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A solid aluminum block?

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From the article:

To meet stringent FCC requirements, the early machines were completely enclosed in a solid cast aluminum block, which made them physically robust but expensive to produce.

Also, extremely difficult to operate, I would guess.

Is this poorly phrased, or just a bit of whimsy on a regular contributor's part?--NapoliRoma (talk) 23:54, 8 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Noting that this has been addressed in several revisions over the years.--NapoliRoma (talk) 17:37, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Successor?

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In the article Atari ST is mentioned as successor. But technically it was designed by another team and had inherited none of the design philosophy of 400/800. Also, the Atari company of 400/800 era and that of ST era - after Tramiel acquisition - was another company in reality.

Technically speaking, I consider the most appropriate candidate for 400/800 successor to be the Amiga platform. Designed by Jay Miner also, using the philosophy of different custom chips for graphics, audio, etc, in a specialized co-processor fashion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.4.245.121 (talk) 17:46, 4 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Rename to "Atari 8-bit computers"

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"Atari 8-bit family" is not a contemporaneous term, as mentioned in the article. That the word computer is omitted makes it sound like it includes 8-bit consoles, like the 2600, 5200, and 7800. "Atari home computers" was used prior to the Atari ST being released. "Atari 8-bit computers" has historical precedent and is the most obvious term.

I suspect "family" came from considering the Atari XEGS as a console, though it's just a 65XE in a different form factor. With 1400+ links to Atari 8-bit family, this is a far-reaching change, but it would be good to get rid of this invented "family" designation.

References:

  1. The Neverending Story manual, 1986
  2. ANALOG Computing, April 1986
  3. Atari Explorer, Summer 1987
  4. Antic, December 1988

Dgpop (talk) 21:02, 15 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This issue was discussed already four years ago, and no one cared enough to oppose, so - I've just went with it. Let's see how it goes with the others.
There are other articles to be renamed, but I'll leave them for now. --Krótki (talk) 07:07, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Brilliant! I'll keep an eye on this! Dgpop (talk) 17:02, 19 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

There is no reason to mention Byte's imaginary "trinity" in an Atari article.

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It is not hard to see the '77 "trinity" was actually just the Radio Shack MicroComputer System. Take a look at the Apple ][ price list from '77 and '78 and note the price of a mid-range system. Now look at the list price of a brand new '77 or '78 Toyota Corolla. See how the computer and the car cost about the same? Note that there were also very few programs avalable for the computer. Almost nobody was buying Apple computers to use at home in '77 or '78. Most machines were bought for use in schools. Apple sold about 7700 microcomputers for '77 and '78 where Radio Shack sold about 185,000. Radio Shack sold more microcomputers than all other manufacturers combined. Byte's "trinity" never existed and the fantasy article should never be quoted in a historical document. 2604:3D09:7A7D:50E0:C9E4:5DF4:B059:5EFF (talk) 22:39, 12 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Merge proposal - "Atari 800XL" translated from German Wikipedia

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Last year, an "Atari 800" article was created by translating from German Wikipedia, which we decided to merge into the main Atari 8-bit computers article. The history repeats, this time with the Atari 800XL article. Translated from DEwiki last week, it has the same issue as that "Atari 800" article: it is not specific to the 800XL computer model, but covers topics applicable to the whole 8-bit computer line. Only the "History" and "Reception" sections seem to contain information specific to the 800XL. The rest of the article's content overlaps with the Atari 8-bit computers, Atari 8-bit computer peripherals and Atari 8-bit computer software articles: if this content were to be moved to these articles, the "Atari 800XL" article would remain rather short on substance.

I propose to move the relevant parts of "Atari 800XL" to the three mentioned articles, and make it again a redirect to "Atari 8-bit computers".

Also note that the article's translator works for "Open Knowledge Association" and is currently drafting a translation of the "Atari 400" article, which is likely to have the same issues.--Krótki (talk) 08:46, 18 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Krótki I was not aware that this was happening, nor the issues surrounding the "Atari 800" article. If this has been an issue with other similar articles, I believe it's best to do as you propose and I will do the same with the rejected Atari 400 article. Thank you for letting me know. Krimsonbat (talk) 00:55, 21 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that 800XL doesn't make sense as a standalone article. There's too much overlap. It's also verbose and overly detailed, so be careful about what gets merged into the main article. Dgpop (talk) 02:52, 28 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agree on merge and redirect. Prune the 800XL page of anything that's already covered and move anything novel (as well as any new sources) into this and the peripherals/software articles. If it hasn't already been done, perhaps redirects should be made for Atari 400/600XL/1200XL and any other models as well to ward off future duplication of effort? MrAureliusRYell at me! 02:30, 9 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Hi all! I am the author of all those fine Atari articles in German Wikipedia. You may have noticed already: I think every Atari model except those from the XE series deserves its own article. There is enough server space for all of them. There is some overlap? There are lots of other articles with overlap in Wikipedia, too. So what? Btw., I found this translation in en Wikipedia by pure accident, nobody told me. Also I am not credited in the version history of the article. That's not fair, Schnurrikowski (talk) 14:52, 15 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Now I had some time to check your Atari 8-bit computers. I think that article is somewhat confusing to people who never have heard of Atari 8-Bit stuff before. For example, the info box states two different versions of the CPU - but then shows the image of an Atari 800! As for the details: "The user-installable RAM modules in the 800 initially had plastic casings but this caused overheating issues, so the casings were removed. Later, the expansion cover was held down with screws instead of the easier-to-open plastic latches" But my article is verbose and overly detailed? Lol. Best regards, Schnurrikowski (talk) 10:57, 16 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The Atari 8-bit page as it is right now seems to be laid out fairly similarly to other computers of the eras with multiple models, such as the Amstrad CPC, the Atari ST, or the Commodore 64. Some of those have sections on particularly notable hardware revisions linked to larger articles covering information specifically about that model. It seems the new Atari 400 and 800 XL articles cover a lot of the same topics in fairly similar manners, which makes me think they don't need to be separate. I think a better approach would be to add this information to the main page, and then split off sub-sections for each model if they become too large in size. InvisibleUp (talk) 04:52, 18 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think the 800XL qualifies as being unique enough to really need a whole separate article, as it appears to just be a cost-reduced 800 with additional RAM. Ditto with the 600XL and the 400. If any split needs to be made, the XL line should all be one page. InvisibleUp (talk) 05:05, 18 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
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