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The Atari VCS Controversies Thread


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2 hours ago, TACODON said:

@Chopsus you really need to stop causing so much trouble in the IGG comment section. It is the Thunder Dome again!

LOL ... it really is a devoted bunch of cheese sycophants LOL!

 

FArtari now has an excuse to drag delivery into next year, I’m betting March by the time the New Year blow an hoes are expended:

Atari 5 hours ago
PROJECT OWNER

Latest update on joystick shipment is that there is no update. Customs does not provide any info, it only holds or releases. Based on experience, our agent thinks the products are being held for random inspection and therefore it’s just a waiting game for now. This is normal and actually happened with some of the Collector’s Editions. It took extra time, but the shipment was eventually released. We will continue to keep everyone updated.

 

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3 hours ago, Chopsus said:

LOL ... it really is a devoted bunch of cheese sycophants LOL!

 

FArtari now has an excuse to drag delivery into next year, I’m betting March by the time the New Year blow an hoes are expended:

Atari 5 hours ago
PROJECT OWNER

Latest update on joystick shipment is that there is no update. Customs does not provide any info, it only holds or releases. Based on experience, our agent thinks the products are being held for random inspection and therefore it’s just a waiting game for now. This is normal and actually happened with some of the Collector’s Editions. It took extra time, but the shipment was eventually released. We will continue to keep everyone updated.

 

^ "Hopes?"  or do you mean ho ho ho's in plural?  ???or ??????

I'm not a pimp! 

Edited by OCAT
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12 minutes ago, TACODON said:

@Chopsus Fred and Tamico are Master Blaster in that Thunderdome.

Neither are capable of managing a lemonade stand at this point, so I ain’t too concerned ... especially if one intends to stick his head up the other’s ass in order to fight LOL (a la Master Blaster).

 

FArtari is the big dumb guy on the bottom?

Edited by Chopsus
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4 hours ago, Chopsus said:

I did wonder if we had a Delorean situation?

Underpowered, made from other manufacturers' parts, paid for by people other than the company that designed it, and destined to be remembered for something other than being at all good at what it does? :D

Edited by x=usr(1536)
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3 hours ago, x=usr(1536) said:

Underpowered, made from other manufacturers' parts, paid for by people other than the company that designed it, and destined to be remembered for something other than being at all good at what it does? :D

Me no care!  I want one! (Delorean, not the Atari VCS)

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1 hour ago, x=usr(1536) said:

Underpowered, made from other manufacturers' parts, paid for by people other than the company that designed it, and destined to be remembered for something other than being at all good at what it does? :D

It was still better than the Bricklin! And all cars in the mid-70's to mid-80's were underpowered.

Edited by MCHufnagel
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1 hour ago, MCHufnagel said:

It was still better than the Bricklin!

 

True, but so is dental surgery.

 

1 hour ago, MCHufnagel said:

 

And all cars in the mid-70's to mid-80's were underpowered.

 

'All' is a pretty sweeping statement.  I've had cars from that timeframe that performed just fine.  Granted, I've also had ones from that time that didn't.

 

Emissions equipment of the time was a power suck, to be sure, but not every vehicle was affected by that.

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3 hours ago, TACODON said:

I can see the IGG comments now...

 

There is a ripped bag of white powder gumming up the cooling fan on my VCS. Please advise me Atari.

^ and just when the POPO was called to your block to do a check for a stolen iPhone someone outside was using... ?‍♀️?‍♂️?????

Cocaína!!!,  Es Cocaína!

 

cocahina.jpg

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38 minutes ago, x=usr(1536) said:

 

True, but so is dental surgery.

 

 

'All' is a pretty sweeping statement.  I've had cars from that timeframe that performed just fine.  Granted, I've also had ones from that time that didn't.

 

Emissions equipment of the time was a power suck, to be sure, but not every vehicle was affected by that.

Well, when a modern, non-turbo V-6 has the same horsepower as most, non-exotic car V-8's of that era; then yes, they were pretty underpowered. I had a S-15 1986 Jimmy with a 2.8L V-6. It had 115 hp. I also had a 1974 AMC Gremlin with the 4.2L straight six that had even less than that. My 2019 Dodge Charger has a 3.6L V-6 rated at 292 HP. A 1984 Mustang GT350 had a 175 hp 5.0L V-8 while a 1984 Chevy Corvette came with a 205 HP 5.7L V-8. Yes, I would say that era is known for underpowered cars.

Edited by MCHufnagel
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16 minutes ago, MCHufnagel said:

Well, when a modern, non-turbo V-6 has the same horsepower as most, non-exotic car V-8's of that era; then yes, they were pretty underpowered. I had a S-15 1986 Jimmy with a 2.8L V-6. It had 115 hp. I also had a 1974 AMC Gremlin with the 4.2L straight six that had even less than that. My 2019 Dodge Charger has a 3.6L V-6 rated at 292 HP. A 1984 Mustang GT350 had a 175 hp 5.0L V-8 while a 1984 Chevy Corvette came with a 205 HP 5.7L V-8. Yes, I would say that era is known for underpowered cars.

 

Sure.  But bear in mind that the only thing I was taking exception with was the use of the word 'all' to describe cars of the time.  Of course there were underpowered cars in that period; I've even owned a couple of them.  But the definition of performance was also very different at the time, and can't be directly compared against modern drivetrains using modern technology and manufacturing processes.

 

In any event, we're getting off-topic and it's not even about tacos.

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2 hours ago, MCHufnagel said:

Well, when a modern, non-turbo V-6 has the same horsepower as most, non-exotic car V-8's of that era; then yes, they were pretty underpowered. I had a S-15 1986 Jimmy with a 2.8L V-6. It had 115 hp. I also had a 1974 AMC Gremlin with the 4.2L straight six that had even less than that. My 2019 Dodge Charger has a 3.6L V-6 rated at 292 HP. A 1984 Mustang GT350 had a 175 hp 5.0L V-8 while a 1984 Chevy Corvette came with a 205 HP 5.7L V-8. Yes, I would say that era is known for underpowered cars.

Comparing vintage hardware to modern is pretty silly...a Model T typically had 20hp.

 

More to the point, a Delorean had 130hp when a contemporary, common, and similarly priced Corvette had 200. That made it underpowered. Nothing about its performance lived up to its looks, much like the VCS.

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45 minutes ago, racerx said:

Comparing vintage hardware to modern is pretty silly...a Model T typically had 20hp.

 

It also doesn't take into account things like power-to-weight ratios, ambient conditions, surface grip, etc.  Torque and horsepower numbers by themselves are relatively meaningless.

 

Quote

 

More to the point, a Delorean had 130hp when a contemporary, common, and similarly priced Corvette had 200. That made it underpowered. Nothing about its performance lived up to its looks, much like the VCS.

 

It's unfortunate that the DeLorean ended up that way, but I can't really blame it for that.

 

The engine that was used (the PRV V6, with 'PRV' standing for 'Peugeot / Renault / Volvo', after the manufacturers developing and using it) was originally intended to be a V8.  After the oil crisis of 1973, two cylinders were lopped off of it in the name of efficiency.  This also explains why the cylinder banks are set at 90° in relation to each other as opposed to the 60° angle more commonly found in V6es.

 

Between the loss of two cylinders and none of the parties involved with its development lifting a finger to make it meet impending emissions regulations in various parts of the world (notably the US) as part of the development process, it ended up being somewhat compromised in terms of performance.  It's not that the engine wasn't capable of higher power outputs - 400bhp was had from them with forced induction and 24-valve heads - or was weak; it just wasn't properly developed for the directions in which legislation would push emissions requirements.  That can also be said of a great many engines of the time, however.

 

There was one other issue, and this one is DeLorean-specific though also indirectly shared with another mid-engined vehicle equipped with the PRV V6, the Alpine A310: the choice of engine placement as rear-midmounted pretty much dictates the requirement for a transaxle in order to drive the rear wheels.  Choosing the PRV V6 limits transaxle choice, meaning that Renault gearboxes (from the Renault 30, IIRC) were about the only bolt-up options.  While they were basically OK for the application at hand, they weren't designed to take a great deal more torque than was stock.  This further restricted the ability to make performance modifications to the engine as well as tune it for those modifications - if you make the engine more powerful, the transmission blows up, and then you have to find something that will work in its place bolted up to your not-very-common engine.

 

In any event, I don't really have anything against the DeLorean.  If anything, I believe that it's a car that suffered shortcomings due to the circumstances surrounding its birth more than anything else, with unfair publicity surrounding John Z. DeLorean's cocaine trafficking misadventure (of which he was later acquitted) being the final nail in the coffin for it.  But if a bit more engineering effort been put into it, it could have been something rather remarkable.

Edited by x=usr(1536)
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