An Introduction to the Atari ST - 10MARC Atari 1040ST Special

What's going on here? An Atari ST on my channel? Blasphemy!
I just got a new Atari 1040ST last month, as I just wanted to see what the fuss was about 35 years ago... This week I am going over the hardware of the ST, and talking about how we can get it to display on modern monitors.
I promise to be polite and not pick on the Atari ST too much in this limited run series of "10 Minute Atari Retro Cast"

Interested in picking up an Atari 1040ST for yourself?

Interested helping me out on Patreon?

Please check out Amiga Art Contest 2020

Follow Pete on Twitter
@recta_pete

Follow me on Twitter
@10marc1

[MrDivingfool]

One thing is find hysterical is the raw emotions of being either an Atari Fan or an AMIGA fan but not both. The truth is the Amiga was designed by the same engineers that built the Atari 800 and the ST was built by the same guys who made the C64. That community was so intertwined that people forget that even Apple has roots at Atari. We put our loyalties to brands rather than the brilliant engineers who made these awesome machines in the first place. And NO, Doug, you may not have my Falcon!

[Marakai]

The cartridge port was actually used for a lot of things like scanner interfaces, video and sound digitizers with stereo capability, midi expanders, external clocks, Action Replay style cartridges, external sound chips, copy protection dongles for professional midi sequencers and so on. Nowadays you can also plug in things like Netusbee for having an ethernet and USB ports etc.

[maniacsatwork]

Really enjoyed this episode. As a staunch Amiga owner, I got my first ST last year and now I have a Mega ST, two STe's and a Falcon. My goal is to jazz them up with modern tech and learn the ins and outs of each one.

[vix_in_japan]

This leaves only two words in your channel name that are factually correct. :)

[lesr]

Great Retro Cast. I recently acquired a 520 STE to sit next to my A500+. I've now added an Ultra Satan and additional RAM which helps with some later games and demos. It's quite surprising how different your ST motherboard is to the later STE. If you are not there already I recommend you join in on the exxoshost forum.

[azurabayta]

It's like looking into a bizarre parallel universe... Shoulda worn a false goatee for this one, Doug!
The STs are really neat machines though, and that diagonal styling on the cases is just beautiful.

[datashed]

Your bravery and willingness to hold your nose and do such an unbiased review is commendable indeed. Great video!

[keithruhl]

I've watched quite a few of your videos Doug. But none have made me laugh as much. Keep up the great work.

[ArchaicTearx]

As always, a very informative and excellent show Doug! I’m excited for the next Atari ST episode.

I have an Amiga 500 and 1200. They are amazing machines and I love them both, but my one true love is my Atari 1040 Ste. In hindsight it seems I have always been one to back the underdog, but in turn makes things feel a bit more special and appreciated.

I have recently been making upgrades to my setup. My power supply died years ago and eventually I got a new power supply from centuriontech and ordered a USB mouse adapter from lotharek. It was such a rush to see the old Ste come back to life.

I am currently waiting on a RGB to Scart cable and the RetroTINK 2xSCART. Hopefully this will allow me to hook up to any modern HDMI tv or monitor. Fingers crossed!

Regarding that terrible Falcon computer, my kids promised me when they grow up and are rich, they will buy me one! I anxiously await that day! Keep up the great work!

[cbmeeks]

That is one complaint I have for Atari ST's. I have six of them and they are a pain to get a display out of. Especially if you've ever tried to solder those 13 pin DIN's! Great computer, otherwise. I actually built an S-Video adapter for my Amiga's using an AD725 encoder. Works amazing. Wished I had something similar for the ST....guess I should build one.

[feralstorm]

Funny to think how, with the natures of the hardware and people behind them, it was all a big swap, with the Amiga being a spiritual successor to Atari's 8 bit stuff, and the ST a spiritual successor to Commodore's 8 bit lines.

[mikekopack]

I've always loved the fact that the ST is really the technical successor to the C64, and the Amiga was the successor to the Atari 400/800... And then the twisted way in which they both ended up where they did... Such a crazy tangled web...

[ritsukasa]

I only had a couple of atari 8 bits at the time. The atari ST is like next-gen to me. And it looks beautifull.

[alaingoulet]

Nice presentation. I never was an Atari fan while growing up but this is a nice looking machine. Looking forward to your further reviews of this machine and don't stop the ribbing - that's really funny.

[BlaBla-pfmf]

Informative + great Amiga and Macintosh jokes.

[Rip-Van-Tinkle]

When I said some weeks ago that this was the start of the "10 minute Atari Retro Cast" I was joking Doug! JOKING!! 🤦‍♂️😳🤪😆

[a]

I appreciate you putting yourself through this so that I don’t have to :-). In all seriousness it would be nice to see what an ST can do, I’ve never owned one, well I’ve never seen one it person. I don’t know of anyone in our school that had one back in the day either. To be honest the only thing I know about it is that some of the earlier games were better on it than the other computer that clearly was not mentioned today. But that soon changed as popularity shifted the other way.
I look forward to the future episodes.

[danjclark]

Really enjoyed this video 👍🏻Have always been in the ST camp rather than the Amiga one and started with a 520STFM in 1990 then a 520STE that I upgraded to 1meg. Then I bought the Falcon when it came out and had that until a few years ago when I stupidly sold my whole retro collection due to lack of room at the time 😪 I have started to rebuild my collection and have a 1040STE upgraded to 4meg and also accelerated to 32Mhz. And as well as various other retro computers and consoles, I have recently been donated an Amiga 1200 and CD32 by a work colleague 😀

[MrThairacer]

oh 😮 you done it ! when i saw your post on tweeter with pixel vixen i thought it was a joke lol ! Nice 👍, it touched me a lot cause it’s my first contact with a computer, bought a second hand, working on summer as a student for paid by myself, A real computer on my desk ! my family didn’t looking at me the same !, first game was major motion and share copy at the lycée, first gui with a mouse, at lycée they have pc with multiplan ! monochrome, when i bought EPIC game, a space opera, the intro music is fantastic !! using samples ! ok, i go on looking your video ! and you know a friend of my sister want d to put in a bin a Falcon ! wtf ! i have to save it. great stuff, great fun !

[Wallygjs]

I had the ST, started with a 520 STFM and then eventually got a Mega ST4. At the time of the 520 STFM I just could not afford the Amiga, though I always wanted one. By the time I got the Mega ST4, I had invested a lot of time and effort (writing programs etc) in C on the Atari so stuck with it and got the Mega ST4. Though I wish I had got an Amiga. I have loads of them now!