I received my first Atari ST in 1989 — a surplus 1040STFM from my father’s business, complete with the Professional software pack. Hooked up to a colour television, I was instantly captivated by the lime-green GEM desktop. I’d never used a mouse before, and it felt like a huge leap from the command-line, keyboard-driven world of the ZX Spectrum and the school BBC Micro.
What it is
Released in 1986, the 1040ST was the first home computer to break the US$1-per-kilobyte memory barrier, shipping with a full 1MB of RAM as standard. The STFM variant added an internal floppy drive, RF and composite video output for a TV instead of a dedicated monitor, and stereo sound over RCA jacks — which is exactly why it suited a bedroom setup so well.
Specifications
| Component | Details |
|---|---|
| CPU | Motorola 68000 @ 8MHz |
| RAM | 1MB |
| Graphics | Low: 320×200 (16 colours) / Medium: 640×200 (4 colours) / High: 640×400 (monochrome) |
| Sound | Yamaha YM2149 PSG (3-channel), stereo out via RCA |
| Storage | 3.5” floppy disk drive (720KB) |
| OS | Atari TOS with GEM desktop |
| Ports | MIDI In/Out, joystick/mouse, ACSI (hard drive), serial, parallel |
Discovering the games
After clicking through every bundled disk, I was only very slightly disappointed by how few games came with it. Fortunately a friend owned the more gaming-oriented Atari ST Power Pack, and before long I was borrowing disks and discovering just how strong the ST’s arcade conversions were: Afterburner, Black Lamp, Bomb Jack, Bombuzal, Double Dragon, Eliminator, Gauntlet II, Nebulus, OutRun, Overlander, Pac-Mania, Predator, R-Type, Space Harrier, Star Goose, Star Ray, Starglider, Super Hang-On, Super Huey, and Xenon.
I kept using the ST well into the 1990s, maintaining a subscription to ST Format magazine and watching it slowly shrink as the platform’s commercial influence waned. Eventually, like almost everyone else, I moved on to the PC — but those formative years with the ST never really left me. It was my first real computer, in the sense of one that encouraged exploring well beyond just the games.
