5 ms·

Connecting the Atari ST to the Internet with an ESP8266 (2017)

49 points by nynyny7 6y ago

DominoTree 6y ago
It's not pretty or nearly as useful, but towards the "end" of its life, the ST had native Ethernet and TCP/IP Here's a picture of a native session running (on sdf.org) https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DG0_h-eU0AEFy_7?format=jpg&name=large https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DG0_h-eU0AEFy_7?format=jpg&name=...
- rasz 6y ago
  You can also connect proper NE2000 compatible Realtek 8019 ISA network card to Atari ST cartridge port using nothing more than a single 74LS245 chip (1). Especially impressive once you investigate cartridge port and learn its READ only :-), no write strobe available. The hack involves treating one of two Rom Chip Select signals as free Address Decoder and actual Address Bus as data bus. (2) There are two Rom Chip Select signals responsible for 0xFA0000 and 0xFB0000 addresses. In order to wrangle a WRITE out of read only port we translate it into reading from 0xFAxxxx where xxxx is our output value. This is also how a Covox like 12bit sound cartridge bundled with a game B.A.T. worked (game used it for digital audio and copy protection). 1/ https://sites.google.com/site/probehouse/networking-the-atari/ethernet-setup-with-ethernec https://sites.google.com/site/probehouse/networking-the-atar... 2/ https://www.atarimagazines.com/startv1n3/CartridgeSlot.html https://www.atarimagazines.com/startv1n3/CartridgeSlot.html 3/ https://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=30389&start=50 https://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=30389&start=...
  - DominoTree 6y ago
    Clever "abuse" of signal lines!
  - swiley 6y ago
    This is similar to how the Atari 2600’s ram could be extended via the read only cartridge port. Except there’s no rom select just 12 address lines.
j45 6y ago
The 1040ST was truly one of the more flexible and malleable computers in it's day. Connectivity between computers using MIDI Cables, for example was a regular way to play networked games. I feel extremely lucky to be exposed to an entire lab of them in Canada and it did the right thing at the time - feed the imagination in ways 5-10 years ahead of it's time in North America that other machines couldn't quite do it. If these kinds of machines had caught on in North America like they had in Europe maybe the world would look different.
- a-dub 6y ago
  so many great european games! and the demoscene was amazing!
- rasz 6y ago
  Cheap. Atari ST line was the cheapest 32bit computer and also cheapest per megabyte computer on the market for a couple of years (4? maybe longer). It certainly wasnt great on its own, almost everything was a compromise, omission or a design defect ;) Electrically its a miracle they worked at all, try probing CPU bus sometime :o. "Bad DMA" chip recall (would erase your hard drive on first access) was actually caused by using too fast DMA chip picking too much interference for the overloaded bus. Lacked smooth horizontal scrolling because someone didnt think to wire one register inside Shifter chip making it terrible for games. Digital Audio added in STE line was also barely ~20 additional logic elements. Those free to implement scrolling and sound oversights in initial model sealed the fate of all games targeting lowest common denominator compatibility, which meant they sucked compared to Amiga. On the other end of the spectrum advanced components at rock bottom dollar made it good business proposition, cheapest Macintosh replacement by a wide margin. Computer + razor sharp 640x480 70Hz monitor + Atari laser printer (no smarts inside! mechanics driven directly by the computer) + Calamus DTP package cost less than just HP/Apple laser printer alone, and managed to print faster too. Too bad US market was obsessed with status of brands and relegated Atari (and Amiga for that matter) to the toy section.
  - cmrdporcupine 6y ago
    It really was a great machine for the price, and despite all the defects you mention above was really a very productive machine. The mistake people in the industry/press made was judging it against the Amiga as a games or graphics machine; it really was more of a productivity machine that could also play games pretty okay. It slotted between a PC and a Mac in terms of style and architecture; Mac-like GUI but MS-DOS or CP/M style OS. It's not a surprise all the hardware corner cutting and oversights and omissions (no blitter until it was too too late ...) because the modus operandi was Rock Bottom Price and they were racing against the clock to get it out before Commodore could launch the Amiga. But I feel it really fell over because of the Tramiel's odd cutthroat business style. They screwed their retailers, and they did a terrible job on software development. Hardly anything was done on the OS after the initial rather brilliant release. They just didn't invest in it until they did a big burst of quality work on it when they hired Eric Smith and brought MiNT in house etc. around the turn of the decade and the release of the Falcon and the TT030. But by then... too late.
peter_d_sherman 6y ago
>"In the following tutorial, I’ll describe how I connected my Atari ST to the Internet via using a cheap ESP8266 microcontroller as a WiFi-to-serial router – running at 19.2 kbit/s." This is a great idea! I don't own an Atari ST, but in theory this should work for any computer with an RS-232 interface, of course, non Atari ST computers would need their own SLIP-compatible software stack on the software side, but this article covers all that's needed on the hardware side for any computer with an RS-232 interface... Anyway, brilliant and tremendously useful idea!

49 points by nynyny7 6y ago

It's not pretty or nearly as useful, but towards the "end" of its life, the ST had native Ethernet and TCP/IP Here's a picture of a native session running (on sdf.org) https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DG0_h-eU0AEFy_7?format=jpg&name=large https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DG0_h-eU0AEFy_7?format=jpg&name=...

rasz 6y ago
You can also connect proper NE2000 compatible Realtek 8019 ISA network card to Atari ST cartridge port using nothing more than a single 74LS245 chip (1). Especially impressive once you investigate cartridge port and learn its READ only :-), no write strobe available. The hack involves treating one of two Rom Chip Select signals as free Address Decoder and actual Address Bus as data bus. (2) There are two Rom Chip Select signals responsible for 0xFA0000 and 0xFB0000 addresses. In order to wrangle a WRITE out of read only port we translate it into reading from 0xFAxxxx where xxxx is our output value. This is also how a Covox like 12bit sound cartridge bundled with a game B.A.T. worked (game used it for digital audio and copy protection). 1/ https://sites.google.com/site/probehouse/networking-the-atari/ethernet-setup-with-ethernec https://sites.google.com/site/probehouse/networking-the-atar... 2/ https://www.atarimagazines.com/startv1n3/CartridgeSlot.html https://www.atarimagazines.com/startv1n3/CartridgeSlot.html 3/ https://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=30389&start=50 https://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=30389&start=...
- DominoTree 6y ago
  Clever "abuse" of signal lines!
- swiley 6y ago
  This is similar to how the Atari 2600’s ram could be extended via the read only cartridge port. Except there’s no rom select just 12 address lines.

j45 6y ago

The 1040ST was truly one of the more flexible and malleable computers in it's day. Connectivity between computers using MIDI Cables, for example was a regular way to play networked games. I feel extremely lucky to be exposed to an entire lab of them in Canada and it did the right thing at the time - feed the imagination in ways 5-10 years ahead of it's time in North America that other machines couldn't quite do it. If these kinds of machines had caught on in North America like they had in Europe maybe the world would look different.

a-dub 6y ago
so many great european games! and the demoscene was amazing!
rasz 6y ago
Cheap. Atari ST line was the cheapest 32bit computer and also cheapest per megabyte computer on the market for a couple of years (4? maybe longer). It certainly wasnt great on its own, almost everything was a compromise, omission or a design defect ;) Electrically its a miracle they worked at all, try probing CPU bus sometime :o. "Bad DMA" chip recall (would erase your hard drive on first access) was actually caused by using too fast DMA chip picking too much interference for the overloaded bus. Lacked smooth horizontal scrolling because someone didnt think to wire one register inside Shifter chip making it terrible for games. Digital Audio added in STE line was also barely ~20 additional logic elements. Those free to implement scrolling and sound oversights in initial model sealed the fate of all games targeting lowest common denominator compatibility, which meant they sucked compared to Amiga. On the other end of the spectrum advanced components at rock bottom dollar made it good business proposition, cheapest Macintosh replacement by a wide margin. Computer + razor sharp 640x480 70Hz monitor + Atari laser printer (no smarts inside! mechanics driven directly by the computer) + Calamus DTP package cost less than just HP/Apple laser printer alone, and managed to print faster too. Too bad US market was obsessed with status of brands and relegated Atari (and Amiga for that matter) to the toy section.
- cmrdporcupine 6y ago
  It really was a great machine for the price, and despite all the defects you mention above was really a very productive machine. The mistake people in the industry/press made was judging it against the Amiga as a games or graphics machine; it really was more of a productivity machine that could also play games pretty okay. It slotted between a PC and a Mac in terms of style and architecture; Mac-like GUI but MS-DOS or CP/M style OS. It's not a surprise all the hardware corner cutting and oversights and omissions (no blitter until it was too too late ...) because the modus operandi was Rock Bottom Price and they were racing against the clock to get it out before Commodore could launch the Amiga. But I feel it really fell over because of the Tramiel's odd cutthroat business style. They screwed their retailers, and they did a terrible job on software development. Hardly anything was done on the OS after the initial rather brilliant release. They just didn't invest in it until they did a big burst of quality work on it when they hired Eric Smith and brought MiNT in house etc. around the turn of the decade and the release of the Falcon and the TT030. But by then... too late.

peter_d_sherman 6y ago

>"In the following tutorial, I’ll describe how I connected my Atari ST to the Internet via using a cheap ESP8266 microcontroller as a WiFi-to-serial router – running at 19.2 kbit/s." This is a great idea! I don't own an Atari ST, but in theory this should work for any computer with an RS-232 interface, of course, non Atari ST computers would need their own SLIP-compatible software stack on the software side, but this article covers all that's needed on the hardware side for any computer with an RS-232 interface... Anyway, brilliant and tremendously useful idea!