#atari800

[adafruit]

🎄💾🗓️ Day 14: Retrocomputing Advent Calendar - Atari 400/800🎄💾🗓️

The Atari 8-bit computer line was launched in 1979 with the Atari 400 and Atari 800. Both were advanced for home computers at the time. Both were driven by a 1.79 MHz MOS Technology 6502 CPU, with ANTIC and CTIA/GTIA custom chips for advanced graphics and the POKEY chip handling sound and input/output duties. The Atari 800 was the premium model, featuring a full mechanical keyboard, user-expandable to 48 KB of memory, more metal shielding, and more durability. The Atari 400 was a lower-cost alternative with a membrane keyboard, limited to 16 KB of RAM, and a simplified construction.

With hardware-accelerated scrolling, Player/Missile graphics, and rich sound, the Atari 8-bit systems were known for gaming and creative applications. They were a versatile platform with cartridge-based software, cassette, and floppy disk storage. Atari's proprietary SIO (Serial Input/Output) port allowed daisy-chaining peripherals such as printers, modems, and disk drives, making connecting them easier than with other systems.

Newer models were more compact, combined memory expansion to as much as 128KB, and compatibility with developing software and peripherals improved. Atari's 8-bit computers are remembered for having groundbreaking hardware and a very colorful game library, and they are still being used by the retrocomputing community.

While doing research for this, I saw the XE Game System, never saw it before, very 80s for sure!

The Atari XEGS (XE Game System) was launched in 1987. A repackaged 65XE with a removable keyboard, it boots to the 1981 port of Missile Command instead of BASIC if the keyboard is disconnected.

Have first computer memories? Post’em up in the comments, or post yours on socialz’ and tag them #firstcomputer #retrocomputing – See you back here tomorrow!

[boredtechnologist]

Hard Hat Mack Poster

[randomclam24]

https://github.com/atari800/atari800/releases

[gamesthatwerent]

Codemasters early conversion entries added

Thanks to Adam Markey for highlighting a conversions call from Codemasters in April 1987, we've created a set of new entries. Various conversions all currently lost for #ZXSpectrum, #Atari800, #MSX and #Commodore16/#Plus4:

[linuxlife]

Linux Life Episode 85

Hello everyone and welcome back to Linux Life, my ever ongoing muddling journey with Linux.

So since we last spoke I have installed Proton and Path of Exile is working fine.

Once again it used to have problems with KDE 5 Wayland but works quite happily with KDE 6 Wayland version. Which is a good thing I even tested it with the new league Necropolis expansion and it works incredibly well.

I admit I am not a huge player of games so I will eventually get around to trying other games but for now I am happy that it works.

I have however found an issue with the Cairo Dock Wayland test. The only way to add shortcuts now is to create a desktop shortcut and drag it to the dock. Previously you could drag from the KDE menu but that stopped working with the new plug-ins update.

It still can not offset the dock like the X11 version but in time I am sure they will crack it.

Screen capture can now be done using the KDE Spectacle app for the moment. Shutter has been got working with Wayland for Ubuntu but is only available a Deb file. Unfortunately he hasn’t got it working with Arch or I would go back to Shutter which is my preferred tool.

I did try a DebTap conversion but it failed to convert got stuck in a script loop. I have no idea if he intends to make an Arch version.

Also managed to get OpenRCT 2.0 working using the GOG version of Rollercoaster Tycoon 2. It’s not a game I play a lot but it is works after installation of a tool called innoextract. Not my position to question why but it worked.

I have also been playing with a few emulators. I am now running the latest version of VICE to emulate a C64. Installed and works fine had to make a few tweaks to setup to get joysticks emulated correctly but it works.

I just wish I knew more C64 games worth playing. Tried Kikstart 2, Uridium, Uridium Plus and BoulderDash. I have documented my life of upset with Commodore 64s in my other blogs and won’t make you suffer having to read about them again.

Also playing with Atari800 emulator. Once again my knowledge of good games is limited I have tried Boulder Dash and Jet Boot Jack but they were the only two games I ever tried. I did try some demos from the Atari 8-bit Tosec with varying levels of success. However I do have the Tosec from archive.org so I will obviously test more games in time.

I have installed OpenMSX and fMSX and the Tosecs but to be honest I am yet to try anything running as BIOS roms need putting in specific locations which sounds like a lot of work.

If anyone has any gaming recommendations on the above emulators or PC games then drop a comment in the Facebook group.

I am now working with an iPhone to connect Linux to the internet. Took a bit of a fight but it’s working. KDE can even mount the iPhone to allow file transfer.

I copied some MP3s across and can be accessed on the iPhone using VLC

If I can do things like that then I can probably copy videos made using the iPhone camera back to the Dell and edit them using KDEnlive. As of yet that’s a future project but could be an interesting idea.

Also want to install Ardour to see if it works with Pipewire and see if podcasting is possible. May even try and see if I can get some VSTs working.

So have plenty of things to attempt when we next speak. Hopefully it will be successful but may equally may break things horrifically.

We shall see.. until next time. Take care...

[retrocgads]

UK 1991

[koney-scanlines]

ATAri 1050 disk dRiVE FoR 800 XL COmpuTeR

[8bitcentral]

Have you pkayed #Atari today? #atari50anniversary #Atari50th #Atari2600 #Atari5200 #Atari7800 #Atari800 #AtariJaguar https://www.instagram.com/p/CfVRHVHO0b0/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[8bitworkshop]

[blisscast]

[Atari 50 ✨ + Atari Inc Business is Fun] More at my blog blisscast.wordpress.com, link in bio. 🆕 Journal Page 25 about Tron 2.0 is out NOW! Link in bio. . Have you played Atari today? I certainly have ( ˙꒳​˙ ). The Atari 50 collection has finally come out! I'm really excited to play these games, especially the newly released VCTR-SCTR game! Its aim is to be a mix of the gameplay of famous vector graphics games, like Asteroids, Tempest, and others. Being a fan of both this kind of graphics and Tempest... You can imagine how happy I am! . Also! There has been a couple more games added than we expected, such as Atari 8-Bit games! For example, I was pretty astonished with the presence of Yoomp! This is an Atari 8-Bit game that was made in 2007, and it's immensely "vibin", as you are a ball jumping across gaps and obstacles inside a tube, and the ball jumps following the rhythm of the catchy music they included. It's kinda hip hop, and you can't help but vibe along with it! Now I know what I'll play tonight lol. If you got this collection as well, I recommend you try it out. . I also recommend that you get this book here, as it has a whopping 800 pages of Atari's history ✨. I'm currently reading it. . #atari50 #atari #atarigames #atari2600 #atarivcs #atari5200 #atari7800 #atari800xl #atari800 #atari8bit #atarixe #tempest #tempest2000 #vctrsctr #yoomp #atarijaguar #atarilynx #retrogamer #retrogaming #gamergirls #gamergirl https://www.instagram.com/p/Ck1XNjsIB8k/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[oldguydoesstuff]

My Atari 800 playing F15 Strike Eagle, off a 30 year old floppy disk.

[adoru-chaos]

My new baby from 1979 ❤️ “We’ve brought the computer age home”

[atariaction]

Floody Bot: BASIC Tenliners Contest 2019 entry

I love the BASIC 10-Liner contest! I didn’t find the time/energy/whatever to enter in 2018, so am excited to write some short BASIC programs for this year’s contest. First out of the gate is Floody Bot. This will be an entry for the EXTREME-256 category.

My soft overarching theme for entries this year is classic BASIC algorithms. Floody Bot started with the kernel of Maze Generator by Charles Bond, which was published in Compute! Magazine Issue 19.

In this game, you play the part of a rescue bot entrusted to save humans from rising flood waters. Touch a human to save them. You must rescue three or more humans to proceed to the next level. As levels increase, the flood waters rise more quickly. Oh, the bot can’t swim.

Once per level, you can press the fire button to set off a bomb destroying everything in your horizontal row. This can get you out a sticky situation. If your bot gets stuck, press START to self-destruct. (If you’ve already rescued three or more humans, you’ll move on to the next level with a new bot.)

Earn points for rescuing humans (lower-down humans are worth more.) Lose a lot of points if your bomb kills a human. (You don’t lose points if flood waters kill a human.)

Let’s look at the code:

GRAPHICS 17:DIM F$(48),A(5):CH=(PEEK(106)-16)*256

Set up graphics screen — graphics 1 with no text window. Save space for strings. F$ is for the custom character set. Array A is for maze generation. CH is the location of the character set in RAM.

F$="\FB\FB\FB\00\DF\DF\DF\00\08\61\B4\D0\66\0B\2D\86\7E\42\42\7E\99\7E\BD\66\3E\2A\14\3E\5D\1C\36\77\80\51\2A\04\80\45\2A\10"

This mess of ATASCII is the custom characters.

MOVE 57344,CH,1024:MOVE ADR(F$),CH+8,40:POKE 756,CH/256

Install the custom characters.

A(0)=2:A(1)=-40:A(2)=-2:A(3)=40 SC=DPEEK(88):

Top of screen memory

DO :'main loop

Set up level:

A=SC+21+(16*RAND(2))

Robot starts in either upper corner

G=0:GG=0:L=L+1:BM=1

G=number of guys to collect. I’m not being sexist. It’s a legacy variable because the humans were originally Gems. GG=number of Guys Got (saved). increase level, you have one bomb

W=16*(L+3)+8:WHILE W>255:W=W-258:WEND:POKE 710,W:

Change the brick color per level.

POKE 709,136 POKE 711,56

Set water and bomb colors.

POSITION 0,0 FOR I=1 TO 23:FOR J=1 TO 19:?#6;"\A1";:NEXT J:?#6:NEXT I

fill screen with bricks

COLOR 161:TEXT 11*RAND(2),15,CHR$(64+L)

draw the level letter in either lower corner in bricks 161=129 (Wall character) + 32 for the correct color

POKE 708,0

Hide character set while drawing maze. (It’s fun to watch but might be confusing.)

Now we get into the maze generation. It was a lot of work to tighten up the tangled original code and make it work without GOTOs, but that’s necessary for 10-liners.

POKE A,5 

place a marker at the maze starting point

MR=1:

MR=1: Start with a Random number. MR=0: iterating 

REPEAT BT=1

BT=0: blazing a new path. BT=1: we're BackTracking

IF MR

MR=do we want a random number to start looking for a valid direction?

J=INT(RND(0)*4):X=J

J=pick a random direction. X=remember our starting dir.

ENDIF B=A+A(J)

look forward to possible next space

IF PEEK(B)=129

is it a wall character? Make it a hallway 

POKE B,J+1

leave appropriate bread crumb for backtracking

POKE A+A(J)/2,0

draw hall character on the even column 

A=B

possible next space promoted to new space

MR=1:BT=0:

we'll pick a random direction to go from here

ELSE

its not a wall, so we can't use it. check another direction

J=(J+1)*(J<3):'iterate 1-2-3-0-1-2-3... IF J<>X MR=0:BT=0

we haven't tested all 4 yet, so look in next direction

ENDIF ENDIF IF BT:

we've tried all 4 directions with no luck. Time to backtrack

J=PEEK(A):

Get breadcrumb on current space

W=PEEK(A-1)+PEEK(A+1)+PEEK(A-20)+PEEK(A+20)=387*(J<5) POKE A,4*W

if there walls on 3 sides, it's a dead end, so draw guy (chr 4) (except on the staring spot: no guy there) else draw hall character (0) to erase unsightly breadcrumb.

G=G+W

G=number of guys to collect

A=A-A(J-1)

change current space to the one pointed to by the breadcrumb

ENDIF UNTIL J=5 

when we've backtracked back to the starting point, maze is done!

IF G<6 :GG=9:G=0:L=L-1:LOOP:ENDIF

If the maze generated fewer than 6 people, it's not good, give up and create another. This is hacky but oh well.

POKE 708,26

Reveal character set

We’ve finally built the screen, now we can play the game!

WL=23:'initial water level C=100-L*10:'countdown before water first appears.

C=C+(25-C)*(C<25)

Tidy way of doing C<25 then C=25

REPEAT POKE A,3 PAUSE 5

The actual game loop. Draw the bot. Pause to slow the game down a bit. J=STICK(0) B=A+(J=7)-(J=11) B=B+20*((J=13)-(J=14))

Potential new bot position based on joystick input.

IF PEEK(B)=0:POKE A,0:A=B:SOUND 0,99,6,8:SOUND:POKE 77,0:ENDIF

If that position is empty, move the bot to new position and make a little tick sound. Also defeat attract mode.

IF PEEK(B)=4:G=G-1:GG=GG+1

If robot touched a human, there’s one less human waiting to be saved. Increase counter of humans saved on this level.

S=S+L*((A-SC) DIV 20)

Increase score. Higher levels and deeper humans increase score more.

POKE A,0:A=B:POS.0,23:?#6;S;" ":SOUND 0,60,10,8:PAUSE 5:SOUND ENDIF

Erase human, update score display. Make a happy sound. 

IF PEEK(53279)<7:POKE A,2:SOUND 0,99,8,8:PAUSE 10:SOUND:EXIT:ENDIF

Press start to self-destruct. Make a sad sound, draw dead bot. Level over.

IF STRIG(0)=0 AND BM

If player pressed the fire button and has a bomb available...

BM=0

Used up the bomb.

Y=SC+20*((A-SC) DIV 20):

Compute player Y position. 

FOR W=-1 TO 0:

Drawing routine twice: first draw bomb fire then erase it

FOR X=1 TO 18:SOUND 1,50+X,8,8

up to 18 fire characters in either direction, with changing noise

FOR I=0 TO 1

iterate for left and right sides

IF I

don't extend past left edge

B=A-X

player screen position minus offset

J=B>Y:ELSE:B=A+X:J=B<Y+18:ENDIF

don't extend past right edge

IF J

IF PEEK(B)=4:G=G-1:S=S-25*L:POS.0,23:?#6;S;" ":SOUND 0,250,10,15:ENDIF

Aw, you're blowing up a human. There's one fewer guy onscreen. Lose points. Update onscreen score. Boop noise.

ENDIF POKE B,W*-194

draw, erase splody. chr=194, erase=0

ENDIF NEXT I NEXT X NEXT W SOUND ENDIF

Wrap up loops.

IF C<1:WL=WL-1

Time to raise the water level? Raise it.

C=60-5*L

countdown till it rises again. 

C=C+(10-C)*(C<10)

Maximum speed (IF C<10:C=10)

Next, draw water and make water sound:

FOR X=0 TO 18 SOUND 1,36-X*2,8,8 Z=SC+WL*20+X

Reduce guy count if it flooded a guy:

IF PEEK(Z)=4:G=G-1:SOUND 0,200,10,15:POKE Z,69:ENDIF 

IF PEEK(Z)=0:POKE Z,69:ENDIF

Draw flooding over guys and hall (but not walls)

NEXT X SOUND ELSE C=C-1:'tick down the timer ENDIF UNTIL G=0

Keep doing this until no people left onscreen.

IF GG>2 LOOP ENDIF

If 3 or more people saved, move on to next level.

POS.0,23:?#6;S;"   GAME OVER" WHILE STRIG(0):WEND:RUN

Otherwise show Game Over and wait for trigger to play again.

[gamesthatwerent]

GTW Highlight No.6: Archer Maclean's lost arcade conversion works preserved (Atari 800)

GTW Highlight No.6: In March, preservation work of Archer Maclean's disks continued with a look at many arcade concepts that Archer had created on the #Atari800 and sadly abandoned, including an early Robotron development.

As well as our page on the arcade findings on Archer Maclean's disks, you can also see a video talking through the findings at:

[linuxlife]

Linux Life Episode 83

Well, here we are again ladies and gentlemen back at the blog stuff regarding my ongoing Linux experience.

Well since we last spoke I am afraid I had to retire my Dell Inspiron M6800 (Mangelwurzel) as the sound card finally decided to give up. So that meant the touchpad, the sound card and the top pair of memory sockets had stopped working so it had to go.

I have recovered the two 480GB SSDs that it had so I can reuse them in another project should the time come for it. However when one machine exits stage right to the farm. Luck would have it I managed to get a new laptop.

The machine admittedly is another Dell laptop but this one is new. The machine in question is a Dell Inspiron 3525. It's a 15.6” laptop with a Ryzen 7 5200U with 16GB RAM, an Integrated Radeon Vega 8 graphics card, and a 1TB NVME drive.

Sure enough for the first 2 hours of its new existence, it did have a copy of Windows 11 Home (stop spitting at the back there). However, after a bit of learning how to get around the BIOS, I managed to install Endeavour OS Galileo (the latest version).

As I had an AMD graphics card (even if it’s integrated) I decided to run KDE Plasma (in the past I have ran MATE but I thought I would change it up).

Now for the first few days, I was running just the basic setup but when I installed Steam only a few games would start. Terraria, Stardew Valley, and Starbound worked fine as they, I believe use Open GL. However, when I tried to run a game using Proton there was no dice as Vulkan was not listed.

I had to install the version of MESA with Vulkan from the extras and then I could get Untitled Goose Game to run including picking up my XBOX 360-style gamepad. However Path of Exile and Pacman Championship Edition 2 both threw errors running Linux native versions.

However, I then turned on Proton usage, and using the Windows versions both games worked without error. Strange but I am not going to argue they work and I am not going to question beyond that.

For some reason they work if it’s through DXVK but not through the actual Linux Vulkan driver go figure that. Considering I can now play them both fine I am not going to fight it.

Parkitect 1.9a works fine through Wine as it’s a GOG game version I am using.

I admit while I am not a huge game player it’s nice to see them in action.

I have also installed and tested various emulators the list includes Fuse (ZX Spectrum), VICE (c64), Caprice32 (Amstrad CPC), Atari800 (Atari 8 bit), and DOSBox-X (MSDOS). I will probably test a few more in time but all successful so far.

I even did my usual build of GDASH and it works fine. So I can play various incarnations of Boulder Dash should I ever feel so.

Set up OBS Studio, KDEnlive, VLC, Audacity, and more so it can be used to create videos or podcasts should the decision take me.

Also, Cairo-Dock is my choice of on-screen dock as it has been for many years. It’s pretty reliable and I can set it up pretty quickly now.

I have also installed some productivity apps in the form of LibreOffice, RedNotebook, Obsidian, and Focuswriter. I also installed InMyDiary via Wine as the Windows version is the most up-to-date one (I like Lotus Organiser and it looks/works the same).

So it has been running for over a week and I admit I am impressed with its capabilities.

However, it does seem the world of Linux is looking to dump X11 in favour of the Wayland compositor. Now on Mangelwurzel, I could not use Wayland as Nouveau could not run it.

But this new Dell (currently named Parsnip but could be subject to change) has a better graphics card and I have installed the version of KDE Plasma Wayland also.

So I can log out of X11 and switch to Wayland if necessary. It works and I admit speed-wise, it's slightly faster at program opening than X11, but Cairo Dock doesn’t support Wayland just yet.

However, I did manage to get a dock in the form of Latte Dock and it does work fine.

However Steam doesn’t like Wayland it works but man is slow and problematic so at this time I still have the system boot into X11 and change up to Wayland should I need it.

So where do I go with this new Dell laptop so far it has performed more than adequately. Also, EndeavourOS once again proves to be my preferred Linux flavour and I won’t be going back to a stable (Debian, Mint, Ubuntu) environment anytime soon unless forced.

Well, that’s a wrap for the moment… In turn, I will probably install MAME and maybe play with QEMU but that’s for the next episode should I get around to it.

Until next time… Take care.

[emreozkhrmn]

Show your #ShowDown 👊 . Sound ON🔊 / 00:31 secs. / 3:4 / 1080x1920 . . #ataricafe #atari2600 #atari800xl #atariart #atari #ataris #atari2600games #atariteenageriot #atariage #atarilynx #atarist #atarijaguar #atari7800 #atarivcs #ataribox #atarigames #atari800 #atari5200 #atari8bit #ataria #atariborder (LETS RACE) https://www.instagram.com/p/CODWEyNnC8Q/?igshid=1d7zbmq2i6vm6