Atari 2600+ Unboxing Experiences

[Thomas Jentzsch]

2 minutes ago, e1will said:

Does the dumper start doing its thing as soon as the power is switched on, or are there separate processes that take time to initialize first?
 

I’ve noticed it doesn’t take too much longer to load a 32k game (~17 seconds) than a 4k game (~14 seconds.)

Hot swapped? On a cold boot, the OS has to be loaded and started first. The time for this is constant.

 

The three seconds difference makes sense. AFAIK the serial bus used by the dumper runs at 115kBits/s. That's about 13K per second. So that's already more than 2 seconds. Finally the dump has to be loaded by Stella, which takes a little more time for 32K.

 

Besides that, the auto detection of the dumper requires some time. Depending on the coding, this can be faster for 4K than for 32K. Or vice versa.

 

 

[Ben from Plaion]

10 minutes ago, e1will said:

Does the dumper start doing its thing as soon as the power is switched on, or are there separate processes that take time to initialize first?
 

I’ve noticed it doesn’t take too much longer to load a 32k game (~17 seconds) than a 4k game (~14 seconds.)

Yes, a good proportion of the total boot time is loading up the OS and associated firmware, that's masked by the Atari logo. The dumper loading is after that where it has the ticking loading text - that time is directly associated with cartridge size, the lower the faster.

Edited December 19, 2023 by Ben from Plaion

[e1will]

@Thomas Jentzsch, @Ben from Plaion Makes sense, thanks.

 

I haven’t tried hot-swapping yet… never did that back in the day and old habits die hard!

[scifidude79]

6 hours ago, Zoyous said:

Oh, there's other people who think 14 seconds to load 4 kilobytes is a bit much. There are modern platforms offering instant resume on multiple titles, maybe something like that could be done on the 2600+ with a future firmware update.

Heh, and I thought I didn't have a lot of patience. 🤣

 

But, I'm not one to tell anyone they're wrong because I know how opinions work. It just doesn't really bother me. But, I also have experience with other cartridge dump consoles, so I knew ahead of time that there would be a "loading" delay. After all, the hardware in these things isn't very powerful, nor does it need to be to run games from the 1970s, 80s or early 90s.

[KainXavier]

My Xbox One X takes over a minute and a half to load from a cold boot.  I can live with 14 seconds for the 2600+. 😛  (That said, any optimizations would certainly be appreciated!)

[Thomas Jentzsch]

11 hours ago, Ben from Plaion said:

Yes, a good proportion of the total boot time is loading up the OS and associated firmware, that's masked by the Atari logo. The dumper loading is after that where it has the ticking loading text - that time is directly associated with cartridge size, the lower the faster.

Only the final dumping process. But the detection code also dumps a lot of data. Here a lot of time can be lost (whole banks dumped instead of byte samples, repeated dumps of the same banks...). Also, if the schemes are detected strictly sequential, more schemes will slow down the worst case even more. This not only affects the schemes detected last in the row, but also all 2/4K ROMs, since they are the fallback scheme, after all others have been checked.

 

So there definitely is room for optimization:

• Sampling banks (e.g. only 1 random byte/256 byte page)
• reuse of previous samples
• parallel detection of multiple schemes

Of course this makes the code more complex. But the detection phase should become much shorter.

[Daedalus304]

On 11/30/2023 at 12:20 PM, eCockpit89 said:

I'm really looking forward to unboxing my 2600+. Unlike most of the target audience of the 2600+, I'm a millennial (born in 1989), but I 100% get the legacy and importance of Atari.  It has a strange allure that really no other era of gaming can duplicate.

I was born in 2000 and feel the same way, seems like people dont want to learn the history of the games they enjoy today and where it all started 

[Daedalus304]

On 12/16/2023 at 2:09 AM, scifidude79 said:

The whole power brick thing is interesting to me. I find it very interesting that so many people are bothered by it, when cellphones don't come with them anymore and haven't for a few years now. The first cellphone maker to do it was Apple, then the others followed suit. The Samsung I got over the summer doesn't have a power brick.

Yeah, like i have too many of them, and my last 2 phones didnt include one either, iphone 11 (bought after the 12 released so had the newer style packaging, and my current z fold 4 didnt have one either, also every ipod i ever had didnt come with one either 

[fluxit]

3 hours ago, Daedalus304 said:

Yeah, like i have too many of them, and my last 2 phones didnt include one either, iphone 11 (bought after the 12 released so had the newer style packaging, and my current z fold 4 didnt have one either, also every ipod i ever had didnt come with one either 

On the one hand, I also have plenty of 'chargers' here, most of them in use.  I also intentionally purchased around half of them, to meet particular amperage, or other device compatibility requirements. 

 

And most corporations are not excluding them from their products packages to protect buyers from having too many, or trying to save the planet, they are saving themselves the <$2 per unit, basically penny pinching. 

 

That said, the gimmick of having an Atari branded 'brick' that was a model of a proper a scaled down version of the old wall-warts with modern internals would actually make the 2600+ a more appealing purchase for me.  I understand however, that this would actually have a development cost attached to it.

Edited December 20, 2023 by fluxit
accidental double negative

[MarcinJ]

Merry Christmas everyone.  

[e1will]

I wrote up some thoughts about the 2600+ on my website; perhaps some here will find it of interest.

 

Cheers.

 

Unboxing the Atari 2600+ – WillNicholes.com

[MysticSword]

44 minutes ago, e1will said:

I wrote up some thoughts about the 2600+ on my website; perhaps some here will find it of interest.

 

Cheers.

 

Unboxing the Atari 2600+ – WillNicholes.com

Aww, such a nice story there. 😊 Well done and thanks for sharing. Cheers!

[tradyblix]

2 hours ago, MarcinJ said:

Merry Christmas everyone.  

Santa has already been hitting the egg nog

[Zap1982]

Well, today's the day and here is my unboxing experience!

 

Straight out the box it is easy to tell that the unit has been lovingly crafted, it doesn't look or feel cheap. Its honestly really nice.

 

Plugged it into the HDTV and I was surprised how good it looks. I use an SVideo and composite modded Sears usually and that looks really very nice but HD is actually something else. Not tried side by side yet but it looks great.

 

Played Mr Run and Jump a bit along with Berzerk Enhanced. Mr Run and Jump whilst unforgiving and brutal is damn good and very addictive. Plays well with the Joystick, nice and responsive. Berzerk Enhanced is good but like anything on the 2600, I find it much harder with the joystick compared to a Genesis controller. I just can't get the precision I can with a controller. I think this is my though as I have a problem with the tendons in my right hand now (I am 41 now and you just can't do all the things you used to when you were younger 😂) my grip isn't very good now and the reflexes are slow so I prefer controllers as I am really only using my thumb and finger tips rather than the whole hand.

 

Paddle set: only played Breakout and Kaboom! Both played well, the paddles really feel great. I have two sets of originals. One is fitted with standard jitter and the other has super jitter. It was nice playing with NO jitter, very good indeed!

 

Next, I played Ms Pacman. Could be PAL, could be ME but it was unplayable, no matter which way I moved the joystick it was just doing it's own thing. I had to proper yank on it too. Strange... will try again tomorrow along with other carts.

 

I tried x2 standard Megadrive controllers and neither worked. The 2600+ didn't recognise anything.

 

Finally, I tried the Retrobit Megadrive wireless controller. Strangely, it half works. Only tried with Berzerk but you can shoot just fine but can't move with the D-Pad. Weirdly, If I hold the fire button (B) I can use the D-Pad to aim shots but I just can't move the character. Hopefully an update might rectify this one day.

[MysticSword]

@Zap1982 Congratz on your new 2600+. The Megadrive controllers you may get to work using the 7800 Mega Controller Adapter: https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_detail&p=1295

For a great feeling 2600+ compatible gamepad and much easier on the hands I could recommend a Hyperkin Ranger gamepad.

Cheers!

[Zap1982]

15 hours ago, MysticSword said:

@Zap1982 Congratz on your new 2600+. The Megadrive controllers you may get to work using the 7800 Mega Controller Adapter: https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_detail&p=1295

For a great feeling 2600+ compatible gamepad and much easier on the hands I could recommend a Hyperkin Ranger gamepad.

Cheers!

That's not badly priced either.. thanks for the recommendation. As soon as payday comes around next I will be grabbing one.

[SparkleFork]

My brother came to spend Xmas with us. Last night we played Combat against each other, 44 years to the day after we unwrapped our original VCS and he then played against my 8 year old boy. They were then fighting over the joystick to play Space Invaders. That was just a wonderful experience and I just wanted to thank @Ben from Plaion and the team for putting together this amazing machine. 

[DrThielegood]

Our 2600+ arrived on Christmas eve. We've got friends visiting and yesterday our kids, aged 14 through 19, sat down for an extended play session. These kids, with the latest PC and console games available to them, spent hours playing Atari 2600. The highlight was an extended Activision Ice Hockey tournament. The kids were locked in, and more excited then I've seen them with video games in ages. It was one of the coolest gaming experiences I have ever had. Thanks for re-releasing the 2600. 

[+LS650]

3 minutes ago, DrThielegood said:

The highlight was an extended Activision Ice Hockey tournament. 

I detest most sports games - but that is one that I actually enjoy a fair bit.

[bradhig1]

What happened to the power cord?  It's just a usb cable I have been plugging into my power strip with usb outlets?  Why no more regular plugs into wall socket?

[Thomas Jentzsch]

11 hours ago, bradhig1 said:

What happened to the power cord?  It's just a usb cable I have been plugging into my power strip with usb outlets?  Why no more regular plugs into wall socket?

Reduced waste.

[scifidude79]

15 hours ago, DrThielegood said:

Our 2600+ arrived on Christmas eve. We've got friends visiting and yesterday our kids, aged 14 through 19, sat down for an extended play session. These kids, with the latest PC and console games available to them, spent hours playing Atari 2600. The highlight was an extended Activision Ice Hockey tournament. The kids were locked in, and more excited then I've seen them with video games in ages. It was one of the coolest gaming experiences I have ever had. Thanks for re-releasing the 2600. 

Thanks for sharing this story. The kids wanting to play the Atari 2600+ when they have other more modern options says so much about the lasting appeal of Atari and its games.

[tradyblix]

On 12/20/2023 at 12:11 PM, Daedalus304 said:

Yeah, like i have too many of them, and my last 2 phones didnt include one either, iphone 11 (bought after the 12 released so had the newer style packaging, and my current z fold 4 didnt have one either, also every ipod i ever had didnt come with one either 

Not to mention you need specific cables and bricks for 45W and up charging. All that you have to do at your expense, or you don't get the fastest charging speeds on modern phones. 

[Thomas Jentzsch]

The 2600+ needs less than 5W.