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Atari 7800 computer


hloberg

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I was looking at the picture of the 7800 computer that never materialized.

http://www.atarihq.com/museum/2678/7800key.html

It looks to me to have been nothing more than a modified XL that attached through the joystick port to the 7800.

I wish there was more info on it but creating such a device would be doable. A cartridge on the 7800 for direction and all the peripherals would hook to the attached computer. The computer would be nothing more than a fancy dumb terminal.

IF one could create a cartridge for the 7800, this could be done with a current XL or XE, just turn off ANTIC as it would not be needed.

Wish had more info on the thing.

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Actually what you mentioned is one of the reasons the Atari 7800 XM was announced. The 7800 XM was supposed allow a keyboard to be used and allow 8 bit computer hardware stuff like a hard drive to be used on an Atari 7800 XM. The 7800 XM also has two planned expansion ports.

 

There is a very old Atari 7800 XM page that you can see a picture of the key that you need to scroll down a lot. Here's the link: http://www.atarimuseum.com/videogames/consoles/7800/expansion/

 

The problem is I have no idea if any of this is scrapped for the 7800 XM because Curt had the system take pre-orders in 2010 and none was shipped out yet for multiple reasons including Curt's health problems.

 

The 7800 XM itself isn't ready yet to be shipped. The XM was supposed to be more than the computer part since it supposed to have more ram, Pokey Sound chip, and YM2151 sound chip, and a built in high score cart.

Edited by 8th lutz
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  • 4 weeks later...

Actually what you mentioned is one of the reasons the Atari 7800 XM was announced. The 7800 XM was supposed allow a keyboard to be used and allow 8 bit computer hardware stuff like a hard drive to be used on an Atari 7800 XM. The 7800 XM also has two planned expansion ports.

 

There is a very old Atari 7800 XM page that you can see a picture of the key that you need to scroll down a lot. Here's the link: http://www.atarimuseum.com/videogames/consoles/7800/expansion/

 

The problem is I have no idea if any of this is scrapped for the 7800 XM because Curt had the system take pre-orders in 2010 and none was shipped out yet for multiple reasons including Curt's health problems.

 

The 7800 XM itself isn't ready yet to be shipped. The XM was supposed to be more than the computer part since it supposed to have more ram, Pokey Sound chip, and YM2151 sound chip, and a built in high score cart.

 

The XM is supposed to do the following:

 

*One POKEY sound chip. [not 2 like with the XBoard].

 

*128K RAM [just like with the XBoard; supposedly mapped to the same location].

 

*High Score Cartridge (HSC) functionality built-in instead of using an external pass-thru cartridge.

 

*1 Yamaha YM2151 sound chip, which was used by most post-1984 Atari Games Corp arcade games....because the Atari AMY wasn't completed.

 

*XEGS keyboard port.

 

*SIO port. Requires adding a PIA chip internally to the XM for it to work.

 

 

I believe it's unknown whether the pre-existing unreleased Atari 7800 keyboard software will auto-detect an XEGS keyboard; probably not.

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  • 6 months later...

Actually its using the same keybaord as a 600/800XL (to reduce costs since they were already made and it just needed different key caps)

 

The innards were a very early masked version of the PIC1670 MCU that communicated to the 7800 through the 2nd joystick port. It had an SIO port on it for using certain Atari periperhals such as Printers.

 

The XM is actually based exactly on the early April 84' design for a computer for the 7800. The only difference is the XM has an opening for a DB15 for the XEGS keyboard versus the DB9 for a version of keyboard to plug into that CPU version...

 

In a sort of sense, the XM is bringing the original CPU add-on to life because now people can write games and even applications (like a word processor) to use the keyboard with the XM. Hopefully someone will write Star Raiders to use with the XM and it would be fun to see some of the older graphic adventure styled games to type commands to play with the XM.

 

 

I was looking at the picture of the 7800 computer that never materialized.

http://www.atarihq.com/museum/2678/7800key.html

It looks to me to have been nothing more than a modified XL that attached through the joystick port to the 7800.

I wish there was more info on it but creating such a device would be doable. A cartridge on the 7800 for direction and all the peripherals would hook to the attached computer. The computer would be nothing more than a fancy dumb terminal.

IF one could create a cartridge for the 7800, this could be done with a current XL or XE, just turn off ANTIC as it would not be needed.

Wish had more info on the thing.

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In a sort of sense, the XM is bringing the original CPU add-on to life because now people can write games and even applications (like a word processor) to use the keyboard with the XM. Hopefully someone will write Star Raiders to use with the XM and it would be fun to see some of the older graphic adventure styled games to type commands to play with the XM.

 

It would be fun to see the Sierra Online games on the 7800. King's Quest was amusing on the Master System, but I wonder how many people played it end-to-end with that joystick driven text entry system? What a pain that was without a keyboard

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It would be fun to see the Sierra Online games on the 7800. King's Quest was amusing on the Master System, but I wonder how many people played it end-to-end with that joystick driven text entry system? What a pain that was without a keyboard

After playing all sierra games 30 years ago on a tandy 1000 I have no need or desire to ever try fiddling with a kings quest game on the 7800 keyboard or not.

I tried kings quest nes 25 some years ago.. it sucked.. horrible arrow on the screen to move etc...unplayable.

I would rather play an original game.

Edited by Jinks
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