Why, in 2023, the 5200 is a better system then the XEGS despite having 1/4 the RAM (16K vs. 64K)

[+MrFish]

25 minutes ago, Stephen said:

How would you propose making a single PCB on a tiny 4.25" square PCB accommodate both the 5200 and A8 hardware mappings?

FPGA

 

[+Stephen]

9 minutes ago, MrFish said:

FPGA

I guess what we obviously need, is a machine with 2 inputs.  One for little 8-bit carts, and one for big wide 5200 carts.  If I was Atari, I would have made this machine and nicknamed it Cindy (for reasons unknown).  Just imagine the awesomeness that dual input Cindy could provide - every 8-bit and 5200 game connected to one glorious CRT.

[doug0909]

15 minutes ago, Stephen said:

I guess what we obviously need, is a machine with 2 inputs.  One for little 8-bit carts, and one for big wide 5200 carts.  If I was Atari, I would have made this machine and nicknamed it Cindy (for reasons unknown).  Just imagine the awesomeness that dual input Cindy could provide - every 8-bit and 5200 game connected to one glorious CRT.

Yes, Cindy would be able to please customers large and small. But it's not only about size, it's also about joysticks which don't self center and joysticks and trackballs which aren't limited to 8 directions. Some 5200 games just aren't playable with 8 bit controllers, and without extra ports or port adaptors the 5200 controllers which could work with those games would be left out in the blue. 

Edited October 19, 2023 by doug0909

[BIGHMW]

In all seriousness guys I know you’re just funnin’ with me but don’t we all wish Atari would’ve gotten it right the first time around?

[+mytek]

3 hours ago, doug0909 said:

Looks great, but to me the one thing that would make it worth the list price would have been 5200 compatibility, either built in or with an expander port including joystick ports. And perhaps a way to add 2 extra joystick ports for the 800 software as well...

Sometimes you just can't please everyone 🫢

 

Maybe while I was at it I should have added support for the 2600, 7800, and Lynx as well. And... a VBXE, a U1MB, and a Rapidus all built-in would have been extra nice

 

And it is a bit on the big side, so stack every chip directly on top of each other and/or extract the chip dies and make it fit inside an old iPhone case being run off of the original Lithium Ion Battery. Then the phone's LCD could get used for the display. Wow! This could really be something

 

Edit: Aww forget all this, bypass the FPGA design, and just run an emulator on the iPhone instead 👍  Obviously the point of this using the original Atari VLSI chips got lost on someone and/or they didn't realize how significant and difficult that was to accomplish in such a small form factor -  BTW, that was the whole point of the exercise known as the 576NUC+

 

Oh and I did the same thing for the ColecoVision as well, see that HERE

[doug0909]

5 hours ago, mytek said:

Sometimes you just can't please everyone 🫢

 

Maybe while I was at it I should have added support for the 2600, 7800, and Lynx as well. And... a VBXE, a U1MB, and a Rapidus all built-in would have been extra nice

 

And it is a bit on the big side, so stack every chip directly on top of each other and/or extract the chip dies and make it fit inside an old iPhone case being run off of the original Lithium Ion Battery. Then the phone's LCD could get used for the display. Wow! This could really be something

 

Edit: Aww forget all this, bypass the FPGA design, and just run an emulator on the iPhone instead 👍  Obviously the point of this using the original Atari VLSI chips got lost on someone and/or they didn't realize how significant and difficult that was to accomplish in such a small form factor -  BTW, that was the whole point of the exercise known as the 576NUC+

 

Oh and I did the same thing for the ColecoVision as well, see that HERE

You did awesome work, and I'm not a techie. I just know about the hardware and software similarities with the 5200 (and not Lynx, 2600, 7800), and saw the price. I'm trying to downsize, and willing to pay to do that. Here, 5200 compatibility, even with an external attachment, would have made the difference to me. Regardless, I hope it's a success with the A8 crowd... 

[johannesmutlu]

12 hours ago, BIGHMW said:

Here are those photos you wanted 

 

 

It’s always nice to have options isn’t it??? I busted my as off to reacquire my 2600 Jr., 7800 and XEGS, and I’m about to get all the multicarts back for them too and maybe rejuvenate The Atari Report by the start of the new year!!!

Heeey thanks pow,and now seeing those size differences between those two systems,the only thing i can say is ,wooooow hooooly shit,what an incredible mind blowing difference in size between those two systems,considering both hardware systems are the same with the only difference in ram size,it makes me wonder how on earth did atari managed to make the atari xe so ssooo much smaller in size,since it still had the diskette port remained intact,did had lots of buttons on the front and it also had a keyboard port,and it had a saperate av out and power input and it remained mostly compatible with atari 400 & 800 games,while the 4 port atari 5200 model had no saperate power in and rf output either but did had a whopping 4 ports in the front,but that controller storage compartment on the back really did made the 5200 HUGE in size,now i wouldn’t be surprised if atari used more advanced nano technology for their chipsets to be able to make the xe sooo much more smaller then the bulky 5200,and let’s face it the atari xe just looks timeless,

in fact am stun that while the 5200 was considered to be a flop,it did sold 1 million units while the atari xe was not considered to be a flop because it reached atari’s goal to take rid off their stock pile of atari 400 games,but it only sold a sake 100.000 units,wich is absolutely mind blowing since the atari xe was a much better system then then 5200,while maybe if atari never came out with their atari 7800 and atari 2600 jr,maybe the atari xe would,ve sold over 4 or 5 million units.

again thanks alot i really do appreciate this😁

[+mytek]

On 10/19/2023 at 4:40 AM, doug0909 said:

You did awesome work, and I'm not a techie. I just know about the hardware and software similarities with the 5200 (and not Lynx, 2600, 7800), and saw the price. I'm trying to downsize, and willing to pay to do that. Here, 5200 compatibility, even with an external attachment, would have made the difference to me. Regardless, I hope it's a success with the A8 crowd... 

Yeah I was just poking a little fun at the 5200 compatibility aspect. But you are right that much of the architecture used in the 5200 did come from the 8-bit systems and shares this commonality. But to try to do both 8-bit and 5200 in a single board the size of what came out of the 576NUC+ project would have been near impossible, especially if one wanted to be able to use physical carts, with the 5200's being so much larger (e.g., based an real Atari Chips not FPGA or Emulation). I think the better approach has been the conversion of the better 5200 games into a form that the 8-bit can run. The 5200 Man was responsible for making much of that happen.

 

Originally the 576NUC+ started out with zero physical cart capability, and was going to rely on either stand-alone SD or FujiNet add-on boards to provide the means of getting games (and programs) into it. However through the efforts of @Mr Robot a physical cart interface became possible while still maintaining the small footprint. I'm also working on a more All-in-One non-physical cart daughter board that will provide a USB cart image capability (e.g., A8Pico Cart), an SDrive, FujiNet, 1088K RAM, and a Real Time Cart all on one upgrade, or close to it (the FujiNet will be a piggyback board).

 

Because of the availability of ported 5200 games as downloadable executable files, there seems to be very little reason to worry about providing an actual 5200 physical cart interface. After all isn't the main idea to be able to easily play the 5200 games irrelevant of how this is done? Plus you get the entire library of downloadable 400/800/XL/XE games and programs to choose from as well, something that the 5200 could never do.

 

As for the 5200 controllers - I certainly wouldn't miss having those

[BIGHMW]

But there are a dozen and a half 5200-only titles like Tempest, the entire Mean Hamster catalog and a handful of independently produced homebrews that are still not available for the A8/XEGS, you CANNOT play Tempest on the XEGS, nor Hangly-Man, nor Castle Blast, nor any of the Mean Hamster games, plus a few others, that’s why I have both.

[johannesmutlu]

32 minutes ago, BIGHMW said:

But there are a dozen and a half 5200-only titles like Tempest, the entire Mean Hamster catalog and a handful of independently produced homebrews that are still not available for the A8/XEGS, you CANNOT play Tempest on the XEGS, nor Hangly-Man, nor Castle Blast, nor any of the Mean Hamster games, plus a few others, that’s why I have both.

Well i do own the atari 5200 but not the atari xe,not yet,also because of it’s high price on ebay,but that atari xe still looks sooo young and fresh,it’s definitely s must have,even if i have to break a bank or refuse to pay tax to our goverment,hahaaa🤣🤣

[doug0909]

3 hours ago, mytek said:

Yeah I was just poking a little fun at the 5200 compatibility aspect. But you are right that much of the architecture used in the 5200 did come from the 8-bit systems and shares this commonality. But to try to do both 8-bit and 5200 in a single board the size of what came out of the 576NUC+ project would have been near impossible, especially if one wanted to be able to use physical carts, with the 5200's being so much larger. I think the better approach has been the conversion of the better 5200 games into a form that the 8-bit can run. The 5200 Man was responsible for making much of that happen.

 

Originally the 576NUC+ started out with zero physical cart capability, and was going to rely on either stand-alone SD or FujiNet add-on boards to provide the means of getting games (and programs) into it. However through the efforts of @Mr Robot a physical cart interface became possible while still maintaining the small footprint. I'm also working on a more All-in-One non-physical cart daughter board that will provide a USB cart image capability (e.g., A8Pico Cart), an SDrive, FujiNet, 1088K RAM, and a Real Time Cart all on one upgrade, or close to it (the FujiNet will be a piggyback board).

 

Because of the availability of ported 5200 games as downloadable executable files, there seems to be very little reason to worry about providing an actual 5200 physical cart interface. After all isn't the main idea to be able to easily play the 5200 games irrelevant of how this is done? Plus you get the entire library of downloadable 400/800/XL/XE games and programs to choose from as well, something that the 5200 could never do.

 

As for the 5200 controllers - I certainly wouldn't miss having those

Yes but analog control was great in the trackball games (esp centipede), and worked decently in paddle type games (super breakout, kaboom) and some of us have awesome homebrew paddles... and even for the shooters with analog control where the control might not add much, it's still a unique experience. And baseball! And pause buttons and start up and reset from the joystick and multiple buttons... 

 

I guess that could be partially solved with some type of input adapter for A8 systems and options to play with other controllers? I think there are hacks which use A8 paddles and 2600 analog trackball for 5200 conversions, but a lot is still missing... Also some people love those wico and other 3rd party sticks... 

[+mytek]

2 hours ago, BIGHMW said:

But there are a dozen and a half 5200-only titles like Tempest, the entire Mean Hamster catalog and a handful of independently produced homebrews that are still not available for the A8/XEGS, you CANNOT play Tempest on the XEGS, nor Hangly-Man, nor Castle Blast, nor any of the Mean Hamster games, plus a few others, that’s why I have both.

And that's also why it doesn't matter if what I created can't play those 5200 games directly. Just like you, people can also buy a 5200. And eventually those will get ported over.

[Bloodcat]

If my experience with the 5200 is anything to go by, it is possibly one of the most poorly made and unreliable systems of all time even before we count the infamous controllers.

 

Half the chips die.  Power supply and switchbox hell.  No monitor output much less Svideo or later.  Enormous.  Tiny library that is usually just as good if not better on the Colecovision, C64, and it's daddy the Atari 800/XL or 130xe.  The latter have Yoomp and Ridiculous Reality.   (The C64 has all the 80s rpg and Strategy titles you can handle in a decent visual form.)

 

For me the 5200 is basically SUNK COST FALLACY THE GAME CONSOLE and I've only been putting in money and time out of sheer pig headed anger and revenge that the thing never wants to work.  I honestly only ever bought the thing to play Gremlins.  I mean yay I have it boxed and complete because it was due to X Entertainment (eventually to become Dinosaur Dracula giving y'all an idea how long this thing has tormented me..) but I'm not sure it was worth it.  Especially when the A800 exists.  

 

It's just been a miserable experience.  I've gotten a Colecovision roughly 20 years after the 5200 (800 family in the middle timeframe) and have had almost zero issues with lots of easy to get upgrades and QoL doohickeys.  Just play the thing!  Sure no Gremlins but Colecovision H.E.R.O. is the definitive version of one of my favorite Crash era titles.  (It's boxed too.  Except it was obviously just as the retro bubble was blowing up, albeit more Nintendo to now era stuff.)

 

It's just not a good machine.  Poorly built and designed with very little exclusive to it.  

Edited December 10, 2023 by Bloodcat

[+pboland]

On 10/19/2023 at 1:17 PM, doug0909 said:

Yes but analog control was great in the trackball games (esp centipede), and worked decently in paddle type games (super breakout, kaboom) and some of us have awesome homebrew paddles... and even for the shooters with analog control where the control might not add much, it's still a unique experience. And baseball! And pause buttons and start up and reset from the joystick and multiple buttons... 

 

I guess that could be partially solved with some type of input adapter for A8 systems and options to play with other controllers? I think there are hacks which use A8 paddles and 2600 analog trackball for 5200 conversions, but a lot is still missing... Also some people love those wico and other 3rd party sticks... 

But doesn't the A8 already have analog controls built in? I know it's not in the same configuration as the 5200 but all the stuff is there. Each controller port can already use a pair of paddles with each paddle having it's own action button. Right there one would have the X & Y pots and two action buttons for a single analog controller for one port! That means each A8 computer can use two analog controllers (and two action button per controller). No special hardware needed. Now software, that's a different story, but hardware wise the A8 is ready to go for analog. Someone just needs to make an analog controller that works with the A8 computers. How hard would it be to convert an analog PC controller? (changes the pots to a value the A8 can use, rewire the button and you're good):

 

[Lord Thag]

On 12/10/2023 at 4:19 AM, Bloodcat said:

If my experience with the 5200 is anything to go by, it is possibly one of the most poorly made and unreliable systems of all time even before we count the infamous controllers.

 

Half the chips die.  Power supply and switchbox hell.  No monitor output much less Svideo or later.  Enormous.  Tiny library that is usually just as good if not better on the Colecovision, C64, and it's daddy the Atari 800/XL or 130xe.  The latter have Yoomp and Ridiculous Reality.   (The C64 has all the 80s rpg and Strategy titles you can handle in a decent visual form.)

 

For me the 5200 is basically SUNK COST FALLACY THE GAME CONSOLE and I've only been putting in money and time out of sheer pig headed anger and revenge that the thing never wants to work.  I honestly only ever bought the thing to play Gremlins.  I mean yay I have it boxed and complete because it was due to X Entertainment (eventually to become Dinosaur Dracula giving y'all an idea how long this thing has tormented me..) but I'm not sure it was worth it.  Especially when the A800 exists.  

 

It's just been a miserable experience.  I've gotten a Colecovision roughly 20 years after the 5200 (800 family in the middle timeframe) and have had almost zero issues with lots of easy to get upgrades and QoL doohickeys.  Just play the thing!  Sure no Gremlins but Colecovision H.E.R.O. is the definitive version of one of my favorite Crash era titles.  (It's boxed too.  Except it was obviously just as the retro bubble was blowing up, albeit more Nintendo to now era stuff.)

 

It's just not a good machine.  Poorly built and designed with very little exclusive to it.  

I love the beast, but none of these criticisms are off base.

 

Throw in the wide availability of cheap SD card interfaces, internet access with Fujinet, far more RAM to run complex games, a bigger homebrew scene, reliable controllers, easy A/V out for upscaling... the 8-bit line is just far superior these days. The GAMES on the 5200 are fantastic, for sure, and I love mine.. but I always steer new fans to an 8-bit computer. There's just so much more you can do, with much less effort. 

[+swlovinist]

I support most all classic Atari systems, but prefer the 8 bit setup for the reasons mentioned.   Every now and then I setup my 5200 to experience true trackball gaming though.  

[phuzaxeman]

On 12/20/2023 at 1:05 PM, Lord Thag said:

I love the beast, but none of these criticisms are off base.

 

Throw in the wide availability of cheap SD card interfaces, internet access with Fujinet, far more RAM to run complex games, a bigger homebrew scene, reliable controllers, easy A/V out for upscaling... the 8-bit line is just far superior these days. The GAMES on the 5200 are fantastic, for sure, and I love mine.. but I always steer new fans to an 8-bit computer. There's just so much more you can do, with much less effort. 

I've had the 5200 since 82.  I've had my 800XL since 84.  I was part of the Houston 8bit community meet ups etc and supported the 8bit for years. I've also published gaming reviews for the 8bt. 

 

In todays age with the new controller upgrades and options, plus many joystick options, the 5200 with the AtariMax and 8bit conversions to me is just easier and better for me to play than my 800XL.  My 5200 also has the 2600 adapter so everything is faster/setup to play 5200/8bit/2600 games on 1 TV. Plus I can store my controller in the 5200 storage.  The 5200 gets way more playing time and is more versatile for my situation than my 8bit. The dual stick and trackball options make the 5200 even better too. 

Edited December 22, 2023 by phuzaxeman