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> My Atari 800 had 48k and a cassette drive... Your Atari 800 also had multiple 'GPUs' (CTIA and ANTIC), and a dedicated 'audio processing unit' (POKEY) as wel

> My Atari 800 had 48k and a cassette drive... Your Atari 800 also had multiple 'GPUs' (CTIA and ANTIC), and a dedicated 'audio processing unit' (POKEY) as well as various input/output ports. Conceptually it was more advanced than the IBM PC up to around the mid-90s and closer to the modular hardware design we have today with multiple losely coupled autonomous coprocessors. It is kind of interesting how the first popular 8-bit home computer also was the most technically advanced until the Commodore Amiga entered the scene (which was the direct technical successor to the 8-bit Atari, designed by the same people).

Lio 2y ago
> first popular 8-bit home computer Are you claiming that the Atari 800 was the first popular 8-bit computer or just the first popular Atari computer? It may depend on where you lived but the Atari 800 was neither the first or most popular 8-bit computer. I think it could be argued that wasn't the most advanced either, although they were really cool.
- deleted 2y ago
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- flohofwoe 2y ago
  The 800 was released in 1979 which was long before the Speccy, C64, Amstrad CPC and MSX (which I consider the other 'popular' home computers). (ok I forgot about the Apple II (1977) I think that was mainly a 'big in USA' phenomenon)