Atari v Commodore

[TMR]

So, I think it would be a pseudo-hybrid anyway....i.e. do PC program with Pokey emulation to do test tracks. Then when you think "I want to hear this on the real machine", just push a key, and a testfile will be sent to the Atari.

 

Would the delay between hitting the "play" button on the PC program and the SIO chunking the current workfile from the PC to the A8 be particularly hideous or is that viable?

 

RMT indeed already does a good job (however, doesn't support polycounter reset/offset, filter (pulsewave) control, 2-tone filter etc.), and testing comes down to exporting .xex (from the RMT PC tool), then convert manually to .atr (XBOOT or MAKEATR dos tools). Then open SIO2PC (another dos tool) to send the .atr to the real Atari. Wait for the loading....especially this line of actions could be 'short cut'.

 

Much as i like RMT, the music driver itself could possibly do with some optimisation if you're going to be throwing more processor intensive jobs at it...?

 

Oh, just to clarify i'm doing an emkay on this project; throwing in a few vague, guesswork-based ideas and leaving it to everyone else to actually code! (Sound effect engines i can just about manage, but not being a musician i'm just not suited to writing music drivers. =-)

[Rockford]

O.k. I got a computer programming degree from Rockford University. Now since I'm a 'coder' my opinions are automagically correct, and you Atari enthusiasts with your paultry 35 years of experience mean nothing! You see, you are not a 'coder' and therefore your opinions mean nothing!

 

Now let me explain how Commodore 64s were made. I worked on the assembly line after my parents realized I shat in 6502 machine code. Now this is absolutely the hardest processor to code for, in the past, present, and future, and this is why we can never be wrong. It takes nothing less than a wunderkind to figure out this cryptic set of instructions. Now when I worked on the Commodore 64 assembly line you only had one task, you pull the lever at a certain time and a whole bunch of molten plastic drops into a mold and goes glorp!. The commodore 64 in fact has no electronics inside it, it is just molded plastic and bees, that's right bees. You can take that to the Rockford University bank. I suggested they make a key chain out of this instead, but this is what they went for. The sid is actualy just a bunch of pissed-off bees. Then when it came time to design the disk drive system, I said to them, sure you could produce a quick, responsive, usefull peripheral unit, but why not instead include a whole microprocessor, and make the drive a kind of useless Frankenstein computer unto itself! Obviously, they went for it, but on one condition, it cannot fully boot games, and you need a third party after-market product to make it usable. Then we produced for them what I like to call the peekpoke language. They decided to call it BASIC. Also when you move the joystick it acts like the keyboard, that was my idea as well.

 

-Rockford University graduate

OK, for change the real story about how C64 was born, from Brian Bagnall's book "The Spectacular Rise and Fall of Commodore". Enjoy !

 

"...It was a remarkable achievement to have working computers for CES, especially considering the engineers had not even started the VIC-II and SID chips until April of 1981. "Nine months later we had enough working prototypes and we were able to go to the show," says Winterble. "So much of the Commodore 64 was just the way it was because of the constraints of time, and I think it actually made it a better product to be honest," says Yannes. "We didn't have time to fiddle with things and change it around too much." The final verdict on the computer would come at CES."

 

"...Compared to most prototype demonstrations, the Commodore 64 was remarkably complete. "Almost all the stuff that was put together quickly for the show was not anything that was real," says Yannes. "They were smoke and mirrors. Part of it was just to get some press at the show and to gauge people's reaction to things. The Commodore 64 was probably one of the most real things that showed at a show."

 

"...There was not much competition at the 1982 Winter CES. Commodore's main rival, Atari, was still showing their Atari 400 and 800 computers. Mattel introduced the Aquarius computer, and a company called Spectravideo introduced the SV 318. Both of these machines were similar to the VIC-20 in specifications, but both were doomed largely because of their calculator-style keyboards.

 

Yannes also spied on potential competitors. "One of the things I was supposed to do at that show was to case the competition and check what was going on at the other places. Charlie or Al asked me to do it," he recalls. The competition was weak. "There wasn't really anything out there. It really was a coup because Apple and Atari and everybody else were just pretty much showing what they already had with a few little additions here and there."

 

"Although marketing created the Commodore 64 presentation at the last moment, it was an impressive demonstration. "It was a rather fancy booth," recalls Winterble. "We had a bunch of stations showing different aspects and different parts with a skilled person at each space. One guy was showing a game demo, one guy was showing something else. We had them scattered all around this booth." One Commodore 64 demonstrated the capabilities of the SID chip using John Feagans music program. The beautifully strange music filled the air, acting as a siren call for technophiles. "They were lined up," says Winterble. Mostly, the presenters just let Fred Bowen's demonstration program show off the features. "It was really impressive for only having the machine in his hands for a short period of time," says Winterble. "He wrote a 'Welcome to Commodore 64,' that came out with a big splash. Then this little man walked across the screen, turned around, and started doing things. It was a great little demo using the sprites."

 

"...As word got out about the new computer, the lines to enter the booth grew longer. "It was a huge sensation. Everybody and their brother were stopping by." Yannes was also thrilled at the positive reception of his computer. "The C64 just kind of blew everybody out of the water because it came out of nowhere," says Yannes. "There was no expectation of it, it was very reasonably priced, and it had 64K of RAM which was a magic number at that point in time because nobody else had 64K of RAM."

 

The computer even impressed Chuck Peddle, who never missed a CES show. "The C64 was an enormously successful machine," says Peddle. "It was a great game machine; not because of the 6502 and not because of the memory that was in it. It was a great game machine because of the work Charpentier did."

 

Perhaps the most impressive aspect of the computer was the proposed price by Commodore. Before the show, Jack decided on a retail price of $595. Competitors reacted to the announcement with skepticism and shock. "We got their attention," says Winterble. "The guys from Atari came by to look at it and said, 'They can't do that. It's impossible for the price.'" From the reactions, Charles Winterble felt the new computer might even outsell the VIC-20. "When we left CES, we knew we had a fantastic product," says Winterble.

 

It was an incredible leap in computing power from their previous efforts. Never before had a computer company gotten everything so right in one package. "It was such a big hit at the show," says Yannes."

 

"..."The reason we could is because of vertical integration," says Winterble. "We put so much in just a couple of chips." Without vertical integration, the custom SID and VIC-II chips would account for a much more significant portion of the costs. Atari and Apple lacked the in-house expertise to manufacture their own custom chips, which meant they had to hire costly outside companies (often MOS Technology) to come up with designs. As a result, Apple and Atari computers were both costlier and not as technologically sophisticated."

 

"The meaning of the Commodore 64 debut was obvious to Jack: he finally had his Apple II killer. Now all he had to do was deliver the crushing blow. He wanted to get the machine into production quickly."

 

 

Well, as history showed, Apple II wasn't the only casualty.

[PeteD]

Surely there's some PC-A8 connection method that's fast enough to be sent a lump of init data (instruments etc) then get pushed notes in realtime? I know actually controlling pokey in realtime is out due to the cycle exactness but there must be a way to send a few bytes of data per frame? I think if some inter platform thing is going to be done that should be the aim, for the best usage method anyway. If not then there's the fallback of outputting the whole song and sending it (making the file, sio2pc etc) but that would frustrate me in about 2 minutes (I'm very impatient though when it comes to that kind of thing).

 

 

Pete

[PeteD]

O.k. I got a computer programming degree from Rockford University. Now since I'm a 'coder' my opinions are automagically correct, and you Atari enthusiasts with your paultry 35 years of experience mean nothing! You see, you are not a 'coder' and therefore your opinions mean nothing!

 

Now let me explain how Commodore 64s were made. I worked on the assembly line after my parents realized I shat in 6502 machine code. Now this is absolutely the hardest processor to code for, in the past, present, and future, and this is why we can never be wrong. It takes nothing less than a wunderkind to figure out this cryptic set of instructions. Now when I worked on the Commodore 64 assembly line you only had one task, you pull the lever at a certain time and a whole bunch of molten plastic drops into a mold and goes glorp!. The commodore 64 in fact has no electronics inside it, it is just molded plastic and bees, that's right bees. You can take that to the Rockford University bank. I suggested they make a key chain out of this instead, but this is what they went for. The sid is actualy just a bunch of pissed-off bees. Then when it came time to design the disk drive system, I said to them, sure you could produce a quick, responsive, usefull peripheral unit, but why not instead include a whole microprocessor, and make the drive a kind of useless Frankenstein computer unto itself! Obviously, they went for it, but on one condition, it cannot fully boot games, and you need a third party after-market product to make it usable. Then we produced for them what I like to call the peekpoke language. They decided to call it BASIC. Also when you move the joystick it acts like the keyboard, that was my idea as well.

 

-Rockford University graduate

 

How dare you! SID is the master of music chips, simply listen to this attached file!

 

 

 

Pete

Insects_in_Space.mp3

[TMR]

Surely there's some PC-A8 connection method that's fast enough to be sent a lump of init data (instruments etc) then get pushed notes in realtime? I know actually controlling pokey in realtime is out due to the cycle exactness but there must be a way to send a few bytes of data per frame?

 

Wasn't atariksi spouting something about using the joystick ports for data transfer...? Granted it's hard to know if anything he's said actually makes sense, but it might be worth investigating...

Edited October 5, 2009 by TMR

[analmux]

Wasn't atariksi spouting something about using the joystick ports for data transfer...? Granted it's hard to know if anything he's said actually makes sense, but it might be worth investigating...

Yes, that's indeed another possibility, but then you'd have to write custom IO stuff: Not the way for lazy coders

 

However, I did some experiments some years ago (2002 IIRC), doing data transfer from C64 to Atari 800 XL, by using a 4bit parallel cable. I used user port of C64, and joystick port of A8. Plenty of possibilities...I used the 2nd atari joystick port, connected for bit 4-7 of C64 user port, for 'command/handshake line', i.e. when it changes, a new nybble is comming in. Worked perfectly, and no pokey channels needed. I used one of 6526's timers (in the C64) and an interrupt, to send the data.

Edited October 5, 2009 by analmux

[+wood_jl]

Well, as history showed, Apple II wasn't the only casualty.

 

I wouldn't say Apple was a casualty at all - Commodore and Atari aren't the ones selling iPods and iPhones - and which company went tits-up first, Atari or Commodore?

 

Seeing as how the even the Vic-20 came out AFTER the Atari-8, why didn't the Commodore 64 (or the Vic, for that matter) best the Atari in every single way? After all those years to copy, it should have been expected. Even the Atari 2600 had 128 colors in 1977.

[analmux]

Anyway, the simplest (IMO) would be to write an Atari-native tracker. Me myself was thinking of a tracker on an 130XE, so we can use a lot of workspace....doing PC-A8 stuff would give enough frustration already, at least to me....but there are other clever ways.

 

Maybe another idea is indeed to use joystick ports and parallel data transfers. Then imagine a pokey-music player, running native on A8, waiting for new commands from the jopystick port. Forget direct pokey register stuffing, but at least when we do 100 hz reg updates, the IO part can fill some buffers, just to be stupidly executed by the A8 native routine.

 

(this gets a bit off-topic, a new thread could be started for this)

[Rockford]

OK, primavera speaking...

 

 

Madame, it's nice to talk to you again.

 

 

 

@Rockford:

 

All of these game comparisons in some last 100 pages are very smart, indeed.

 

 

I agree, and thanks for appreciating my work. I am honoured.

 

 

 

Yeah, and they have probably one thing in common - you didn't code a byte in tham, right?

 

You are dead right.

 

 

 

So, maybe show us some of YOUR achievements on this (as you said) superior comp.

 

I can't, because I'm not as talented as you.

 

 

 

 

(just checked - there IS a guy called Rockford on Commodore scene, let's see it is him)

Nope, he isn't me, I'm the one and only, inimitable.

 

I hope I will hear from you soon.

[Rockford]

Well, as history showed, Apple II wasn't the only casualty.

 

I wouldn't say Apple was a casualty at all - Commodore and Atari aren't the ones selling iPods and iPhones - and which company went tits-up first, Atari or Commodore?

 

Seeing as how the even the Vic-20 came out AFTER the Atari-8, why didn't the Commodore 64 (or the Vic, for that matter) best the Atari in every single way? After all those years to copy, it should have been expected. Even the Atari 2600 had 128 colors in 1977.

In general you are right, but it was reffered to the model not company.

[Rockford]

@ Rockford:

 

I really like the comparisons; I think you're doing well at posting them, and when I get a lil' more time I am going to fire up all of those games on both systems and do make some comparisons. That's pure fun, and it's the reason I got a C64 (well, 1541U actually) after all these years. But I suggest you let the screenshots (etc) speak for themselves; is it necessary to insult Atari lovers? Why not have a "we report....you decide" take on these things? Of course the better game (in any comparison) could only prove superiority for one machine (or the other) if we could be certain the programmers exploited the hardware to the theoretical maximum on both platforms, and THEN one of them won. Of course we'll never know that. But we don't need to - to understand which version of the game is better....for whatever unknown reason...superior hardware or inferior programming....or some indeterminate mix. But indeterminate is the key word.

 

Who cares why? I'd like to play the better version, regardless of which hardware. And of course, as screenshots are not representative of actual fluid gameplay, they don't tell the whole story. That's where the observations of gamers come in. If the graphics AND gameplay are better on one system, then I think we have a winner - for THAT game, certainly not all.

 

Keep in mind whatever you say, you're never going to convice people on Atari Age to throw away their Ataris. You may pique interest in C64 however - if that is your ultimate goal (if not, then what is it?) - but likely NOT through adverseness.

Thanks for kind words and suggestions As for my style of writing, I'd rather stick to it.

 

Cheers

[analmux]

Thanks for kind words and suggestions As for my style of writing, I'd rather stick to it.

Let me guess: You made a bet with someone that you can induce a doubling of the number of posts in this thread within 6 weeks?

 

Anyway, if Rockford didn't show up here, a lot of (interesting) side-line discussions here wouldn't exist anyway, and there were many good ones. Keep posting

[Gury]

Keep in mind whatever you say, you're never going to convice people on Atari Age to throw away their Ataris. You may pique interest in C64 however - if that is your ultimate goal (if not, then what is it?) - but likely NOT through adverseness.

Thanks for kind words and suggestions As for my style of writing, I'd rather stick to it.

 

Cheers

 

Hej wood_jl, don't worry, I am one of those Atarians who will never throw away their Ataris. C64 doesn't offer anything I would miss from my Atari. Both have their advantages and disadvantages, and for me, A8 has everything I need. I remember having Atari with few others in my city, all others were C64 or ZX Spectrum. Even then Atari was considered more professional, besides others things, not just for games.

[emkay]

So, I think it would be a pseudo-hybrid anyway....i.e. do PC program with Pokey emulation to do test tracks. Then when you think "I want to hear this on the real machine", just push a key, and a testfile will be sent to the Atari.

 

Would the delay between hitting the "play" button on the PC program and the SIO chunking the current workfile from the PC to the A8 be particularly hideous or is that viable?

 

 

 

Setting the SIO datablocks to 32 bytes is fast enough to have almost immediate reactions on the player side. If someone sets the POKEY's divider for the short moment of data transfer to 1 , you would hardly recognize a break of the sound. It's shorter than a "click"

[analmux]

Setting the SIO datablocks to 32 bytes is fast enough to have almost immediate reactions on the player side. If someone sets the POKEY's divider for the short moment of data transfer to 1 , you would hardly recognize a break of the sound. It's shorter than a "click"

Yes, but relative timer offsets (used for the pulse waveform) will be screwed up....So, I'd say don't use the SIO.

[emkay]

Setting the SIO datablocks to 32 bytes is fast enough to have almost immediate reactions on the player side. If someone sets the POKEY's divider for the short moment of data transfer to 1 , you would hardly recognize a break of the sound. It's shorter than a "click"

Yes, but relative timer offsets (used for the pulse waveform) will be screwed up....So, I'd say don't use the SIO.

 

A small block of data transfer you could do in part of a single VBI. Timers have to be adjusted anyways before an instrument gets started.

Edited October 5, 2009 by emkay

[frenchman]

Well, as history showed, Apple II wasn't the only casualty.

 

I wouldn't say Apple was a casualty at all - Commodore and Atari aren't the ones selling iPods and iPhones - and which company went tits-up first, Atari or Commodore?

 

Seeing as how the even the Vic-20 came out AFTER the Atari-8, why didn't the Commodore 64 (or the Vic, for that matter) best the Atari in every single way? After all those years to copy, it should have been expected. Even the Atari 2600 had 128 colors in 1977.

 

 

Actually Apple 2 was not a casualty at all, as the Apple 2 had already established itself in schools, that is something the C64 never managed, not even in UK. Apple 2 had the most software of all 8-bits (as I previously shown from that 1985 magazine report, here's a reminder):

 

and even after C64 support dried up in the USA, games were still being made for Apple 2, eg Prince of Persia, Mines of Titan...etc.

Edited October 5, 2009 by frenchman

[Rockford]

Well, as history showed, Apple II wasn't the only casualty.

 

I wouldn't say Apple was a casualty at all - Commodore and Atari aren't the ones selling iPods and iPhones - and which company went tits-up first, Atari or Commodore?

 

Seeing as how the even the Vic-20 came out AFTER the Atari-8, why didn't the Commodore 64 (or the Vic, for that matter) best the Atari in every single way? After all those years to copy, it should have been expected. Even the Atari 2600 had 128 colors in 1977.

 

 

Actually Apple 2 was not a casualty at all, as the Apple 2 had already established itself in schools, that is something the C64 never managed, not even in UK. Apple 2 had the most software of all 8-bits (as I previously shown from that 1985 magazine report, here's a reminder):

 

and even after C64 support dried up in the USA, games were still being made for Apple 2, eg Prince of Persia, Mines of Titan...etc.

From Wiki:

 

" By the end of its production in 1993, somewhere between five and six million Apple II series computers (including approximately 1.25 million Apple IIGS models) had been produced."

 

 

"During the Commodore 64's lifetime, sales totalled 17 million units, making it the best-selling single personal computer model of all time. For a substantial period of time (1983-1986), the Commodore 64 dominated the market with between 30% and 40% share and 2 million units sold per year, outselling the IBM PC clones, Apple computers, and Atari computers."

 

C64 outsold Apple II 3:1. I think it sums it up pretty well.

[ANTIQ]

It was an incredible leap in computing power from their previous efforts. Never before had a computer company gotten everything so right in one package. "It was such a big hit at the show," says Yannes."

 

"..."The reason we could is because of vertical integration," says Winterble. "We put so much in just a couple of chips."

 

Isn't someone conflating vertical integration and very large scale integration(!)?

 

Without vertical integration, the custom SID and VIC-II chips would account for a much more significant portion of the costs. Atari and Apple lacked the in-house expertise to manufacture their own custom chips, which meant they had to hire costly outside companies (often MOS Technology) to come up with designs. As a result, Apple and Atari computers were both costlier and not as technologically sophisticated."

 

Quick, someone tell nVidia!

[atarian63]

Well, as history showed, Apple II wasn't the only casualty.

 

I wouldn't say Apple was a casualty at all - Commodore and Atari aren't the ones selling iPods and iPhones - and which company went tits-up first, Atari or Commodore?

 

Seeing as how the even the Vic-20 came out AFTER the Atari-8, why didn't the Commodore 64 (or the Vic, for that matter) best the Atari in every single way? After all those years to copy, it should have been expected. Even the Atari 2600 had 128 colors in 1977.

 

 

Actually Apple 2 was not a casualty at all, as the Apple 2 had already established itself in schools, that is something the C64 never managed, not even in UK. Apple 2 had the most software of all 8-bits (as I previously shown from that 1985 magazine report, here's a reminder):

 

and even after C64 support dried up in the USA, games were still being made for Apple 2, eg Prince of Persia, Mines of Titan...etc.

From Wiki:

 

" By the end of its production in 1993, somewhere between five and six million Apple II series computers (including approximately 1.25 million Apple IIGS models) had been produced."

 

 

"During the Commodore 64's lifetime, sales totalled 17 million units, making it the best-selling single personal computer model of all time. For a substantial period of time (1983-1986), the Commodore 64 dominated the market with between 30% and 40% share and 2 million units sold per year, outselling the IBM PC clones, Apple computers, and Atari computers."

 

C64 outsold Apple II 3:1. I think it sums it up pretty well.

yep, people are cheap!That does sum it up.

[TMR]

From Wiki:

 

" By the end of its production in 1993, somewhere between five and six million Apple II series computers (including approximately 1.25 million Apple IIGS models) had been produced."

 

 

"During the Commodore 64's lifetime, sales totalled 17 million units, making it the best-selling single personal computer model of all time. For a substantial period of time (1983-1986), the Commodore 64 dominated the market with between 30% and 40% share and 2 million units sold per year, outselling the IBM PC clones, Apple computers, and Atari computers."

 

C64 outsold Apple II 3:1. I think it sums it up pretty well.

yep, people are cheap!That does sum it up.

 

i can't comment, my 800XL was cheaper than my C64...

[frenchman]

Well, as history showed, Apple II wasn't the only casualty.

 

I wouldn't say Apple was a casualty at all - Commodore and Atari aren't the ones selling iPods and iPhones - and which company went tits-up first, Atari or Commodore?

 

Seeing as how the even the Vic-20 came out AFTER the Atari-8, why didn't the Commodore 64 (or the Vic, for that matter) best the Atari in every single way? After all those years to copy, it should have been expected. Even the Atari 2600 had 128 colors in 1977.

 

 

Actually Apple 2 was not a casualty at all, as the Apple 2 had already established itself in schools, that is something the C64 never managed, not even in UK. Apple 2 had the most software of all 8-bits (as I previously shown from that 1985 magazine report, here's a reminder):

 

and even after C64 support dried up in the USA, games were still being made for Apple 2, eg Prince of Persia, Mines of Titan...etc.

From Wiki:

 

" By the end of its production in 1993, somewhere between five and six million Apple II series computers (including approximately 1.25 million Apple IIGS models) had been produced."

 

 

"During the Commodore 64's lifetime, sales totalled 17 million units, making it the best-selling single personal computer model of all time. For a substantial period of time (1983-1986), the Commodore 64 dominated the market with between 30% and 40% share and 2 million units sold per year, outselling the IBM PC clones, Apple computers, and Atari computers."

 

C64 outsold Apple II 3:1. I think it sums it up pretty well.

 

Sums nothing up.

C64 outsold other 8-bitters, but still Apple 2 was in USA schools, not C64. That was important for software companies back then.

And if your way of thinking 'best selling is better quality', you must love the Spectrum, best selling computer in UK. Or lets put it this way, Apple 2 had most software of all the 8-bits, in your way of thinking Apple 2 software is best then.

Edited October 5, 2009 by frenchman

[+wood_jl]

"During the Commodore 64's lifetime, sales totalled 17 million units, making it the best-selling single personal computer model of all time. For a substantial period of time (1983-1986), the Commodore 64 dominated the market with between 30% and 40% share and 2 million units sold per year, outselling the IBM PC clones, Apple computers, and Atari computers."

 

C64 outsold Apple II 3:1. I think it sums it up pretty well.

 

In other news, 99-cent cheeseburgers outsold filet mignon today 10:1. Equally

[potatohead]

I like the game comparisons also. No worries there. It's good to see lots of older titles side by side. Always interesting.

 

As for giving up Atari, no way. As for checking out a C64, absolutely! At some point, that will happen, as it would for other interesting 8 bitters. For me personally, it's a matter of time, space and dollars. Picked up a CoCo 3 a while back, and am saving my pennies for a PC adapter / SD device. Now is the time to collect these goodies, as has been said here.

 

As for the style, if it's just entertainment Rockford wants, I'll largely pass, unless a good opportunity presents itself. Then it's game on! Those of you reading this thread long enough know I'm totally up for that.

 

So yeah, keep posting. No worries here.

[frenchman]

I like the game comparisons also. No worries there. It's good to see lots of older titles side by side. Always interesting.

 

As for giving up Atari, no way. As for checking out a C64, absolutely! At some point, that will happen, as it would for other interesting 8 bitters. For me personally, it's a matter of time, space and dollars. Picked up a CoCo 3 a while back, and am saving my pennies for a PC adapter / SD device. Now is the time to collect these goodies, as has been said here.

 

As for the style, if it's just entertainment Rockford wants, I'll largely pass, unless a good opportunity presents itself. Then it's game on! Those of you reading this thread long enough know I'm totally up for that.

 

So yeah, keep posting. No worries here.

 

You know, I am using a C128 since 1987, sometimes I also used an Apple 2, but get one (C64 or 128), try it out, there's some real classics to be found within the US software range. Stay away from UK softs as boredom sets in quite quickly after a few minutes with those games. Exceptions are softs from Thalamus, System 3, Hewson, Level 9, Rainbird, but that's it really. But try some US classics, Starflight, Zak McKracken, Alter Ego, Space Rogue, LCP, Times of Lore, Bards Tale III....etc. Huge list of classics

Edited October 5, 2009 by frenchman