Atari's ST-compatible machines, launched at the Atari Messe in Dusseldorf in Germany, are to be displayed at the PC Show, held from the 27th of September to the 1st of October, ST Format can reveal.
The Atari Village is to have special booths where demonstrations of the new machines will take place. The STE, at £499, is to replace the existing 1040 - and is seen by Atari as its top-end games machine. The upgraded ST offers a 4096-colour palette (however the graphics resolutions and total number of colours on screen remains the same), stereo 8-bit DMA sound chip which plays sampled music at preset frequencies, horizontal and vertical hardware scrolling, and two new game controller ports. The new game ports mean the STE can have a total of six joysticks attached at any time. Other input devices like a light gun, light pen and paddles can also be attached.
Atari has no immediate plans to launch a 512K version of the STE, but rumours suggest that a half megabyte model might appear next year.
Meanwhile, the TT is Atari's performance machine, boasting a 68030 processor clocked at 16MHz (with room for an optional 68881 or 68882 maths co-processor), 2Mbytes of memory expand- able to 8Mbytes, a 30Mbyte hard drive and a high resolution colour monitor. And all for under £2000.
In addition to the two new ST compatible machines, Atari is expected to show the long-awaited Stacy laptop ST. While four models are planned, only two - the low end and high end versions - will be available in the UK.
For the first three days the PC Show is open only to trade and business visitors, while the remaining days it's open to everyone. Opening hours from Wednesday through to Saturday are loam to 6.30pm and from loam to 5pm on Sunday. The venue is Earl's Court in London.