Atari Graduate
| Atari Graduate (CX-3000) | |
|---|---|
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|
| The keyboard unit fitted to a 2600, as pictured in Atari Age, May–June 1983 | |
| Manufacturer | Atari, Inc. (unreleased) |
| Type | Keyboard computer add-on for the Atari 2600 |
| Interface | 2600 cartridge slot[1] |
| Compatible | Atari 2600[1] |
| Model | CX-3000[2] |
| Developer | Peripheral Visions, Inc.[2] |
The Atari Graduate is an unreleased keyboard computer for the Atari 2600 (VCS), model CX-3000. It plugs into the console's cartridge slot and turns the 2600 into a home computer with its own memory and a built-in BASIC.[1][2] Peripheral Visions, Inc. developed it for Atari in 1982 and 1983 under the names "My First Computer", "2600 Computer" and "The Graduate". Atari announced it in February 1983, showed it at the Summer Consumer Electronics Show in June 1983 and cancelled it later that year.[2]
History
[edit | edit source]Peripheral Visions, Inc. (PVI) was formed in late 1982 by three former Commodore engineers, Charles Winterble, Al Charpentier and Bob Yannes. According to the Atari Compendium, Winterble had the idea of turning the VCS into a computer; PVI offered it to Atari's chief executive Ray Kassar, who agreed to buy it for a million dollars, with PVI developing the hardware and Atari the software. The first target price was $29.95, with a membrane keyboard and BASIC built in.[2]
A prototype came from the collection of an Atari programme manager who helped present it privately to key accounts at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January 1983. RR Auction's description of it gives 57 keys, a size of 13.5 × 7 × 3 in and a target price under $90.[3] Atari announced the computer on 9 February 1983.[2] In its May–June 1983 issue, Atari's club magazine Atari Age described a keyboard module that snaps into the cartridge slot, with a "full raised 56-key typewriter-style keyboard", 8K bytes of RAM, Microsoft BASIC built in, memory expandable to 32K with add-on modules, program storage on an ordinary cassette recorder or an optional data drive, and a printer and modem to follow. It gave autumn 1983 for the introduction.[1]
The Compendium says the computer was shown at the 1983 Summer CES with a printer and a wafer drive, and was cancelled by James Morgan after he became Atari's chief executive in September 1983. It names a lawsuit that Commodore had brought against PVI as the likely main reason.[2] The auction description of the January 1983 prototype gives a different account: that Atari ended the project in late spring 1983 because it feared the Graduate would take sales from its own home computers.[3] Curt Vendel's Atari Museum also dates the cancellation to the autumn of 1983, when Morgan took over.[4]
Design
[edit | edit source]The Compendium describes the unit as self-contained, using the 2600 only for power and display, much as the 5200's VCS adaptor works.[2] The auction description lists these features for the design:[3]
| Item | Specification |
|---|---|
| Processor | 6502 |
| RAM | 8K, expandable to 32K |
| ROM | 16K, including an 8K BASIC |
| Display | 16 colours with eight luminances each (128 in all); 32 columns × 24 rows of text; graphics up to 192 × 160 pixels |
| Sound | Two sound generators |
| Storage | Interface for a standard cassette recorder |
| Expansion | Slot for game cartridges, memory expanders and peripherals |
Atari Age gave the same 8K RAM, 32K expansion, cassette storage and built-in Microsoft BASIC.[1] The auction description says the BASIC was to be a cross between Atari BASIC and Microsoft BASIC, closer to Microsoft's in its string handling.[3]
To write to the 2600's TIA registers faster, the designers used a "bus stuffing" technique. The 2600 program loads $FF into the Y register and executes three-cycle STY instructions to the TIA registers; at the moment the $FF is written, the Graduate hardware drives the wanted value onto the data bus over the top of it.[2]
Surviving units
[edit | edit source]- The Compendium reports one known working prototype, with a 56-key membrane keyboard that includes a key labelled "PVI" and a cartridge port on the side. It was shown at the World of Atari show in 1998. Atari also had marketing mock-ups made, and it is not known whether any of them work.[2]
- The prototype from the January 1983 CES presentation, from the collection of Bill Simmeth, Atari's product manager for new products in the Consumer Division, was sold by RR Auction in March 2023 without its power supply, described as untested.[3]
- The Atari Museum has a keyboard mock-up with no electronics, in a case styled like the 2600 Jr, and suggests it may have been a restyling of the Graduate.[4]
Related pages
[edit | edit source]References
[edit | edit source]- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 "Keyboard Will Turn Atari VCS Into Powerful Home Computer: Fall Introduction Planned For Revolutionary Device", Atari Age vol. 2 no. 1, May–June 1983, p. 11 (Sneak Peeks). Internet Archive item Atari_Age_Volume_2_Number_1_May-June_1983.
- ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 The Atari Compendium, "The Graduate Computer" (prototype page), citing Brian Bagnall, On the Edge: The Spectacular Rise and Fall of Commodore, pp. 274 to 279, for the PVI lawsuit. ataricompendium.com. Community reference.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 RR Auction, lot 8054, "Atari CX3000 Graduate Computer Keyboard Prototype", auction 660, ended 16 March 2023, lot description and provenance (consignor Bill Simmeth). rrauction.com.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Curt Vendel, Atari Museum, "Atari 2600 Keyboard Add-on". atarimuseum.ctrl-alt-rees.com.