tob@inuxa.UUCP (T Burger) (01/08/85)
ANTIC ONLINE NEWS
SPECIAL BULLETIN
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ANTIC SPECIAL BULLETIN,
REPRINTED BY PERMISSION.
COPYRIGHT 1985, ANTIC
PUBLISHING INC.
Atari Corp. unveils new
products and image
Saturday, 5 January 1985
by MICHAEL CIRAOLO, Associate
Editor, Antic
Las Vegas--The new Atari Corp.
unveiled a new product line and
a new image today--all intended
to compete with Apple and IBM.
"We are not a game
company. We are a
microcomputer company," said
Sig Hartmann, president of
Atari Software, at the Winter
Consumer Electronics Show. "We
will produce productivity
software and educational
material."
Atari will now carry
complete lines of 8-bit and 16-
bit machines, as well as an
array of printers, monitors and
other peripherals intended for
users of Atari, Apple, IBM,
Commodore and Texas Instruments
equipment.
The XE line of 8-bit
personal computers will include
a portable 64K machine with
built-in 5" monitor and 3-1/2
inch disk drive priced under
$400, a 128K computer priced
under $200, and a redressed
version of the 800XL priced
around $100. All are said to
be compatible with existing
Atari software.
Two 16-bit computers,
the 130ST and 520ST, are based
on an 8 MHz MC68000
microprocessor, according to
the company's announcement.
Packaged in sleek, low-
profile cases similar to the
Apple IIc case, thelong-awaited
"Jackintosh" Atari ST computers
come with 128K RAM or 512K
RAM, priced under $400 and $600
respectively.
Today's press
conference was introduced by
Nevada governor Richard Bryan,
who has been negotiating with
Atari President Jack Tramiel to
establish an Atari
semiconductor factory in
Nevada.
Negotiations for such
an Atari plant are going well,
according to Jack Tramiel, but
have not been finalized.
Atari will also be
actively entering the computer
education area, tradionally the
domain of Apple, according to
Hartmann.
According to Atari,
both machines will have 32K bit
mapped screens. There will be
a choice of three graphics
modes: a 320 x 200 pixel, 16
color mode, a 640 x 200 pixel,
4 color mode, and a monochrome
640 x 400 pixel mode.
Atari claims both
machines will have a range of
512 colors, with 8 levels each
of red, green and blue.
According to the Atari,
both computers will have a
special sound chip capable of
producing controllable
frequencies from 30 Hz to super
-sonic. There will be three
channels, with separate
frequency and volume control.
Both machines will have
interfaces to Musical
Instrument Digital Interface.
The central processing
units feature 8 32-bit data
registers, 8 32-bit address
registers, a 16-bit data bus, a
24-bit address bus, according
to the Atari.
The operating system
uses a graphics kernel
developed by Digital Research (
Pacific Grove, California), and
the Graphics Environment
Manager user interface from the
same company.
The GEM gives users
access to icons, windows, mouse
control, a memory management
system and a real-time clock.
Atari claims that both
machines have a Centronics
port, an RS232 port, interfaces
for disk controllers, joysticks
and mice. In addition, there
are apparently four video ports
--television, composite video,
RGB and high-resolution
monochrome.
Accoring to Atari's
director of marketing, James
Copland, the XE machines will
be shipped "as soon as the old
800XLs are out of the
pipeline," and the 16-bit
computers will be on store
shelves by April 1. The
company is taking orders now.