Programming the Atari System 1

Animan · January 5, 2010

I have found myself interested in programming the Atari System 1, an old interchangeable arcade system (Marble Madness, Road Runner, etc.). I have tried to find some info about programming it, but have had no luck. I know it uses a Motorola 68010 for it's main CPU, and a 6502 for a sound processor, but that's it. Does anybody know about programming this thing, or know any links about Atari System 1 Programming? Thanks.

GroovyBee · January 5, 2010

Do you have any links to the information you've found so far?

Bruce Tomlin · January 5, 2010

You might get some info by downloading the MAME source. Be warned that there are a lot of files, and if you're not on a unix/linux type OS (or install Cygwin) where you can do something like...

grep -ril "marble madness" *

...then you'll have a hard time finding anything.

andym00 · January 13, 2010

You might get some info by downloading the MAME source. Be warned that there are a lot of files, and if you're not on a unix/linux type OS (or install Cygwin) where you can do something like...
grep -ril "marble madness" *
...then you'll have a hard time finding anything.

I'd head to MAME as your first port of call actually as that'll probably have most of what you want to get started, plus modifying the driver to add your own ROMs to it so you can test would probably be one of the few ways to do it.. Though I've no idea what the state of play is with other System 1 emulators..

It's easy to find your way around though, once you get the naming conventions clear.. Just get the thing loaded into Visual Studio, and it's childs play to navigate the source.. If you haven't got a meaty version of VS/VC or whatever then grab the Express version, which is free.. Anyway, that's only if you want a n easy life browsing the source, but I can't remember where the solutions came from, or if I just made my own last time I was playing inside Mame..

Drivers/atarisy1.c is the driver you'll be interested in

It's got most of the registers 'documented' in it and of course you have the source to it so it's easy to figure out what the hardware is actually doing with registers and stuff..

The list of actual hardware dragged in is:


#include "driver.h"
#include "cpu/m68000/m68000.h"
#include "cpu/m6502/m6502.h"
#include "machine/atarigen.h"
#include "machine/6522via.h"
#include "includes/atarisy1.h"
#include "sound/tms5220.h"
#include "sound/2151intf.h"
#include "sound/pokey.h"

edit: Just went hunting, and managed to find an interesting little place..

http://www.alsarcade.com/Andy/arc/atari/

Specfically, he has the "SYSTEM 1 Hardware & Operating System description manual" available

http://www.alsarcade.com/Andy/arc/atari/system1/system1_hardware_and_os_description.pdf

Which might save some reading of source code..

Edited January 13, 2010 by andym00