply eventually fried. It was a good machine for writing books.

I wonder if Steve and James May shops at the same place. I love those shirts!

I love how even today, Logic Pro X's UI quirks can trace their lineage back to how it was done on the original Logic for Atari ST, especially obvious in the MIDI environment and the scoring engine.

@enemysub9057

9 жыл бұрын

I would have thought Logic's UI quirks would have been due to Apple's long running insistence upon the single mouse button, I mean that was the default on their laptops for quite some time even after they implemented support for two button mice.

@fluffycritter

9 жыл бұрын

Enemy Sub It has very little to do with that, really. I started using Logic on Windows back when it was still cross-platform (before Apple bought out eMagic), and it was still a quirky UI by Windows' standards as well. I only switched to it on a Mac well after the OSX transition was complete, and it was always a multi-mouse-button UI on there (they mapped the Esc key to act like a right button click at the time, since ctrl-click meant something else). The UI was probably completely ordinary for the Atari ST on which it started, but until very recently they'd never really changed the UI's layout at all, and even today it's still not a very Mac-like interface. Like, it still makes use of menu bars embedded into the application windows (which is pretty normal on Windows but almost unheard of on Mac and never in apps written by Apple themselves), and the way that notation primitives are selected in the scoring mode still looks almost exactly how it did back on the ST (and is, again, very much un-Mac-like).

Ran Cubase 2.0 on it. Let's just say my studio has expanded a bit since then, but my dad and I had 4 synths hooked up to it back then. // Sonic Peak Studio

There a problem with the older CRT monitors, with scanning kit you can pick up the leaking radio waves enabling you to watch the user using his/her computer, the image can be very clear... This was a HUGE security concern back in the day.

listen to Omni Trio on youtube, most of his early work from 90s sound great. he used atari. really well defines notes.

Speaking of music with the atari st, i found a atari stacy2 which was very expensive and its main selling point was creating midis.

Aww I learned C programming on the Atari back in the day. And another thing - the GEM operating system fitted in to a 2k ROM chip as I recall. How come Windows comes on a DVD these days?

@DrSteveBagley

9 жыл бұрын

192k -- but the point still holds ;)

@zeke1220

9 жыл бұрын

Bloat.

@dipi71

9 жыл бұрын

Also, the TOS versions in the ATARI ROMs lacked the most of the VDI (virtual device interface), font management and several other things the original GEM did include. Atari just never managed to finish those components until the community provided replacement (NVDI, MagiC!, MinT). Oh, and I too learned K&R C on my Mega ST4. :-)

@SteveGouldinSpain

9 жыл бұрын

***** K&R 2nd edition? Classic!!

@dipi71

9 жыл бұрын

Yes, it's the 2nd edition -- kinda. My uncle thought that all this GFA Basic and 68k assembly hacking would spoil me for proper software engineering and bought me for my 17th birthday »Programmieren in C, Zweite Ausgabe«, a German-language translation of the 2nd edition. It's a bit of a weird read these days, for example arrays are translated with »Vektoren« (vectors) in the book, and it was »Alternativen« instead of unions. But it's definitely one of those rare books that changed my life trajectory. Having studied CS, I'm a developer and Linux admin now. Blame my uncle! Except for my love of the Ruby language; that was a co-worker. :-)

No mention of the full backstory, Tramiel (RIP) came up with the ST after the deal to purchase the Amiga from its developers fell through and he was ousted from Commodore.

@zarjesve2

9 жыл бұрын

CaptainCorleone not true. Jack Tramiel never planed to built computer based on Amiga technology.

@captaincorleone7088

9 жыл бұрын

Perhaps it's not true in your mind but it's really well established computing history. The Amiga was originally going to be the Atari Lorraine. Look up the Atari-Commodore lawsuit and the Atari-Amiga Agreement (Mickey).

@zarjesve2

9 жыл бұрын

CaptainCorleone Atari Inc. yes (they did Amiga agreement) but NOT Atari Corp. (Jack Tramiels Atari).

Just started up my STfm that's been laying in the attic since the 90's, too bad but the drive won't read floppys anymore... wish I had SD-card interface for it :/

I still have my Atari MegaST 4 sitting around in my parents basement, wondering if someone would buy it for nostalgica reasons, but everytime i decide against it cause of nostalgica reasons ;)

I had an STE 1080 with a few games, mostly payed Lemmings on it. I ended up giving to a friend who had a Roland Synth as he could use it to input thousands of new sound banks really easily.

@kingofmambo

4 жыл бұрын

1040 ste

Can't resist: AMIGA RULEZ! A bit of retro-flame-war. I was thirteen when the "Atari St vs Amiga" begin. At time it looked so important...

Damn that is a good shirt.

i still have a amiga and atari st cool systems i really wish i gave upgrading a amiga 1200 a go though

You look horizontally stretched? Did you record in 4:3 and are playing back in 16:9...?

Substation was also an STE enhanced game if I remember correctly?

Multitasking you say, Well don't forget Sinclair QL back in 1984.

In a way I regret never using an ST - I jumped from a 800XL to 130XE then to the PC. Oh, and Windows, Icons, Menus, Pointers! :)

at 1:12 you say it has windows, icons , mouse and pointers but should it not be windows icons, menues and pointers

I still make music on Atari ST, but I'm using the YM chip alone, no DMA or MIDI for me thanks!

i had 1040ST and Falcon , my grandad gave it to me

Cool

Cool video. Now do one on the Amiga. I loved my Amiga 500. Video and audio was years ahead of the competition.

Putting the shinny iPad right on the edge of the table disturbs me.

@TheMrKeksLp

9 жыл бұрын

Ikr. One little push and the screen is srewed :3

@TheMrKeksLp

9 жыл бұрын

***** k

@Tuberuser187

9 жыл бұрын

I know right? An accident just waiting to happen.

Had an ST so my allegiance, for want of a better word, is with it but come on, really now; it's just amazing(ly pathetic) to still see the playground battles still going on. It would be funny if it was in jest but some of these people are still deadly serious in their dedication to let the rest of us know how much richer their parents were at the time. My grandfather even won mine in a raffle!

Ooh Crikey Wot A Scorcher!

'Seal', don't you mean Adamski? (might be coming across a bit of an anorak there!)

I'd love to get a multi toss one day

When you say " six-eight-thousand " Is that the Motorola 6800 processor?

@DrSteveBagley

9 жыл бұрын

68000

did he say "six, 80,000?" 1:16

Is this about how Atari STs were good for Music, or how they're just like Macintoshes? I'm a third of the way through the video and he's said Macintosh almost as many times as he's said Atari.

It's time for an Amiga special tbh...

In a parallel world we would have had an Commodore ST and an Atari Amiga. Atari ST is closer to commodore 64 and Amiga closer to Atari, sorts of an evolution of previous Jay Miner work the Atari 2600

"...And occasionally a PC" lol :)

so distracted by the screensaver in the background...

08:09 Last time I checked, Mac is also a PC.

You sir, need a case on that ipad XD

golden age of RPG games

Music talk starts at 7:00

Fuck, me... Mint started as an Atari OS?!

This guy reminds me of Louie Anderson.

MINT is not TOS --> MINT is now TOS That must have been the biggest coincidence ever.

That is the most pimping shirt I've ever seen

does anyone else hear the highly pitched noise of the crt? :P

@oestrek

9 жыл бұрын

the old atari monitors squealed. Part of the "joy" of early computing. I think the color ones were the worst. I had three color displays of different vintages and they all squealed as I recall.

"GEM, the interface, was also available for the PC as well, but it didn't take off because a small company in Seattle came up with something that they called Windows." Hah! (Though I don't think Microsoft were "small" by that point. DOS alone must have given them a great position.)

@drzeissler

8 жыл бұрын

+TazeTSchnitzel I use GEM 1.4 on my Tandy 1000 and on my Schneider Tower-AT 286/10. It works great :)

@hikari_no_yume

8 жыл бұрын

+nazo333 Yes, but I'm talking about Microsoft.

Windows Icons Mouse Pointer... WIMP... Pretty much the first Graphical User Interface.

Aaaammiiiiigaaaaaaaaaaaa!

@retrogamer33

7 жыл бұрын

AAAAAAAAAAATTTTTTTTTAAAAAAAARRRRRRIIIIIII video so jog on fanboy!

I'm not sure if Computerphile ever read the comments, But i'm big fan of Numberphile and I also like technology. Computer field has alot of interesting and thought provoking subjects, but I feel the topics being selected are very bland (SQL injection, Binary addition, flip flops.. ).

"YEAH BUT YOU COULD ADD MIDI PORTS TO AN AMIGA EASILY, ATARI SUXX!" Ever notice that the "Atari vs Amiga" wars that everyone complains about only really happens on Atari videos, where Amiga people come in and start spouting off. Go and look at Amiga videos and you don't see Atari people saying anything. My conclusion is: the price differential naturally separated the rich, spoiled brats into the Amiga camp, and they can't stand seeing Atari people still happy with the humbler, budget choice they made all those years ago. I'm sure 95% of Amiga people are fine, but if you were an asshole you most likely went for the Amiga. And that 5% never shuts up.

@zo1dberg

8 жыл бұрын

+tosgem "Go and look at Amiga videos and you don't see Atari people saying anything." That's because they've got nothing to say! Trolololololollll!!1

@Orionrobots

7 жыл бұрын

Wow - 30 years later and the Amiga vs ST wars are still alive and kicking? I owned a C64 (original breadbin) and a Speccy (48k awful rubber). Controversy - I always preferred the C64 as it was really my first. I'd later owned (for interest) a VIC20 and zx81.

@leeball4585

5 жыл бұрын

They have the quiet confidence of people who owned the better, more versatile machine...so no need to shout about it!

I loved my STE until i turned it on and smoke came out :(

Why do you claim that they borrowed ideas from the Mac? How about Xerox Parc? Sigh.

@blenderpanzi

9 жыл бұрын

They probably *did* borrow it from the Mac. Yes, Apple borrowed from Xerox, but that is the next in the chain.

@MrCOPYPASTE

9 жыл бұрын

So they borrowed from Xerox...

@TheUglyGnome

9 жыл бұрын

There are features in GEM which were first implemented on Mac and not on Xerox systems.

@victornpb

9 жыл бұрын

Xerox Parc was inspired on the NLS computer, douglas demostrated the concept to thousands of engineers. Then PARC was funded and they made a prototype, that xerox refused to mass produce it. Apple brought it to the masses.

@quarthinos

9 жыл бұрын

At 0:41, you can see an explicit callout to GEM and Digital Research, Inc. GEM was designed by a former PARC person, so they both have a common ancestor. There's also the fact the ST was released the year after the Macintosh, which is a pretty short time to develop a complete window system.

Brady, I miss you! This other camera guy is not as good

3,950th view!

I love the video, but can you put a low pass filter on your master, I'm getting a high pitch tone that just jars me.

@kedamono2562

7 жыл бұрын

Dude, if you wanna hear a song with terrible high pitch hiss, listen to the REM song Star Me Kitten.