XE Plastic Colour

[flashjazzcat]

The topic of what is the "real" colour of Atari XE equipment came up a while ago (I forget where, but somewhere on the forum), and I was intrigued enough to wonder - on arrival of my XEGS - what colour it's supposed to be. A few days of RetroBrite-ing have brought it up nicely, certainly to the extent that the outside of the casing is the same colour as the inside (and one would assume the inside's less prone to fading and discolouration). But even though the XEGS now looks pretty good in its own right, it's certainly a colour far removed from any of my other XEs (even the most tarnished of which are much less "olive" than the XEGS). It was only this evening that while cleaning the room I rediscovered the one item which is the exact same shade of grey as the XEGS: my XF551:

 

 

Apologies for the flash photography. I'd love to see some "true" colour photos of the original equipment. I honestly don't remember this XF551 being any different when I bought it twenty years ago. It was never the same colour as an XE. The XF is certainly a good match for the XEGS.

Edited February 23, 2010 by flashjazzcat

[Catsmasher]

I just got an XEGS today. It is NIB and doesn't appear to have ever been unpacked. The color is uniform all over and I am assuming it has not changed - it sure as heck looks brand new.

Anyway, it is not grey at all. It is more of a light olive green. And of course the buttons look like Easter eggs. Overall a big departure from my other Atari games which look like they were designed by someone with a crush on Darth Vader.

 

Maybe you could clue me in on the best games for it. I will probably try to get a disk drive eventually.

 

Catsmasher

[tjlazer]

Well its hard to tell from the pics, but it seems its right on with the XE grey. I have several XE computers and ST's and your XEGS is spot on. Olive Green? Ugh.... Post a pic I gotta see dat!

[Rybags]

Olive green = aged.

 

I remember the XEs when new never looking green. IMO, they've aged the worst of all the 8-bit systems. My 800XL looks relatively fresh and my 400 although a bit dirty looks reasonably close to what they did 25 years ago.

 

The funny thing about my 130XE is that although it has a definite olive complexion, if I take a photo of it, it looks like it just came out of the factory.

[tjlazer]

Olive green = aged.

 

I remember the XEs when new never looking green. IMO, they've aged the worst of all the 8-bit systems. My 800XL looks relatively fresh and my 400 although a bit dirty looks reasonably close to what they did 25 years ago.

 

The funny thing about my 130XE is that although it has a definite olive complexion, if I take a photo of it, it looks like it just came out of the factory.

 

Is this what you mean?

 

 

Ah I see now......

 

Edited February 24, 2010 by tjlazer

[Rybags]

Actually, I suspect the flash does us the favour of removing the offending olive tinge.

 

 

That's of my 130XE a few years ago. In reality, the back of the machine is almost the same shade as the top.

[Catsmasher]

I was going by memory. I think I can buy "olive tinge" as a valid description.

I was expecting typical grey, the olive tinge took me by surprise. But there IS an olive tinge.

[flashjazzcat]

Olive green does not equate to aged in this example. The XEGS and XF-551 are - as far as I can establish - just about their original colour. I'm basing this conclusion on the fact that I've had the XF-551 from new, and I recall it being the same colour when it came out of the box (it was never exposed to direct sunlight in daily use, and it spent the last ten years in a box). Perhaps because of it's nascent "olive" tinge, it (and the XEGS) seem to have aged rather better than some XEs.

 

The other pictures in this thread are of discoloured XE cases: something quite different. It's true that flash light or good natural light tends to make the XEGS/XF look less olive. Flourescent or other artificial light (no flash) really shows up the greeny tinge. Of course, my XEs don't look as good in artificial light either, but they don't look green.

 

I have one particularly mint 130XE which I'll try and photograph without flash alongside the XEGS and XF551. The XEGS and XF are a completely different colour to the rest of the XE line. And the ST is slightly different again...

 

EDIT: Here we go. I took a number of macro pics, etc, but none showed it as well as this:

 

 

That XF is NOT heavily discoloured, and I believe the XE to be just about factory nick.

Edited February 24, 2010 by flashjazzcat

[+Philsan]

Surely ST line has a different grey than XE line.

 

 

[mimo]

Yes the st is a different shade, slightly darker and more blue IMO .

I also noticed that the xe and xf are slightly different in shade, I had a nib 130 xe and xf 551 a couple of years ago and noticed the difference. Never could get used to the xf looking slightly different, it made the whole setup look wrong.

Spent 2 hours today scouring my HDD for photos but can't find any