kek@mgweed.UUCP (Kit Kimes) (06/04/85)
Atari made an 11th hour decision to appear on the floor at the Summer CES. They had one of the meeting rooms in McCormick Place West. It was pretty crowded on Sunday and I didn't get to talk much. They were very stingy with hand-outs, although they were taking names to sent it later. I would like to clear up a little of the confusion about what will be available and when. The 520ST is already shipping in Europe and Canada and will be available in the US next month (July) although the first few thousand will go to Atari User Groups. In the US, this version will be sold through Computer and Specialized stores. It will be available in a package at $799. This includes three software packages in addition to the 3 1/2 inch disk drive and the monitor. The 260ST is the model that they were showing and that was drawing all the attention. It will be the 256K version and will be marketed through the mass merchants. The price will be $399 stand alone and $499 with the disk drive. No software was mentioned. This version will be available in September (give or take). It is definitely packaged in such a way as to be different from the 520ST. The 130XE is available now and is the only 128K machine Atari plans to bring out. It first shipped in March and according to James Copland "they sold out in a week". Atari has put development of the 32 bit machine on the back burner to concentrate on the 260ST. I can be brought to market quicker and according to Copland "We only have so much fuel in the gas tank". One suspects, also, that they only have so much money in the til. Rumor has it that nearly everyone at Atari not directly associated with the ST project has been laid off to save money. I didn't have a chance to find out about the GEM but it will probably be on disk for the 520ST, at least initially. It will almost assuredly be in ROM for the 260ST since this model is targeted more for the home user that the business user and I suspect that Atari figures most home users will be happy to have GEM built in. This doesn't answer all the questions, especially about software, but I hope it helps... Kit Kimes AT&T Consumer Products Montgomery Works Montgomery, Il. 60538-0305 ..!ihnp4!mgweed!kek