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Sothius' Home-Museum- ATARI

Back to museumATARI Corp.

Machines in my collection::ATARI history::ATARI peripherals


Machines in my collection

All machines - of course - fully functional.
Click on a machine for more details!


ATARI C-140 Super Pong ThumbnailATARI SUPER PONG
(C-140)
ATARI Corp.
1976
ATARI 800XL ThumbnailATARI 800XL
ATARI Corp.
1983
ATARI 520ST+ ThumbnailATARI 520ST+
ATARI Corp.
1985
ATARI 260ST ThumbnailATARI 260ST
ATARI Corp.
1986
ATARI 1040STFM ThumbnailATARI 1040STFM
ATARI Corp.
1986
ATARI VCS 2600 jr. REV.C ThumbnailATARI 2600 jr.
Codename: 'Bonnie'
REV.C
ATARI Corp.
1986
ATARI 7800 ThumbnailATARI 7800 PRO System
Codename: 'VCS3600/ Maria'
ATARI Corp.
1986
ATARI XE GS ThumbnailATARI XE SYSTEM
ATARI Corp.
1987
ATARI VCS 2600 jr. REV.F1 ThumbnailATARI 2600 jr.
Codename: 'Bonnie'
REV.F1
ATARI Corp.
1991



ATARI history

ATARI Games Corp. logo (37 KBytes)ATARI Corp. was founded by Nolan Bushnell in 1972, where 'ATARI' is japanese for "I'm going to win!" (deriving from the traditional board game 'Go!'). First plans, in which the company was to be called 'Syzygy' (an astronomical term), fortunately failed because of copyright-reasons...
Bushnell, however, needed a company to sell the legendary Pong-videogame (in arcade-, later home-versions), which made ATARI the leading force of the videogame-market these days; also legendary became the later games, like Breakout (developed by Steve Jobs, who worked for Bushnell these days!) and Asteroids (1979, launched to oppose Taito's Space Invaders). In 1977 ATARI introduced the VCS 2600, a best-selling videogame-system. But Nolan Bushnell had, by that time, already sold ATARI to Warner Bros. and left the company - without Warner, ATARI would have gone bankrupt because of the expensive VCS-development.
In the following years of the videogame-boom, ATARI was waypointing in designing new videogames, both home- and arcade. But then, around 1983, the videogame-market crashed from one day to another (the so-called 'videogame shakeout'). Luckily, ATARI had already found their part in the upcoming 8 bit computer-market at that time, with famous machines like the ATARI 400/800 and their successors 1200XL, 600XL and 800XL. Nevertheless, they later tried to resurrect videogames with the ATARI 5200 SuperSystem and the VCS 7800 PRO System, which both failed.
In 1984 then, ATARI was split: computer- and videogame-divisions were sold to Jack Tramiel (called 'ATARI Technology Corp.' from then on), the arcade-section was sold to Namco (forming 'ATARI Games Corp.', see logo above). VCS 2600-version of the successful PONG (5 KBytes) With the ATARI Technology Corp., Tramiel wanted to rival Commodore, the company he had founded himself, and which he had left because of some disputes with management. After failing to overtake Amiga Inc. (to prevent CBM from buying it), ATARI had to mothball the planned 1850XL and a high-end game-console (both based on the Amiga-chipset they had planned to license). So in 1985 they introduced the ST-series ('Sixteen-Thirtytwo', because of their 16/32 bit Motorola 68000 CPU), finally entering the 16 bit-market and following Apple's Lisa and Macintosh in many ways (that's why many people called it the 'Jackintosh'...). Although it didn't sell as good as it's opponent, the Amiga did, it was a milestone in computer technology as well. It was cheap, had built-in MIDI and a high-res black-and-white monitor with 70Hz and so was often seen in sound-recording studios or offices. There was even a ST-based laptop called 'STacy', and a notebook (ST-book). Also, together with the first STs, the XL-series was relaunched as XE-series (130XE, 800XE, 65XE and XE SYSTEM), in similar designed cases - considered a step backwards by most people, since the 8 bit market was already dying, these machines didn't sell as well as their ancestors did. The ST-series, however, sold well, but as mentioned earlier, couldn't rival the Amiga's multimedia capabilities. Additionally, Commodore had already released much faster machines with 68020 and 68030 CPUs. That's why ATARI decided to improve the ST-design; the ATARI TT was a true 32 bit machine built around a 68030 CPU ('Thirtytwo-Thirtytwo'), but with only slightly improved graphics and not fully ST-compatible. The STE-series ('ST enhanced') was more compatible and featured 4096 colors and PCM-sound. Both sold quite well, but due to the lack of software making use of their capabilities, didn't become as successful as the ST-series was.
Finally, after having launched the first 64 bit videogame (the Jaguar) and the FALCON 030 (aka SPARROW/ FX-1 - a fantastic, new ST-design based on a 68030 CPU and DSP), the company was forced to give up due to financial problems...
Also worth mentioning is that ATARI had, like Commodore, developed many machines that were interesting but have never been released (prototypes); among them were improved versions of the VCS (e.g. VCS 2700), XL-protoypes (1400XL, XLD-series) and many ST-variants (a 130ST with only 128K RAM, a 1040STE+ with additional onboard 80286, ESTs ('enhanced ST') with new BLiTTER and Shifter, a FALCON 040 etc).
Today, Hasbro Interactive holds most of ATARI's rights, using that popular name and trademark to sell actual computer games.

Visit the ATARI website for more info on actual products!

All trademarks mentioned on these pages belong to their respective owners (if they still exist). All other content, including pictures is (C) M.A.Grundke (aka Sothius), unless otherwise noted. Unauthorized copying or usage of that content, without former permission from M.A.Grundke or the rightful copyright-holder, is prohibited. Note that the 'ATARI Games sign' has been scanned and reworked by M.A.Grundke, from Power Play, issue 1

Sothius' Home-Museum- ATARI