FB3...

[+Random Terrain]

please refuse to speculate more wait till the smoke clears and the mirrors are shattered. he refuses to tell us straight up whats going on so we can only assume its just more of the same lies that he keeps feeding us.

 

curt dont give us the nda bs either. just tell us whats going on without the cloak and dagger antics.

Sorry, but that's really rude. Curt has told us what he can tell us and I certainly wouldn't expect someone to put his job at risk just because you want more advanced information. I don't see any lies being fed, just a designer working with a company whose product lineup (and finanicial status) changes daily. Most of us here have jobs that give us information we can't necessarily share with others - you need to be greatful for the information he has been able to share instead of complaining that he's lying or being coy on purpose.

 

I predict a post soon to come that looks like this:

 

"please leave me alone. i have already dealt with your hatered."

[Curt Vendel]

Werejag - you should know far better then to make such a post as that. Do you understand an NDA means Non-Disclosure, its a legal contract and I can put myself and my company at risk by violating it. This is not some homebrew project that is being done independent outside anyone else's involvement, this is two companies involved with one another and there are a lot of things that simply cannot be made public. I can't tell you "straight up" on certain things, because legally I don't have a right to do so.

 

What I can tell everyone "straight up" is there will be no further information until next year, not even little tid bits I will share here and there anymore, so that's it, the plug is pulled on any further sharing of what information I could and wanted to share, now you'll just wait, sorry but I'm not going to have this kind of nonsense such as what is written below thrown in my face, that is totally uncalled for.

 

 

Curt

 

please refuse to speculate more wait till the smoke clears and the mirrors are shattered. he refuses to tell us straight up whats going on so we can only assume its just more of the same lies that he keeps feeding us.

 

curt dont give us the nda bs either. just tell us whats going on without the cloak and dagger antics.

[+davidcalgary29]

Totally understandable, Curt, and you've given us lots to think about already. I'm sure the new project will be awesome -- in whatever form it takes -- and I'll await more news in January.

[n8littlefield]

I agree - although I personally would have loved verification just of portable vs settop box I'm more than willing to wait.

[raskar42]

you suck werejag.

 

 

Curt, thanks for everything you done for us.

you're a good guy.

[Albert]

please refuse to speculate more wait till the smoke clears and the mirrors are shattered. he refuses to tell us straight up whats going on so we can only assume its just more of the same lies that he keeps feeding us.

 

curt dont give us the nda bs either. just tell us whats going on without the cloak and dagger antics.

Curt doesn't owe you ANYTHING, and your garbage posts like this don't serve any useful purpose other than to attack Curt. What have YOU done to bring new Atari retro products out except to impatiently bitch and moan? Grow up and don't post in this or any other Flashback-related threads unless you have something useful to contribute to them.

 

..Al

[Gorf]

It's a shame people feel they can push others into action with silly threats. It 's also a shame that

some people have not the first clue of the effort it takes to release a product like the FB3. Everyone

should just remember what Curt has done for Atari fans everywhere. Don't sweat it Curt. Some of

us do know how to appreciate the efforts and the products you make happen. Release it if and when

it's ready. Let's also be glad its not a careless ruch job either. Quality still means something to some

of us.

Edited August 7, 2007 by Gorf

[TwinChargers]

I certainly hope I didn't help cause this commotion. All I said is that its hard to guess what is going on. I'll stand behind that, and I'll also say pretty much all of what werejag has to say is bitter and negative. Very troll-like.

Its very unfortunate that we won't know whats going on until sometime in 2008. I'm not upset at Curt like werejag. Curts got his job to do, and thats more important than filling us in on some insider stuff. I wish Atari themselves would maybe announce something from time to time, or give us a teaser ad on there website. Oh well, I cannot lie, my moral is lowered some on the wait, but thats life. Hopefully with whatever venture Atari goes into, it will help out there financial status and get themselves back up on there feet and they can offer us more cool retro products.

[mos6507]

Definitely don't blame Curt. I know he'd post a blog on every milestone of the project if he were allowed to.

 

Just chill.

[XT]

I do not post here much, but I enjoy reading the site. Reading this post and seeing the personal Attack on Curt makes me Ill. I think it's totally rediculous and I do believe personal attacks are a bannable offense....

 

Curt, thanks for all you have done for the Atari community. I love your Museum site and I have both of your flashback products. My kids and I love them.

Edited August 8, 2007 by XT

[Fort Apocalypse]

Curt, you are the man.

 

The Flashback 2 takes a prominent place in our house, and I attribute my total obsession with this forum to the cool stuff you have shared in it as well as the super cool work you are doing (not to mention my endless fascination with Atari and other retro stuff!).

 

That dude has made me so mad I had to bite my tongue a number of times. That kind of dementor attitude started to make me feel depressed. I'm really glad someone spoke up.

 

I apologize if my posts and polls get annoying also. I was having way too much fun getting into things.

[Hocus Cadabra]

please refuse to speculate more wait till the smoke clears and the mirrors are shattered. he refuses to tell us straight up whats going on so we can only assume its just more of the same lies that he keeps feeding us.

 

curt dont give us the nda bs either. just tell us whats going on without the cloak and dagger antics.

 

We don't need these kind of inflammatory remarks on the forums. Anyone that is upset that werejag has caused Curt to go silent, please "Report" his post to the moderators...

[raskar42]

not much let to discuss...

fb2p on hold

nothing new planned until next year

 

any other discussion is idle speculation

 

 

now if you'll excuse me me, i'm gonna go save mary

 

aparently someone blew up the damn

[+karri]

fb2p on hold

nothing new planned until next year

 

any other discussion is idle speculation

 

The discussion about fb2p and fb3 has made me look closer into other retro protables.

 

The Gameport looks very nice but it sounds expensive.

 

The heart of the system is a programmable gate array with 300k gates equivalent and 38k bytes of fast 8ns memory, which provides more than enough power to run synthesized version of all the 8 bit systems and some 16 bit ones. Without entering into technical details, this allows to run a very large number of logic process entierely in parallel

 

This unit might be used for running code even for the Atari Lynx in hardware.

 

We are commited to keep the GamePort open and also believe that having such a system in place provides an incentive for professional developers to make more content available.

 

This sounds like a nice platform for new development.

 

But just as FB3 or FB2P the Gameport is not available for me.

 

I would _love_ to see a new cheap retro-platform with a large user base for hobby development. But currently the Atari Lynx is the closest thing to what I want so I just continue to release code and hw for that platform.

 

--

Karri

[raskar42]

ok yes

i admit it

 

gameport looks really cool.

 

but most people on here will hate it for it's emulation.

[nathanallan]

ok yes

i admit it

 

gameport looks really cool.

 

but most people on here will hate it for it's emulation.

>sigh< yep, it'll be a love-hate relationship. It'll grow on me though.

[Draikar]

Curt, I know you can't talk about any of the information but im getting the bad feeling like everything is on hold permanently... Is this the end of Atari Flashback 3 and or Atari Flashback Portable ? From what you had said they look like very good systems. I'm a fan from the ideas you posted and hope you can post more if allowed latter on.

[Math You]

Y'know, I feel really bitter about this Gameport portable. I can't help thinking that someone there has been watching this forum and decided to cash in on the Flashback phenomenon.

 

The thing that really disappoints me though, is that they've forced Curt and Atari to keep quiet about new Atari products. This is a real shame, as discussing the new consoles was one of the best things about this forum.

[Asaki]

Is this the end of Atari Flashback 3 and or Atari Flashback Portable ?

 

He said to expect a release in the Spring, though he's incredibly vague about what release we'll be expecting. He said he'll have more info for us after New Years.

[n8littlefield]

Y'know, I feel really bitter about this Gameport portable. I can't help thinking that someone there has been watching this forum and decided to cash in on the Flashback phenomenon.

 

The thing that really disappoints me though, is that they've forced Curt and Atari to keep quiet about new Atari products. This is a real shame, as discussing the new consoles was one of the best things about this forum.

I'm indifferent on the Gameport portable thing. I don't realy know why someone would buy it over something like the GP32x which seems much more capable. Maybe once more is revealed I'll jump on board and be excited but for now even the mockup is ugly compared to other options out there for portable emulation. The portable FB2 had me very, very exited - the pricepoint and features were absolutely perfect for me (and for me to give as gifts). I'm not quite as sure on the FB3 as it seems to be based on a console I've never owned...

 

To me the big thing will be that the FB3 will be available at retail and be a polished, profession piece of equipment suitable for gift giving and will have some nice nods to the past. I'm expecting the Gameport to be only online, fairly ugly, and just something that screams hobbyist project.

 

And there's no "they" that forced Curt to keep quiet - it's werejag who attacked Curt for no reason whatsoever.

[+remowilliams]

I'm indifferent on the Gameport portable thing. I don't realy know why someone would buy it over something like the GP32x which seems much more capable.

The main reason would be that its an FPGA device. Emulation done in hardware > emulation in software. Theoretically anyway.

 

As far as the rest of the FBP2P/3 and Curt, it's a shame that he has to fall back to the 'no news' policy but as people should be able to see now, there's often a good reason to do so. Most people have no idea how hard it is to get a product from concept to market, and what an NDA means. Catching flack after putting in all the T&E and putting yourself out there, is not cool at all.

[Retro Rogue]

And there's no "they" that forced Curt to keep quiet - it's werejag who attacked Curt for no reason whatsoever.

 

 

I think he' was still sore from the shutdown of his FB2 replacement label thread.

[supercat]

The main reason would be that its an FPGA device. Emulation done in hardware > emulation in software. Theoretically anyway.

 

Suppose there are two 2600 games sitting side by side. One of them outputs 258 scan lines and shows an object that moves left to right one pixel per frame, but gets reset every 133 frames. The other outputs 266 scan lines and shows a similar object that is reset every 129 frames.

 

On both 2600's, the objects will repeat their motion every 2.18563868 seconds. On both systems the objects will move perfectly smoothly one pixel per frame, and yet the distance travelled each 2.18563868 seconds will be different because of the slightly-different frame rates.

 

It would not be possible to display those motions 100% smoothly on a frame rate that was fixed at 60fps. In emulation, either one game would have to drop while the other doubled-up frames, or else the two emulators would have to force the games to run at 60fps (which would mean the two games were no longer running at correct speed).

 

I don't really see any way to do 100% accurate emulation without low-level hardware support.

[Asaki]

I'm not quite as sure on the FB3 as it seems to be based on a console I've never owned...

 

Me neither, but the more I research the 5200/8-bits, the more excited I am. I actually got to play an 8-bit computer once, long long ago...don't remember much about it...I remember the carts were tiny. He had Cobra Triangle (or something very similar) on cart, and we also played a lot of BASIC (or maybe it was just a regular old word processing program)...but couldn't figure out how to make it do anything =)

[ijor]

Suppose there are two 2600 games sitting side by side. One of them outputs 258 scan lines and shows an object that moves left to right one pixel per frame, but gets reset every 133 frames. The other outputs 266 scan lines and shows a similar object that is reset every 129 frames.

...

I don't really see any way to do 100% accurate emulation without low-level hardware support.

 

 

I'm not sure understand your point. Are you talking about the problem of using an LCD display (which has a fixed refresh rate)? Or about the problems related to emulation under a PC running Windows/Linux?

 

The problems related to an LCD display are both relevant for emulation and hardware cloning (and even the original console). Unfortunately, we'll need to live with this limitation because seems sooner or later CRT displays won't be available anymore.