Why the 2600+ is fracturing the Atari community

[Living Room Arcade]

Mike from Mike's Gaming Gala channel on Youtube had this to say. 

"Now, on PC, Stella is about as perfect of an emulator as we have for any system.  It plays roms of all shapes and sizes." 

Atari 2600+ REVIEW and HOMEBREW COMPATIBILITY TEST
Mike's Gaming Gala on Nov. 25, 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROHw3L29i9E
Cue to 18:29 at the end of his video.

I think I see what he means.  At home, I run Stella on my Windows PC, and for me Stella plays every rom I have, including Champ Games demos like Qyx and PAL format roms like Klax (PAL).  At home on my PC laptop, Stella seems to work perfectly on all roms. 

I agree with your main point, Andrew.  The 2600+ is dividing the Atari community, and that's a shame.  I think that Atari's #1 priority should be to develop a new console that has 100% compatibility with ALL Atari 2600 roms.  Some possibilities:
- Al_Nafuur's Community-Built Unnamed 1970's Video Game Console-Compatible System (WIP), as he stated, above.
- a "field programmable gate array" hardware implementation.  You guys probably heard that Analogue is making a FPGA N64 next year, so I'm sure a FPGA Atari 2600 should be possible.
- Build an Atari 2600 motherboard out of chips and wire them together like john_q_atari's "2600 Plus" My modernized 2600 console project
https://forums.atariage.com/topic/342260-2600-plus-my-modernized-2600-console-project/
- And nine years ago, someone made a field programmable gate array (FPGA) Atari 2600 motherboard
FPGA Atari 2600 Playing a Few Homebrews
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G94qfpnilzg

But no matter how it is done, the sooner, the better IMO. 

[Andrew Davie]

Thanks for your comments.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROHw3L29i9E
Cue to 18:29 at the end of his video.

If you right-click on the video at that time, you can select "Copy video URL at current time" and paste that, then you will be taken directly to that time in the video. Also, in this forum, there's a YouTube icon in the edit bar, where you can just add the video ID (without time, though) and it will embed for you.

[Living Room Arcade]

Thanks for your comments.

If you right-click on the video at that time, you can select "Copy video URL at current time" and paste that, then you will be taken directly to that time in the video. Also, in this forum, there's a YouTube icon in the edit bar, where you can just add the video ID (without time, though) and it will embed for you... 

Didn't know that.  Thanks, Andrew. 

[JetSetIlly]

I see that there is now to be a 7800+ from Atari. Bearing in mind that the 2600+ was being advertised as 7800 compatible and this new 7800+ as being 2600 compatible, I think this is a very strange development.

The only reason I can think of is that it's a tacit admission that the 2600+ hardware spec was too low and its way of working was a mistake. The latter being the cause of a lot of unpleasantness I seem to remember.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

I see that there is now to be a 7800+ from Atari. Bearing in mind that the 2600+ was being advertised as 7800 compatible and this new 7800+ as being 2600 compatible, I think this is a very strange development.

The only reason I can think of is that it's a tacit admission that the 2600+ hardware spec was too low and its way of working was a mistake. The latter being the cause of a lot of unpleasantness I seem to remember.

AFAIK there are some hardware updates on the dumper and controller MCUs (that's what I got from that AtariAge thread). But besides that, the 7800+ is just a 2600+ in a new case. Probably to be able to better milk the 7800 fans. Or milk 2600 and 7800 fans twice.

[alex_79]

Probably to be able to better milk the 7800 fans. Or milk 2600 and 7800 fans twice.

Why stop there? They can do many more case variations (junior, vader, 2800...) and resell the same thing again and again.

Collect them all!

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Wanna bet?

[Al_Nafuur]

Probably to be able to better milk the 7800 fans. Or milk 2600 and 7800 fans twice.

Why stop there? They can do many more case variations (junior, vader, 2800...) and resell the same thing again and again.

Collect them all!

I would be interested in a 2600jr in 80% size