Atari 1090 XL Expansion Cards
 

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Atari 1090 80 Column Video Card

(Atari 80CVC)

80 Column Video Card - Front

80 Column Video Card - Back

 

 

Atari 1090 80 Column Video Card.  One of the most sought after

features that all Atari Home computer users longed to have as a

standard feature of their systems.  The card is an Addressable card.

This means that it requires the selection dial (located in the left side)

to be set to a PBI Device ID # from 1 to 8.  This made sure that the

device would not conflict with other PBI devices and it would also set

its priorty.  The lower the ID# the higher the priority on the PBI system

Buss.  Of interesting note, if the board is installed and the 1090 XL is

powered on.  When the XL computer is booted, only the 80CVC will

work, the video output from the computer directly is shut off. Most likely

the ANTIC chip is turned off.  This could have a major benefit to users

looking for a speed boost from the XL's as turning off the ANTIC chip

increases the system speed.    A test/demo version of Atariwriter was

written.  It would be assumed that Atari, Inc. planned to update many of

its programs to take advantage of the 80 column card. One of the more

beneficial programs would of course be a wordprocessor running in full

80 columns.