Atari 5200 Guy

All I ask is if you all can hold off until I get my replacement ST so I can participate, please.

I have enjoyed watching this develop. Always entertaining to see how these end up.

You know what you could do, Justin, is do a poll. I'm not sure how many Atari IO members see this post but they might see a post from you polling for ST challenges. Just a thought.

ST needs a Minecraft clone. Awesome stuff!

As long as I get a decent working ST I'll be happy. I don't have to return the disk drive so hopefully the replacement computer has a built-in drive, too. I do plan to use both drives as it will help in music creation. I can keep the music software in drive A and use drive B to save my work. Extras would be nice but not necessary. Me!!!! There are lots of arcade greats that would make great challenges. I have yet to see an ST challenge and it would be a great way to warm up to the ST. There are some good ST emulators available as well. I still find it odd that the ST has DOS and MAC emulators for it. Buggy Boy comes to mind for a fun challenge. I'm sure there are others. And the tutorial I made on creating disks from images could come in handy. It would also be a good way to find software for NTSC STs as most ST support came from the UK which don't play well on NTSC TV sets. I am currently looking into finding utilities to help remedy that.

Well, a bit of bad news. This was sent to me by mistake and has to be returned. I will post more when I know more as another is suppose to take its place.

Thought you all would like to read this. Has video showing 19 minutes of game play. http://www.nintendolife.com/news/2018/12/unreleased_nes_simcity_gets_preserved_publicly_released Enjoy.

I'm afraid that one might be dead. The ROMs are epoxy coated so you can't do anything with those. I could be wrong. Have you tried cleaning contacts on cart edge with an emery board, gently?

Crazy. Within a few days I've managed to locate a useful tool for ST owners. SYSINFO SysInfo is a small program that gives ST owners detailed information about their system. Machine type, processor speed, amount of RAM, and more are printed out on your monitor/TV. Kind of handy. Program is a compressed PRG file, not a disk image. I am currently going through some more stuff to see what is helpful and learning how to use them. I'll post more as I find more. In the meantime, this is my resource: Atari ST Essential Software

Thanks, NSG! Thanks, RickR! Totally wasn't what I was expecting. I didn't even see the Jag ports until I took the top off. Even then it took me a while. In my mind I knew they were controller ports but the location took me a while to notice. When I removed the metal shielding my jaw dropped.

Ummm. Guys? The computer shell is correct. I was doing a teardown for cleaning but I think I will just clean the shell as I don't want to take chance on destroying this one. Why? I'm sorry the image is blurry but I am shaking with excitement. This is a honest to goodness STe! I'm still in shock. All I have been able to do is sit and stare for the past half hour. What's the big deal between this and other STs? The "e" stands for "enhanced" and for good reason. The Atari Jaguar design is based off of the STe models. Both have a Blitter processor. It has left and right audio outs but I am not sure if they are stereo sound or mono. Still learning some ST model hardware variants. But one key feature, and I did not notice these when I was unpacking and setting up the computer, are ... ...these two. An STe characteristic. These are Jaguar controller ports. I'm not sure what all games these can be used for but, yea. This is the Cadillac of ST models. I'm putting it back together. It can stay grungy as long as it works. I'm not doing anything to upset this bad boy. I am not bragging...I had to share my discovery because I was expecting an STfm inside an STe shell. STfm don't have the stuff mentioned. What a nice surprise. Best...Christmas...EVER!

Well, accomplished something this evening. I finished setting up the game room. My tablet is just not a camera at all...but it is currently all I have at ten moment. Computer rigs. Right one is for ST stuff only. Its not even allowed to go online. Computer on left used for other things but mostly gaming. It needs a memory upgrade. 2 GB just doesn't go far these days. TV and 5200 setup next to that. I love how I can slide the 5200 under the TV when I'm done. XE computer under hand towel. On the shelf next to the TV is a XEGS setup on top, PSOne and Original with a SNES (decided to leave these out), 7800 on right of those. Jaguar and XBOX on bottom. Only the XEGS, 7800, and Jag are fully connected on this shelf. The others are just there to be there. And ... The games! What good are computers and game consoles without games? Condensed down to mostly Atari games. I honestly never realized just how many 2600 carts I had until I did this as not all of them were on this shelf. Least played were in small boxes. Not anymore. Top shelves I gave up for my wife's TY collection and other things. The TI has its own space. All by itself, hardly used. But I enjoy looking at it from time to time...not much into it otherwise. That's it. Its getting close to Christmas. Merry Christmas everyone! Many blessings.

Well, what family I have left is in Arkansas, North Carolina, and Washington state and all of my wife's family is in Arizona. So it will be just her and I as usual. Wrapping each other's gifts (except the new ST I got lol) and just enjoy each other's company. Dinner will be in house. Tonight or tomorrow will be an outing to see our towns lights in the park and other houses. Christmas day comes the exchange of gifts and lunch. Not entirely sure after that other than watching When Calks The Heart special on Hallmark. May play some card and board games. Not sure about video games but I might try to sneak in an ST game or two. Were also going to make chocolate covered pretzels later this evening. No family visiting so anything goes. Who knows?

The difference between a 520 and 1040 is the amount of RAM. 520s have 512k while 1040s have 1MB of RAM. I believe they can be upgraded depending on the revision of the motherboard. Not entirely sure so don't quote me on that. STs are still new to me but I plan to do a lot with it and for Atari IO members with STs. I have future plans I'm keeping hush hush for now. Thank you for the kind words. Merry Christmas everyone! Nothing like getting an Atari for Christmas. My Atari hardware collection is complete as far as I'm concerned. A Falcon was on my list but those things cost way too much for my tastes. Now, Justin, do some ST score challenges sometime, Bro.

I said I would show when it arrived. Very excited about this one!! She's a bit grungy but working. Dual DD disk drives, too! My Atari hardware collection is complete. And, before I get asked, its a 1040 STfm in a 1040 STe shell. I don't think it has the Blitter processor. Will know when it is taken apart to clean. Santa came a day early.

All of mine would most likely be sub par. I remember my old 386 back in the day getting good results after lots of upgrades. The machines I have now are pretty basic, not much for gaming. One desktop is an old Dell running XP. It does have a GeForce graphics card installed but is strictly used for Atari ST stuff. I don't even let it get online. The second computer is a Dell Inspiron from 2008 running Vista. Graphics card has been upgraded but it need a RAM upgrade. 2 GB doesn't do a whole lot. Its fixing to get a Windows 7 upgrade to break the 4 GB barrier, hopefully. Third computer is a Thinkpad laptop originally running Vista but memory and hard drive have been upgraded. Sadly, it has Intel's attempt at a graphics GPU which is not good for much of anything. It has been upgraded with Win 7. I'll download and run that benchmark test on the laptop. My final computer is actually a server running Linux. But I can't use it to play video games on I don't think. Plus, its simply too damn noisy to run. Sounds like a jet airplane. Pretty sure it would win the RAM and CPU benchmarks but that would be about it. Everything else would be pretty basic. Dual AMD processors and 12 GB of main RAM. It also has extra video RAM. Its pretty nice. Wouldn't mind using it for gaming but Windows 7 returned an error because it wouldn't install on a dual processor system. Stubborn OS.

Im seeing double! I need new glasses. 😁

I've never played Electrocop on the Lynx. I think Epic MegaGames made a similar game of the same name on the PC. Not sure. Will have to look.

I don't honestly remember. It was a long time ago when I played Cybermorph and beat it. Last time I played was about a month ago and I didn't get very far. I'll have to keep trying. Thanks for pointing that out.

Most of my used systems were purchased in poor condition needing something. Except the Master System that was gifted to me. That thing looked hardly used. And I've got another mystery system on its way. Suppose to be here tomorrow. Fingers crossed. I'll most likely do a teardown and cleaning of it, too. I'm picky that way.

That's a nice ride! What does that bulb look like?

Too cute not to share.

Nice, Creep! You got a machine, too!

Contrary to popular belief, Arkansas has some gorgeous spots. That's my home state. At times I miss it.

Ditto! Their first album is my favorite.