Talk:Atari Falcon

Specifications

The specifications listed are bog standard - is this section the correct place to add clock speed and RAM changes due to third party upgrades such as FX Extender (e.g. my Falcon has 4MB ST RAM and 8MB FX RAM :p), Afterburner, etc., or should there be an Upgrade / Non standard specifications section? 84.9.125.170 (talk) 05:12, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Separate section, most definitely. If it's not something you would either get in the box, the machine could handle natively (even if not originally specced to that level), or could at least buy as an official first-party upgrade that extended its core abilities, then it shouldn't be on the regular spec list. Otherwise we'll have to come back and fiddle with the historical record should some hobbyist go and make a new and unique upgrade board in their shed... 193.63.174.211 (talk) 12:10, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

Scope

WikiProject Video Games seems the wrong place for the Falcon, this is a mini-NeXT Cube not a console 84.9.125.170 (talk) 05:20, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Falcon Simulators

Does anybody know if there are any Falcon simulators out there that run on the Mac or PC? If so, the main article could be improved by making reference to simulators, and mention could be made to the programmers responsible for it. 198.177.27.22 (talk) 05:23, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

some specs questionable... sources?

For example, just for now - in e.g. Atari magazines of the time, I seem to remember the "high colour" mode being 32768 colours (15-bit, following on from the STe/TT's 4096/12bit and the original ST's 512/9bit)... possibly "out of 262144" itself, making it one of the most ludicrously over-palletted machines ever. The 256 mode may well also have been from 32768. If I get bored one of these days, I'll gad on and dig them out of the cupboard to check... Sorta sticks in the mind because we just bought a PC at the time, and the Falcon suddenly looked very underpowered in terms of CPU, memory, drive, graphics AND sound next to it when I did like-for-like comparison (having an integrated DSP to allow direct-to-disc recording also looked a bit pointless also when a bogstandard 486 plus soundblaster did it in CD quality without any kind of fanfare), its only advantage then being price... 193.63.174.10 (talk) 11:44, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

--

"There is also a true color 15 bit mode where bits defining each pixel are grouped together to display 32,768 colors simultaneously. This mode is easier to manage but more resource intensive.[according to whom?]"

-> There's no citation needed as this is blindingly obvious to anybody dealing with graphics. Other modes need palette handling so they're more annoying to deal with whereas 15-bits means 2x-15x more data compared to lower bit depths, so performance suffers when the resolution is same. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.78.155.108 (talk) 10:58, 28 September 2012 (UTC)

It's also easier to handle as it's chunky-pixel rather than bitplane, so you can easily send one pixel over the bus all in one go (15/16 bit pixel, 16 bit bus, probably one bit wasted in 15 bit mode...) and shove it directly into the vidchip registers or perform various maths on it without having to do the much messier operations required of grabbing, say, 16 pixels from each of 8 bitplanes (each bit for a particular pixel being held in 16 different memory pages...) in 256-colour mode in order to either do the same operations all at once (assuming they're not paletted, or have a pseudo fixed bits-per-channel palette) or even more wastefully on just one of the 16...

However, at the end of the day, the 8-bit mode will still take up less memory, and if you're only changing small parts of it at a time (or doing simpler things that the vidchip may be able to do natively like scrolling) it's quicker to shove that info into a suitably designed decoder 16 pixels at a time than 16-bit chunky data, leaving more bus time free for non-graphics operations (and hence an effectively faster "CPU speed"). And of course the chunky pixels are better for fades, but don't offer neat stuff like palette animation... 193.63.174.211 (talk) 15:28, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Falcon use 16 bit in TrueColor mod (Red: 5 bits, Green 6bits, Blue: 5 bits). If you use genlocking, than one of six green bits is used for overlay "color" so you will get 32,768 colors (instead of 65,536). Calimero (talk) 16:16, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

So it actually does both, hence the confusion from incomplete reports? Or did they just stick to 15-bit (with the genlock bit being with LSB or MSB instead of stuck in the middle of the word) and consider the very slight and somewhat arguable improvement in usable colour depth of 16-bit an acceptable loss for keeping things otherwise a lot simpler (e.g. avoiding the 16-bit-hicolour issues of "grey" with the lower bit set sliding towards the greenish at the dark end, or towards pink at the light end with the bit unset, and always being tinged with one or the other in the middle) and not offering two otherwise very similar modes that differed only in genlocking ability? 193.63.174.211 (talk) 15:32, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

I just make RGB gradients on Falcon. Please take a look at original picture exported from Falcon:

Atari Falcon truecolor (16bit) banding

(btw utterly stupid way to upload simple file) as you can see: there are twice more GREEN shades than red or blue so Falcon use 6bits for Green in TrueColor (chunk) mode. btw I am not sure for order inside of WORD! Maybe 6 bits of green are at end of word? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Calimero (talk • contribs) 19:37, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

That image was produced on the Falcon itself, and looked identical on the monitor to what we have here, then? Interesting... 193.63.174.211 (talk) 12:07, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

I made that image with Apex Media application on F030 connected to VGA monitor in true color mode. I save it as TGA and than converted it to PNG with Adobe PhotoShop. And it looks exactly same on Atari Falcon connected to VGA monitor. Beside, you can read at http://www.sarnau.info/files/Falcon030DeveloperDocumentation.pdf in "Video documentation" section that Falcon true color format is RRRRRGGGGGxBBBBB where x can be Green or overlay bit. Calimero (talk) 14:37, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

*Standing ovation*

Mate, I don't think you understand just how useful that one link you provided might end up being, to me and a lot of other people. The PDF was an insta-download after I'd read a bare few pages, and the site itself an instant bookmark. It answers SO MANY longstanding questions I've had about the Falcon and I bet the other docs on there will do similar about other Atari computers. It'll probably be helpful in clearing up a lot of stuff on this article too. A great, GREAT many thanks for posting that. Even if I'm 18 months late in saying so! 193.63.174.115 (talk) 17:09, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

(Though, having gone through some other things, I'm a little confused; the ST can do 40-column/15khz with 4 bitplanes, 80-column/15khz with 2 bitplanes, and 80-column VGA-compatible with 1 bitplane, with an 8mhz clock, 16 bit bus, and a 50% duty cycle interleaving memory access between shifter and CPU. The Falcon has the same bus, and twice the speed, and presumably can have the Videl reprogrammed to demand all of the available memory bandwidth in higher colour modes ... but can use up to 8x as much colour in each mode as the ST - ie up to 16 bits in 40 AND 80 column 15khz (and 40-column VGA), and 8 bits in 80-column VGA. That's twice as much as the maths suggest it should be able to - by rights, it should only be able to match stock PC VGA, IE 4 bits in the highest resolution/scan rate, 8 bits in the middle two, and 16 bits only in 40-column 15khz. So what's going on?! How does it manage to defy that by a factor of 2?) 193.63.174.115 (talk) 12:26, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Falcon video chip, Videl, can access ST-RAM at 32bits and in burst mode: http://powerphenix.com/rodolphe.czuba.free.fr/CT2/english/technic.htm ...Sorry for late answer but better come to atari-forum.com or similar and ask this kind of questions. Calimero (talk) 13:25, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

16 bit bus

from wikipedia article: "This was a side effect of the prototype system being based around the 68000, with the 68030 a separate expansion card." well... "somebody" (author of best Acceleration card for Atari Falcon, Jaguar programmer ...) - Rodolphe Czuba - have another opinion regarding origin of 16 bit bus: "On this system, the ram is divided in 2 banks of 16 bits, 2 MBytes each. ... The advantage of the 2 banks is the interleaving. ... But why ? To avoid the loss of cycle durring PRECHARGE TIME. ... To have a 32 bit wide DATA bus for the CPU and to keep same performances using interleaving, Atari would have to provide RAM configurations of 2 or 8 MBytes. 2 is not enought, and 8, at the time the machine was done, was too expensive." http://rodolphe.czuba.free.fr/CT2/english/technic.htm

so, this sentence should be corrected. there are also more information about development of Falcon at atari-forum.com thread "Falcon Designer" (http://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=92&t=23603&hilit=falcon+designer#p213075) - why I do not make these changes? I simple have no time to spent on primitive "mechanism" such is wikipedia. my two minutes ;) --Calimero (talk) 19:30, 12 October 2013 (UTC) (btw why I need to add signature by hand on wikipedia?!?!)

The problem is, neither one of those can be used as references here. One is a fan site, the other is a forum. --Marty Goldberg (talk) 15:25, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

oh really?! Since you are author of "Atari: Business is fun" and soon "Business is War" maybe you could bring some first hand reference about Falcon bus (instead of trying to discredit Rodolphe Czuba opinion and mark his site as "fan site"!)? ...or you will kept these information for yours agenda - upcoming book about Atari Corp. history? ;) Calimero (talk) 10:24, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're trying to insinuate, but Wikipedia has specific rules on what constitutes reliable sources here. It has zero to do with me. And nobody was trying to discredit anyone, that site simply does not meet the requirements Wikipedia has set forth. I would advise not to try and turn this into something personal. --Marty Goldberg (talk) 16:02, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

How this can be personal? I do not know you personally. I simple stating the "facts": it is not in yours best interest to expose facts about development of Atari Falcon before you finish (and start to sell) your book: "Business is War" (book about Atari Corp history). If I am right (that you do not want to disclosure information about development of Atari Falcon at wikipedia right now), we will see in few months, when your book come out. Of course, this is your right but to understand someone writings, one must know his agenda. Calimero (talk) 13:57, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

It's pure speculation and it's turning discussion about the reliability of a claimed source that doesn't meet Wikipedia's standards into personal claims about the person explaining that it doesn't meet reliability standards here. Whether or not I'm the author of a book still being written and not due out until the second half of next year is completely irrelevant to whether a site meets Wikipedia's own standards. Likewise it's silly stating a trivial tidbit like this is somehow going to make or break the sales of what's going to be another 800 page book. We haven't even started the later years and products like the Falcon, we're still focusing on the creation and early years of Atari Corp. So again, knock off the ridiculous conspiracy theories and stick to finding references that meet Wikipedia's demands on what constitutes reliable sources. --Marty Goldberg (talk) 16:19, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

and reference for: "This was a side effect of the prototype system being based around the 68000, with the 68030 a separate expansion card." is _where_?!? at same forum-thread that you previously dispute:

I'm not sure what you're trying to write about above. Regardless, a discussion forum is not a valid reference at Wikipedia either. --Marty Goldberg (talk) 04:19, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

I have to wonder...

Why did they go and base it on the ST specifically, when the capabilities and hardware were being largely expanded - when the TT and indeed affordable Mega STe already existed? IE, Atari already had a machine, from many years previous, with a 32MHz 68030 on a 32MHz, 32-bit bus, and the bitplane-pushing power - even if not the full palette - to exceed the actual Falcon's highest resolutions... it wouldn't have been too expensive a thing to make, surely, especially as it was ultimately intended to go in a standalone system box, rather than an outdated keyboard-computer box?

Just imagine if they'd released THAT instead - essentially a TT with a 56k DSP, 18-bit (VGA-like) palette, hi-colour mode (at higher resolution thanks to the faster bus and RAM access), HD floppy drive and a modulator, aimed at the home market instead of the professional one. Maybe with a CD drive too. It would have done a much better job of disrupting things versus what they released - the overall power would probably have been comparable to a mid-lower end "multimedia" 486 of the time, for less than half the price. It almost seems like they took a very early stage, proof of concept prototype, and sent it into series production...

(Ah, alternate realities, how I love you. You're where I'm a viking!) 193.63.174.211 (talk) 12:17, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

come and visit thread regarding Falcon designers: http://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=92&t=23603&start=25 (or wait for new book from Marty Goldberg :P) --Calimero (talk) 15:51, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Release in 1992?

Reading ST Format from late 1992/early 1993 I see many articles about how good Falcon will be, but still no actual release... ST Format from August 1993 (pages 27-29) even has long article about lack of new game development for Atari ST/Falcon, one part is striking:

There even seems to be some confusion about whether the Falcon is available or not. When asked by ST FORMAT if US Gold were going to commit themselves to creating games for the Falcon, Product Communications Manager Bridgett Hirst responded by saying, "The Falcon is a victim of timing - launch dates have not been met and we´re still awaiting a confirmed date. Once the machine has been released and there´s proven demand for compatible games, US Gold will consider supporting the Falcon."

Was Falcon really released in 1992? Pavlor (talk) 18:59, 24 September 2016 (UTC)

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VIDEL technology described as an 'innovation for its time'. No, Acorn did the same from 1987 with the VIDC.

Sorry but no. Acorn VIDC used the same approach and the Archimedes was launched in 1987. Source : VIDC datasheet : http://www.home.marutan.net/arcemdocs/datasheets/VIDC-1bpp%20300.pdf VIDC enhancer, to get more resolutions feeding the VIDC with different frequencies : https://www.retro-kit.co.uk/Ultra-VIDC-Enhancer/

Falcon Mk X 1U or 2U rack case?

What is the form factor of that case used for Falcon Mk X? Fellow IP editor claims it is 2U. According to the source I provided it is 1U - but this content may be well taken from Wikipedia... Is there any reliable source to settle this issue? Even primary source (manufacturer claim) could be taken as reliable in this case. Pavlor (talk) 05:39, 1 July 2022 (UTC)

Judging from the width of the case on the photos you can find, the height looks like 2U. I've used https://wiki.newtosworld.de/images/0/0b/FalconMKX.jpg and compared the height of the 3.5-in floppy drive (21 pixels) - to the height of the case (37 pixels). Accordingly, the height seems to be about 2.15 inch, just slightly more than 1U. So, it doesn't really seem to be 19-inch form factor, just flat and rackable. --Zac67 (talk)

Sadly, we need a source, this is an original research. Best course of action is probably to remove the form factor altogether - at least until better source is found. Pavlor (talk) 06:37, 1 July 2022 (UTC)

Yes, of course my estimation is OR and was merely meant as indicator (and it's at least close to 1U). Even though the source you've found is likely a circular one (it doesn't list WP as source though), I think we can leave it as is for now. --Zac67 (talk) 07:17, 1 July 2022 (UTC)

It is 2U, I own one so I should know. But will the wikipedia page need a picture with a measurement tape next to it for verification? 212.100.117.2 (talk) 08:10, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Backwards compatible?

Why are some of the specs "backwards compatible", such as the YM soundchip, blitter, while others are apparantly not, (MIDI, cartridge port, MFP, Floppy, serial port, parallell port, ACIA(keyboard), dma-sound etc). The YM chip is there not only for sound but because the I/O ports are a necessity for hardware functions on the ST platform, it's not there to be "backwards compatible" per se. The blitter, while obviously "backwards compatible" is there because it does certain things faster than the CPU on an unaccelerated machine. Falcon is a part of the ST platform, singling out particular features as "backwards compatible" is just absurd. I just find the sprinkling of the term ridiculous.

sold in relatively small numbers, mainly to hobbyists

Please, a few paragraphs lower, it even explains how a music company bought the rights to F030. 212.100.117.2 (talk) 08:49, 13 June 2024 (UTC)