Atari 7800

Atari 7800 Specifications

The Atari 7800 ProSystem, or simply the Atari 7800, is a home video game console officially released by Atari Corporation in 1986 as the successor to both the Atari 2600 and Atari 5200. It can run almost all Atari 2600 cartridges, making it one of the first consoles with backward compatibility. It shipped with a different model of joystick from the 2600-standard CX40 and Pole Position II as the pack-in game. Most of the announced titles at launch were ports of 1981–1983 arcade video games.

Designed by General Computer Corporation, the 7800 has significantly improved graphics hardware over Atari's previous consoles, but the same Television Interface Adaptor chip that launched with the 2600 in 1977 is used to generate audio. In an effort to prevent the flood of poor quality games that contributed to the video game crash of 1983, cartridges had to be digitally signed by Atari.

The Atari 7800 was first announced by Atari, Inc. on May 21, 1984, but a general release was shelved until May 1986 due to the sale of the company. Atari Corporation dropped support for the 7800, along with the 2600 and the Atari 8-bit family, on January 1, 1992.

Atari had been facing pressure from Mattel and Coleco with their Intellivision and ColecoVision consoles respectively, which supported graphics that more closely mirrored arcade games of the time than either the Atari 2600 or 5200. The Atari 5200 (released as a successor to the Atari 2600) aimed to address this issue, but was ultimately criticized for lack of backwards compatibility with 2600 games, flawed controllers, and initially high price. Released just prior to the video game crash of 1983, the 5200 failed to meet sales expectations.

The Atari 7800 ProSystem was the first console from Atari, Inc. designed by an outside company, General Computer Corporation. It was designed in 1983–84 with an intended mass market rollout in June 1984, but was canceled after the sale of the company to Tramel Technology Ltd on July 2, 1984. The project was originally called the Atari 3600.

With a background in creating arcade games such as Food Fight, GCC designed the new system with a graphics architecture similar to arcade machines of the time. The CPU is a slightly customized 6502 processor, the Atari SALLY, running at 1.79 MHz. By some measures the 7800 is more powerful, and by others less, than the 1983 Nintendo Entertainment System. It uses the 2600's Television Interface Adaptor chip, with the same restrictions, for generating two-channels of audio.