Atari v Commodore

[Barnacle boy]

Showing them a cool game on a computer screen is just a cool old game on a screen. When the machine is sitting there, controllers to be picked up, felt and enjoyed, it's different. One person said, "I've not played Atari in years!". Now they had, but it was emulated. "Playing Atari" happens with an Atari...

Now, put that emulator inside the case? Ha! That's playing Atari to most people. Funny how that works.

 

Hmm. Interesting. Kind of makes me want to try to shoehorn the innards of my xbox into a c64 breadbin case.

 

BTW, I must admit that one of the drawbacks of emulating on xbox is that it outputs a 640x480 interlaced image, and although the rescaling is nicely done and not at all ugly, it still lacks the steady scan-liney goodness of a proper non-interlaced 200p image.

[Barnacle boy]

-snip- RAH RAH RAH! -/snip- ...remember I want to play Hyper Sports and it's not on A8.... -snip- RAH RAH RAH! -/snip-

If you're so keen to play Hypersports in particular, then unless I'm mistaken a solid state card solution like the SD2IEC board for $45 should do the trick, considering Hypersports is just a single load game. Plus it apparently works with 300+ multi-load games. It's not a complete solution like the 1541 Ultimate, but perhaps it would meet your needs.

 

...you can attempt to attract attention and somehow feel better about themselves with such nonsense as "Mine sold more, and I was THERE back in 1985."

Actually, that "I was THERE" bullshit came from an Atari user.

Edited April 17, 2009 by Barnacle boy

[Heaven/TQA]

Star Raiders would be a walk in the park.

 

As it is, it's relatively slow compared to what either machine is capable of. That's the price you pay by fitting it in 8K.

 

Little space for tables or unwound loops. It even restricts itself to only using the bottom 8K of RAM, which is part of the reason it only uses Gr. 7.

 

Very likely easy to do now.

But Star Raiders is a "launch title" and is of higher quality than any launch title I can think of for the C64. I think the thread was to compare the same games to see where the Atari was actually better. The first space shooter I'm aware of for the C64 was Neutral Zone, which was beautiful for the time but had awful playability and lagged far behind Star Raiders from a technical perspective. (And also from a 3D perspective perspective )

 

suddenly it does matter again what mattered in the heydays. but when I say the c64 focused technically better on what mattered in the heydays, that does not matter because now is now.

 

launch title this or that, c64 sold more, as a8 fans admit it almost everyone of them bought a c64, eventho they think its a bad machine. I wonder why...

 

I bought mine 2 years ago when I thought it would fit into my collection... I got an AR-cart plus 1541 but realised that SID is not everything... that I could not connect easily the C64 to my laptop which acts as a retro server and so on... maybe I should get additional device like the mmc stuff... how are demos and fastloaders work with such tools?

 

but I have to admit that I power up more my A8 than the c64... but simply because its my primary coding platform... to be honest... the c64 lost it's magic and myths when it arrived in my house... 20 years of myth.

 

But I am retro fan so I needed the 6502 machines of my childhood... so to say a8, vic20, c64...apple 2 was nothing here in europe so thats why I do not have one... maybe I am getting Z80 machines, too but dislike the cpu...

[atariksi]

Wolfram, do those devices completely eliminate the need for a 1541?

 

In other words, does the C64 see them the same way it does the 1541, or are there issues?

 

I wouldn't trust a word of what he states. He's more biased than TMR and misinformed as well. Everything that C64 cannot do is subjective or useless for him. He reminds me of the story of Dr. Frog in a well. He was stuck in a well and regardless of how many other frogs told him there's an Atlantic Ocean out there, he kept insisting there is nothing better than this well. This is the best. I cannot have any other better home. Such narrow-minded individuals are a complete disgrace to computer society. He can't even accept the Atari has a superior palette what to speak of Joystick ports, hundreds of graphics modes, better interlace graphics, etc. etc. He's a complete waste of time thus far.

[Fröhn]

that I could not connect easily the C64 to my laptop which acts as a retro server and so on... maybe I should get additional device like the mmc stuff... how are demos and fastloaders work with such tools?

I use one of those ethernet solutions when coding: Simply press button on PC, source code gets assembled, crunched, sent via ethernet to C64 and then executed in one go. The same also works for other programs. Disk images are written to real disks via ethernet too. There's also the possibility to have a virtual disk drive but ofcourse that doesn't work with all the fast loaders.

 

The other solution is the 1541u which fully replaces the 1541 and other hardware (ram expansion, different cartridges) but is quite expensive.

 

but I have to admit that I power up more my A8 than the c64... but simply because its my primary coding platform...

To me it's the same for A8. It's just too difficult to get my stuff running on it. I have to power up my old DOS PC, transfer all the code there, power up A8 etc and then jump through all kinds of A8 DOS/SIO2PC software to finally run my executables. Comparing to "one button pressed on primary PC -> done" that's quite some trouble.

[atariksi]

He did, didn't he. He just signed on here to show off and failed miserably. The last straw was the PWTP slogan, he thought it was an Inc. slogan when in fact it was a Corp slogan devised by JT. And then when he realises he's got it wrong again, he screams 'success'. Wolfram is a trolling loser indeed.

 

 

the atari 8 bit fans willingly create screens with that slogan, sporting cheap is good ("power without the price"), in the same time a8 fans call c64 for being cheap, bad. prooves the bias.

 

It only proves your misunderstanding of the word cheap. It has many meanings-- go look it up in the dictionary. At the time of A8, only the PGA graphics card from IBM allowed for 16 shades of colors for personal computers and it cost thousands of dollars. The A8 allowed for 16-shaded colors and cost less than a thousand. That's an example of getting that same feature without paying thousands of dollars.

[Barnacle boy]

He reminds me of the story of Dr. Frog in a well. He was stuck in a well and regardless of how many other frogs told him there's an Atlantic Ocean out there, he kept insisting there is nothing better than this well. This is the best. I cannot have any other better home. Such narrow-minded individuals are a complete disgrace to computer society.

Cool story bro. Considering the frog would DIE in the Atlantic Ocean, I guess that's one smart froggy.

[Heaven/TQA]

that I could not connect easily the C64 to my laptop which acts as a retro server and so on... maybe I should get additional device like the mmc stuff... how are demos and fastloaders work with such tools?

I use one of those ethernet solutions when coding: Simply press button on PC, source code gets assembled, crunched, sent via ethernet to C64 and then executed in one go. The same also works for other programs. Disk images are written to real disks via ethernet too. There's also the possibility to have a virtual disk drive but ofcourse that doesn't work with all the fast loaders.

 

The other solution is the 1541u which fully replaces the 1541 and other hardware (ram expansion, different cartridges) but is quite expensive.

 

but I have to admit that I power up more my A8 than the c64... but simply because its my primary coding platform...

To me it's the same for A8. It's just too difficult to get my stuff running on it. I have to power up my old DOS PC, transfer all the code there, power up A8 etc and then jump through all kinds of A8 DOS/SIO2PC software to finally run my executables. Comparing to "one button pressed on primary PC -> done" that's quite some trouble.

 

will have to look into it... and what kind of mass storage thing works best as plug and play (where I can have my d64 files on a usb flash or sd/mmc card)?

[atariksi]

Their 16 color modes are overrated. They are not that flexible for graphics as they are for colored 40-column text.

 

yeah, this picture just prooves that:

 

 

the cpu can sit iddle while showing this. you need cpu intervention just to get more than a few colors (not shades). and even so you're nowhere near to this flexibility.

 

Bullcrap. Disgusting image removed. Once again attacking something that you don't understand and doing a biased analysis on top of it. I already described some reasons why the 16-color modes are overrated-- (1) they are extensions of text-mode (cell-based) and harder to address than linear (real) graphics modes, (2) they are not actually 16-color modes since their color RAM is far less resolute, (3) in higher resolution the color is not retained at 1/320 positioning (I guess you never read those posts), etc. etc. You have a misconception that GTIA modes are just shades. That's just bullcrap. There are three GTIA modes-- a paletted mode, a color mode, and a shade mode. You can have more than 16 colors easily using GPRIOR which does not involve CPU intervention. And what's wrong with CPU intervention-- do you know you lose 40 DMA cycles everytime you use the color RAM on a scanline. So Atari can have plenty of more time available to do things per scanline (more than C64) but it can not use it to generate more colors. What kind of bullcrap is that. You want to show C64 is superior or equal to Atari, then those 40 cycles you lose to color RAM atari can use. A DLI fits in within 40 cycles on a scanline.

[Wolfram]

Number of systems sold back in the day is irrelevant, and quality of software is too - **UNLESS** I can get that "quality" software running on a real machine with practical, affordable peripheral emulation.

 

so you cant afford $150 ? are you still a kid on parent's money ? c64 has 10x and better games for 3x the money. so just think for a moment about nr of stuff&quality/buck ratio.

[atariksi]

Just because the c64 had more games support doesnt make the c64 a better machine...

 

well for one thing: that simple fact made almost all a8 fans to buy a c64. while almost no "original" c64 user went out to get a8. this 2 facts tells a lot.

 

Your observations are too limited to make such a conclusion. In order to draw the above conclusion, you have to have known all A8 fans all original c64 users. You don't. You don't know any in my area.

[atariksi]

The picture will never get better if you use the C64's image as source

 

Someone should get the original photo of this couple

 

Wolfram is biased since he rather take a badly miscolored image and use a 16-shade mode to display it. He should use a color mode to show a colored image-- can't even tell whether the original is colored or gray given the limited palette of C64. Perhaps, he should first find out what the 16-gray scale images look like and how GTIA works before he distorts things to suit his bias. Here's an example of a 16-gray image from Graphics 9 mode:

[atariksi]

I prefer some nicer C64 pictures:

 

CPU on idle (160x200):

...

CPU on idle but still having less cycles remaining than Atari.

 

>CPU supports VIC2 to fetch more colors (160x200):

 

I.e., CPU halting everytime VIC2 fetches color RAM data.

 

>CPU supports VIC2 to fetch more colors + sprite layer (320x200):

 

I.e., CPU can't do anything until VBlank.

[Wolfram]

Wolfram, do those devices completely eliminate the need for a 1541?

 

In other words, does the C64 see them the same way it does the 1541, or are there issues?

 

I wouldn't trust a word of what he states. He's more biased than TMR and misinformed as well. Everything that C64 cannot do is subjective or useless for him. He reminds me of the story of Dr. Frog in a well. He was stuck in a well and regardless of how many other frogs told him there's an Atlantic Ocean out there, he kept insisting there is nothing better than this well. This is the best. I cannot have any other better home. Such narrow-minded individuals are a complete disgrace to computer society. He can't even accept the Atari has a superior palette what to speak of Joystick ports, hundreds of graphics modes, better interlace graphics, etc. etc. He's a complete waste of time thus far.

 

you got it all wrong. proof from a previous post:

 

http://www.atariage.com/forums/index.php?s...t&p=1728306

 

I have no problem admitting the a8's strengths. many colors are nice, faster cpu yeah, pokey ehmm the misstuned musics when it plays 4 channels are horrible, display list is cool, especially lms, and the scrolling is nice, widescreen, more than 200 lines is cool too.

 

16 shades bigpixel modes are awesome for demos with the faster cpu.

 

...

 

yeah 256 colors, they are cool, I often wished the c64 had more colors.

 

...

 

display list, lms, etc yaddayadda, cool features.

 

..,

a8 definitly has the upper hand in demos, to write something positve to the end

 

now please stop with the personal insults, which have no truth.

[Fröhn]

Wolfram is biased since he rather take a badly miscolored image and use a 16-shade mode to display it. He should use a color mode to show a colored image-- can't even tell whether the original is colored or gray given the limited palette of C64. Perhaps, he should first find out what the 16-gray scale images look like and how GTIA works before he distorts things to suit his bias. Here's an example of a 16-gray image from Graphics 9 mode:

So a C64 image is always "miscolored" while pictures in the 16 shades monochrome mode made entirely green (or blue... or grey etc) isn't miscolored?

[atariksi]

Their 16 color modes are overrated. They are not that flexible for graphics as they are for colored 40-column text.

 

yeah, this picture just prooves that:

 

...

Yup, it does, it looks like a 16 colour picture made up with a fixed palette. Yuk

 

He hasn't proven anything. According to his logic, if they keep the 40*25 color RAM and keep making resolutions like 160*200, 320*200, 320*400, 640*400, 1024*768, they are ALL 16-color modes. What bullcrap! What nonsense! Here's some real imagery (interlaced of image previously posted with almost zero flicker):

[atariksi]

Wolfram is biased since he rather take a badly miscolored image and use a 16-shade mode to display it. He should use a color mode to show a colored image-- can't even tell whether the original is colored or gray given the limited palette of C64. Perhaps, he should first find out what the 16-gray scale images look like and how GTIA works before he distorts things to suit his bias. Here's an example of a 16-gray image from Graphics 9 mode:

So a C64 image is always "miscolored" while pictures in the 16 shades monochrome mode made entirely green (or blue... or grey etc) isn't miscolored?

 

No, the gray-scale imagery shown as color on C64 is miscolored. We also have colored modes on Atari (I thought you would know that).

[Wolfram]

He did, didn't he. He just signed on here to show off and failed miserably. The last straw was the PWTP slogan, he thought it was an Inc. slogan when in fact it was a Corp slogan devised by JT. And then when he realises he's got it wrong again, he screams 'success'. Wolfram is a trolling loser indeed.

 

 

the atari 8 bit fans willingly create screens with that slogan, sporting cheap is good ("power without the price"), in the same time a8 fans call c64 for being cheap, bad. prooves the bias.

 

It only proves your misunderstanding of the word cheap. It has many meanings-- go look it up in the dictionary. At the time of A8, only the PGA graphics card from IBM allowed for 16 shades of colors for personal computers and it cost thousands of dollars. The A8 allowed for 16-shaded colors and cost less than a thousand. That's an example of getting that same feature without paying thousands of dollars.

 

indeed the word cheap has many meanings for atari fans. in a8 context cheap is good, and in c64 context cheap is bad. the proof is out there as I have shown.

[Fröhn]

I prefer some nicer C64 pictures:

 

CPU on idle (160x200):

...

CPU on idle but still having less cycles remaining than Atari.

 

>CPU supports VIC2 to fetch more colors (160x200):

 

I.e., CPU halting everytime VIC2 fetches color RAM data.

Not less cycles when you consider that A8 needs G2F to do something comparable when on C64 the CPU is totally free for other jobs.

 

>CPU supports VIC2 to fetch more colors + sprite layer (320x200):

 

I.e., CPU can't do anything until VBlank.

Just the same as a G2F picture, but easier to use and higher color density. I tried to get some gfx guys to do G2F pictures, they didn't understand what to do. Most gfx guys are no technical people, they just want to set pixels.

[Fröhn]

No, the gray-scale imagery shown as color on C64 is miscolored. We also have colored modes on Atari (I thought you would know that).

I just wanted to hint you to your own bias. And trying to look at the colored images on A8 with "your" eyes: They are also miscolored, perhaps less than C64 images but somebody used to i.e. truecolor pictures will still see a lot of wrong colors. The 128 colors palette also has it's limits, it can't reduce it's saturation for example and due to the restrictions of A8 color usage you will be forced to use wrong colors in places where the palette might offer better colors.

[atariksi]

All those picture looks great, but here there is 29 colors... who can do more?

 

 

obviously the c64. without extra effort you have ugly 4 color or 16 shades of one color in huge pixels.

 

the c64 can have both 16colors on highres picture AND many many sprites moving.

 

A8 uses up its CPU and "sprite" resources, to come close to what the c64 does without using cpu or sprites.

 

...

 

See your misunderstanding-- you think there's only a 4-color mode or 16-shade mode. There's also 5-color modes. There's also a 9-color paletted mode and there's also a 16-color mode. There's also GPRIOR on top of the graphics modes. It's the C64 which can never even come close to the Atari modes that use more than 16 colors/scanline.

[Wolfram]

Bullcrap. Disgusting image removed. Once again attacking something that you don't understand and doing a biased analysis on top of it. I already described some reasons why the 16-color modes are overrated-- (1) they are extensions of text-mode (cell-based) and harder to address than linear (real) graphics modes

 

so? they can still display a higher color density than a8 ever dreamt of. most games use charmode anyway, and c64 charmode is aswell better then a8 bitmapmode.

 

(2) they are not actually 16-color modes since their color RAM is far less resolute,

 

still much better than what a8 can do.

 

(3) in higher resolution the color is not retained at 1/320 positioning

 

it is. a8 engineers may have been unable to get that right (artefacting) but thats not the case for c64. its an a8 issue.

 

You can have more than 16 colors easily using GPRIOR which does not involve CPU intervention.

 

yes, having 100x lower color density than c64 has while the cpu is iddle. you can have some colored boxes with that, while the c64 is displaying a real picture.

 

And what's wrong with CPU intervention

 

not wrong, but the c64 can still do loads of things beside a 16col pic, while u use up all cpu and "sprites" to get some inferior coloring.

[atariksi]

No, the gray-scale imagery shown as color on C64 is miscolored. We also have colored modes on Atari (I thought you would know that).

I just wanted to hint you to your own bias. And trying to look at the colored images on A8 with "your" eyes: They are also miscolored, perhaps less than C64 images but somebody used to i.e. truecolor pictures will still see a lot of wrong colors. The 128 colors palette also has it's limits, it can't reduce it's saturation for example and due to the restrictions of A8 color usage you will be forced to use wrong colors in places where the palette might offer better colors.

 

If you convert A8 graphics to C64, they will be miscolored. If you convert true-color to A8, yes it will get wrong colors but not be as off as on C64. No bias. Just facts. He was taking a miscolored image and then converting to A8, which is a biased approach. It's better to go to original and then convert to A8.

[Wolfram]

Wolfram is biased since he rather take a badly miscolored image and use a 16-shade mode to display it.

 

 

whose image is badly miscolored ? you even cheat by showing an interlaced picture.

[atariksi]

Bullcrap. Disgusting image removed. Once again attacking something that you don't understand and doing a biased analysis on top of it. I already described some reasons why the 16-color modes are overrated-- (1) they are extensions of text-mode (cell-based) and harder to address than linear (real) graphics modes

 

so? they can still display a higher color density than a8 ever dreamt of. most games use charmode anyway, and c64 charmode is aswell better then a8 bitmapmode.

 

(2) they are not actually 16-color modes since their color RAM is far less resolute,

 

still much better than what a8 can do.

...

 

Wrong. You cannot display any imagery of 16-gray scale or 16-shades of other colors. Higher color density on C64 in your imagination.

 

>>(3) in higher resolution the color is not retained at 1/320 positioning

 

>it is. a8 engineers may have been unable to get that right (artefacting) but thats not the case for c64. its an a8 issue.

 

Bullcrap. I tried it on C64 as well. Ask Frohn unless he has a different C64 than you.

 

>>You can have more than 16 colors easily using GPRIOR which does not involve CPU intervention.

 

>yes, having 100x lower color density than c64 has while the cpu is iddle. you can have some colored boxes with that, while the c64 is displaying a real picture.

 

Once again throwing up arbitrary numbers to confuse people. Prove it's 100X lower density.

 

>>And what's wrong with CPU intervention

 

>not wrong, but the c64 can still do loads of things beside a 16col pic, while u use up all cpu and "sprites" to get some inferior coloring.

 

Bullcrap. As I stated, the 40 DMA cycles you use up for fetching color RAM, I can use to do a DLI. And GPRIOR will automatically generate further colors.