Atari 8-bit
3rd Party Hardware

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The Atari 8-bit computers had a lot of 3rd party support.  Here is a look at some 3rd party products were offered for these oustanding computer systems.....

Amdek Amdisk III - Amdek was mainly known for their monitors.  They attempted to bring a new floppy drive standard to the Atari systems.   Using propriatery 3 inch media, these drives would hold roughly 360k per disk.

ATR-8000 by SWP - The ATR-8000 is a CP/M microcomputer add-on device for the 8-bit systems.  It features a 4MHz Z80 processor with 64k of RAM.  Besides bringing CP/M compatibility to the Atari 8-bit systems, it also enhances the Atari computer operation.  The ATR-8000 has ports for attaching a serial or parallel printer for use under the Atari OS, complete with a 48k buffer.  The ATR-8000 also enables the use of standard 5 1/4 and 8 inch disk drives under MyDOS, or other disk operating system that support extended drives. 

An additional option for this unit was the CoPower-88 upgrade, which added an Intel 8088 processor for IBM PC/XT compatibility.

Rana Systems 1000 Floppy Drive - Rana was known as a high quality manufacturer of floppy drives for Apple computers.  The drive above is their attempt to penetrate the Atari market, and it was a VERY good drive.  It was a single sided/double density drive.  It had a track LED readout, and several buttons on the front of the drive for controlling write protection, error status, etc.  The write protection button was an Atari first, and would be copied by other manufacturers.

One of the big attractions of this drive was its size.   Look at the picture above, and notice how much more compact it was compared to the Atari 810 drive.

TRAK AT-D2 Disk Drive - The TRAK drive was a nice 3rd party alternative for disk drives.  The drive itself was a single sided/double density unit, with a status panel on the front of the unit.  It is hard to tell in the photo above, but the color of the drive is the same basic beige of the 400/800 line.

TRAK AT-D4 Disk Drive - The original TRAK AT-D2 drive was very popular, and this was the follow-up product.  Released in 1984, this drive was a double sided/double density unit that also included a parallel printer interface with a printer buffer.

Micro Mainframe MF-1681 Disk Drive - This device brought two drives together into a single device.  The drives themselves could be anything from single sided/single density, single sided/double density, or double sided/double density.  The unit also featured a parallel port & printer buffer, and the ability to read multiple disk formats such as CP/M disks. 

Indus GT Disk Drive -  Indus proclaimed this drive as the "Ferrarri of disk drives."  It was, in fact, a slick little drive.   It featured a LED track display, write protect switch, and other features similar to the other drives above.  It was a single sided/double density drive.

Astra Disk Drives -  Astra made multiple models of floppy drives for Atari 8-bit systems over the years.  The one above, known as "The One" was a single sided or double-sided drive, capable of single-density or double-density operation.  The mode of operation for this drive was completely selectable via software.  It also had a parallel printer interface & 360k printer buffer. 

Among Astra's other disk drives was a unit that had two floppy drives in a single case.

Percom Disk Drives -  Percom made some of the biggest selling 3rd party floppy drives for the original 400/800 series.  The drive shown above, the "AT88-S1-PD," featured a single-sided, single-density/double-density floppy drive mechanism, along with a parallel printer interface.   

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I own one of these!  I'll post a photo soon.

ICD MIO Board - This device was designed for use on the 600XL/800XL and 130XE systems only.  It used the PBI/ECI ports of these systems.  It was designed to give you a RAMdisk of 256k or 1mb depending on the model.  It also had a hard disk interface, serial port, and parallel port.  All in all, it was a very useful little box.

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Black Box by CSS - The Black Box by CSS is one of the few remaining Atari 8-bit devices still being manufactured/sold to this day.   It is designed for any XL computer that has the Parallel Bus Interface, or any XE computer with the Enhanced Cartridge Interface.  This device allows these systems to use industry standard SCSI hard drives, industry standard floppy disk drives, a high speed serial interface, a parallel port interface w/buffer, and a built menu system.  It is a very powerful and useful device.

Supra Hard Drive Unit - This hard drive connected to the XL/XE parallel bus interface using a special adapter.  The standard drive size was 10 megabytes, and there were other sizes available.  The transfer rate averaged between 8,000-10,000 bytes per second, which was 10-15 times faster than a standard Atari floppy drive.

ICD Hard Drive Unit - This hard drive marketed by ICD, was designed for the ST series.  It would, however, work quite well on an Atari XL/XE system that were equipped with the ICD MIO Board, and ICD's SpartaDOS.

Commodore 1702 Monitor - Now most die-hard Atari fans will be upset that I have a Commodore device on this page.  However, let's face the facts:   Commodore had some damn fine monitors, and this one was probably the best one for use on the Atari 8-bit systems.  This is the monitor that I use with my Atari 800 system.  These monitors also work great for more modern video games, including the Atari Jaguar, Sony PlayStation, and Sega Dreamcast..

The reason that we had to turn to Commodore for monitors was simple: Atari didn't make any for the 8-bit line.  They did make an attempt when the XE's were released.  That monitor, the XC-1411 never did get past the prototype stage.  (I actually own a working prototype of the XC-1411 monitor.  See the 8-bit Vaporware/Prototypes section for a photo.) 

John Skruch of Atari was actually quoted in A.N.A.L.O.G. Magazine (Issue #49, dated Dec. 1986, Pages 13 & 15) as saying "The 8-bit product division has more important business at hand than to take some other manufacturers monitor and conceive a fancy box for it."

Expando-Vision by Stimultech - This device was just so weird that I had to include it here.  It was a hardware device that plugged into your TV and an Atari 8-bit computer.  When properly programmed, it would flash subliminal messages across your screen while watching TV. 

Rat by Zobian Controls - The "Rat" was one of the first mice available for the 8-bit line.  It came with a drawing program, and a driver for making the cursor in commercial programs, like word processors, follow the movement of the Rat.  BASIC code was included on the program disk so the Rat could be used in your own programs.

Joytyper 400 by Microtronics - The Atari 400 keyboard had its advantages and disadvantages.  Since it was made of a pressure sensitive material with no moving parts, it was good for children, and easy to keep clean.   However, if you had to type a letter, or do programming, it was next to impossible.

The Joytyper was one of several keyboard replacements for the 400.  It featured a standard 800 keyboard that would replace the existing one.   The four function keys have been moved from the right side of the keyboard to the bottom of the unit -- two function keys on each side of the spacebar.  The function keys were slightly recessed, and had stronger springs, so it was not easy to hit them by accident while typing.

An optional cable was available that would allow the keyboard to detach from the system. 

KB-400 by AttoSoft - The Atari 400 keyboard had its advantages and disadvantages.  Since it was made of a pressure sensitive material with no moving parts, it was good for children, and easy to keep clean.  However, if you had to type a letter, or do programming, speed typing was next to impossible.

The KB-400 was one of several keyboard replacements for the 400.  The old keyboard would be removed, and this one with spring activated keys was installed.  Usually, the job involved taking the system apart, and doing some soldering.

Star Printers - Star provided some of the best 3rd party printers for use on the Atari 8-bit systems.  The printer above is the Star Gemini 10.  Star made many other printers such as the NX-1000, and NX-1000c.