The New Generation

1984, Jack Tramiel leaves Commodore and purchases the computer/home entertainment division of Atari, leaving the arcade division to owners Warner Communications. As new technology develops, Mr. Tramiel pushes Atari Corp. to new computing limits but stops the game consoles market. Atari Corp. bid to acquire the powerful Amiga Lorraine 16/32-bit computer but lost it to Commodore, so his team would design it's own new power PC. Based on the same Motorola 68000 CPU with a powerful yet user-friendly graphics environment desktop that made MS-DOS look ancient in comparison, and more affordable so anyone can own one, at home and/or office. The powerful GUI code was created by Digital Research; GEM (Graphics Environment Manager).The STs are not compatible with 8-bit hardware or software..|CLICK IMAGES BELOW FOR IMAGE GALLERIES...

Atari 520ST & 1040ST

March 1985. Atari debuts the ST {for sixteen/thirty two bit, the new Motorola 68000 microprocessor capacity} . Two models, the 130ST and 520ST, are shown in prototype. Atari Corp. states they will have the new windowing GEM desktop and TOS {the o/s} in ROM and release both models by mid 1985.

Summer 1985, the 520ST is finally released. With MIDI in/out, external 3½" floppy drive, DMA hard drive, parallel printer, and RS232C serial ports built-in. Also a ROM cartridge port (128K), and mouse/joystick ports. They cancelled the 130ST design due to GEM and TOS not fitting within the 192K ROM chips. The early 520ST's had to boot from disk and left about 300K RAM. This was corrected within the year.

Early 1986, Atari Corp. returns with a new ST model. The 1040ST shipped soon afterwards and became the consumer reports' best buy for the year. Another prototype, the 260ST, was also cancelled. The 1040ST had a built-in double sided floppy drive, soon afterwards the 520ST was re-designed with the internal drive also, as well as a TV port. !!Click on images for more!!

`NEW`-- screenshots from ST desktop, low res.
`NEW` -- screenshots from medium res.
'Cyber Sculpt' monochrome high res screenshot

Atari ST has a bigger screen and higher resolution than Apple MacIntosh

Atari MEGA ST

New for 1987, the MEGA ST offers all the early ST features in a new case with room for expandability and an internal hard drive. The new detached keyboard freed up desk space while the case could support the monitor. The Atari MEGA ST was available with 2Mb or 4Mb RAM standard, memory is socketed for easy upgrading.

Portables; STacy & ST Book
{1988} After months of development and FCC tests, Atari releases it's portable ST computer dubbed STacy. STacy offered the complete ST keyboard, an LCD screen simulating 640x400 hi-res, and a mini-trakball to work the pointer. STacy was not very popular since it killed batteries quickly, and using an AC adapter limited portability.

full page Advertisement for STACY, from Atari corp.

+*An Image Gallery of STACY.