Acorn Atom

The Acorn Atom was a home computer made by Acorn Computers Ltd from 1981 to 1983 when it was replaced by the BBC Micro (originally Proton) and later the Acorn Electron. The Atom was a progression of the MOS Technology 6502 based machines that the company had been making from 1979. The Atom was a cut-down Acorn System 3 without a disk drive but with an integral keyboard and cassette tape interface, sold in either kit or complete form. It was priced at around GBP175. It had a MC6847 VDU video chip, allowing for text or two-colour graphics modes. It could be connected to a TV or modified to output to a video monitor. Basic video memory was 1 kbyte but could be expanded to 6 kbyte. A PAL colour card was also available. It had built-in BASIC (Atom BASIC), although in an idiosyncratic version, which included poke and peek operators for bytes and double bytes. It also included an assembler allowing you to produce machine code as output of a program. The Acorn LAN, Econet, was first configured on the Atom. The case was designed by industrial designer Allen Boothroyd of Cambridge Product Design Ltd and hi-fi company Boothroyd Stuart Meridian.

Specifications

  • CPU: MOS Technology 6502
  • Speed: 1 MHz
  • RAM: 2 kB, expandable to 12 kB
  • ROM: 8 kB
  • Sound: 1 channel, integral loudspeaker
  • Size: 381 x 241 x 64 mm
  • I/O Ports: Computer Users Tape Standard (CUTS) interface, TV connector, Centronics parallel printer
  • Storage: Kansas City standard audio cassette interface
  • Power: 8 volts DC, providing 5 volts stabilised

External links

  • http://www.xs4all.nl/~fjkraan/comp/atom/index.html
  • http://www.howell1964.freeserve.co.uk/Acorn/Atom/Atom.htm

 

<< PreviousWord BrowserNext >>
organisation for economic co operation and development
george soros
nativism
subvertising
community management
2006 commonwealth games
david korten
debt relief
2010 winter olympics
six acts
toronto international film festival
land reform
corporate crime
nonviolence
starhawk
balsa
arundhati roy
bridget riley
basis of unity
john sellers
ruckus society
afl cio
intravenous therapy
starbucks
independent television authority
iv
history of martinique
earth first!
francis schaeffer
islamic fundamentalism
jupiter cantab
transfusion medicine
experimental aircraft association
arqa
sarah blaffer hrdy
braehead
mahommedan
saskatoon, saskatchewan
mogul
james wilson
jack bruce
federal reserve banks
egersund
public broadcasting