New SYNERTEK C014806-03 Atari Sally CPU, DIP40, Atari, Apple IIe, C64 & Others.  30 day returns, Buyer pays for return shipping  More than 10 available / 28 sold on 04-02-23, only 5 left, 51 sold on 06-16-24, 53 sold on 08-18-24.  Current 27 day E-bay auction as of 08-18-24.  Buy it now for $26.98 with free shipping  It is very clear to Best Electronics, this E-Bay seller does not know what they are selling.  The Atari CO14806 chip is an Atari Custom made 6502 chip that has extra support chips built into this one of kind Atari custom chip.   It will only work in Atari made products that are design to accept this Atari custom CPU chip.  It will not work in any other products that requires a standard off the shelf 6502 CPU chip.

New Atari CO14806 custom CPU chip with normal 90 day Atari Warranty.  $8.00 plus Shipping

E-bay Atari chip auctions:

ATARI PokeyMAX Replacement Part for Atari Pokey - 100% Compatible.  More than 10 available / 22 sold.  Seller does not accept returns  Current 20 day E-Bay auction as of 06-02-24.  Buy it now for $140.04 plus $8.68 shipping from Germany  

Bests New Atari Custom made CO12294 Pokey Chip with normal 90 day Atari Warranty.  $30.00 plus Max. US shipping $10.40

Atari Pokey Chip – C012294-03.  2 available, 2 sold  Seller does not offer returns  Current 12 day E-Bay auction as of 05-26-24.  Buy it now for $85.00 plus $9.00 shipping 

Bests New Atari Custom made CO12294 Pokey Chip with normal 90 day Atari Warranty.  $30.00 plus Max. US shipping $10.40

Atari Floppy Controller VLSI 1772-02.  10 sold  Seller does not offer returns  Sold on E-Bay 04-28-24 for $30.00 plus $5.55 shipping

Cliff H. of the UK.   Cliff ordered some Atari 8 bit custom chips.  "Thank you for the Custom ICs, which arrived today.  They will also allow me to upgrade two of the machines to 130XE's - I'm looking forward to that project.  A pleasure doing business with you, as always!"

Atari TOS

6500 / 6800 / 68000 Series

The 68882 is the pin to pin hardware compatible drop in replacement for the 68881 (MC) but with a variety of Performance Enhancements / Circuitry that allows execution of multiple instructions in for more than 2X - 4X the floating point performance of the 68881. Older ST / Mega software that will access the 68881 MC may NOT access the 68882, check with your Software manufacture for the updated Rev. software that will access the 68882 MC.

Atari DISK CONTROLLERS

CUSTOM CHIPS, Other

Atari TRANSISTORS

MISCELLANEOUS I.C.'s

Atari CRYSTALS and Atari OSCILLATORS

Atari Ajax Floppy Disk Controller

(The little known Atari Custom made Smart Upgrade chip)

History

When Atari Japan was Designing / Engineering the First Generation Atari ST Computer (Atari 520ST Computer with external Power Supply and external Floppy Disk Drive) back in mid 1985 era, they based the first series Atari 16 bit computers on the Motorola 68000 16 bit 8Mhz CPU, it supporting chips like the Motorola Multi Function Peripheral  (MFP) chip, and Atari Custom made ST Memory Management Unit (MMU), Glue (code named because it holds the ST System together), DMA (Direct Memory Access) and Video Shifter chips.  In 1985 one of the State of the Art Floppy Disk Controller chips was the Western Digital WD1772 720K SSSD / DSDD Floppy Disk Controller chip.  This is the ST Floppy Disk controller chip Atari Japan Engineering decided to use in the first Atari 520ST computer and all other Atari ST Computers right up the early 68000 16Mhz Atari TT Business Computers.

The subsequent Atari designed 68000 16 bit 8Mhz 1040STF, 520STFM, 1040STE, Mega 1/2/4, MegaSTE 68000 16Mhz and later 68000 32Mhz second generation TT Computers all used the same WD1772 Floppy Disk Controller chip to drive the ST SSSD or DSDD Floppy internal Disk Drive circuits over many years.  As time marched on, Atari Engineering was asked by Atari Marketing to the upgrade the stock Atari Top line TT Business Computers 720K Internal Floppy disk drives to the Newer (for that era) 1.44 High Density (HD) Floppy standard.  

Atari Japan Engineering challenge was to upgrade existing Atari TT Computers to the HD 1.44 Floppy Mechs without major circuit changes to the TT motherboards or major chip changes to on the TT Motherboards.  What was finally decided, was to use hand selected / tested WD1772 chips and over clock them (run them at a faster chip clock speed 8Mhz to 16Mhz).  The WD1772 chips were not originally designed run at the faster 16Mhz internal clock speed, but thru testing, some were found be able to run at the fast clock speed required for HD 1.44 Floppy operation.   With some TT TOS Operating System upgrades (New version TT TOS), New 1.44 HD TT Floppy Disk mechs and the Hand selected / Tested WD1772 chips, Atari was able to upgrade all older / early 16Mhz Atari TT’s and Newer 32Mhz TT’s computers to the HD 1.44 Floppy Disk standard. 

Obsolete WD1772 Chip

Years down line when the newer Atari MegaSTE and Atari Falcon computers were being designed, the old WD1772 chips were becoming obsolete.  Most Disk Controller chips of that era, were lucky to have a normal useful product life / run of 1 to 2 years at most.  Atari had been using the WD1772 Floppy Disk Controller chip in ST computers close to 7+ years.  Western Digital had not made any new production runs of WD1772 Disk Controller chips in years and could not be convinced to make a new run of that old Disk Controller chip.  To support the older Atari ST computer line, Atari had the VLS Chip Company get a license from Western Digital and make a small new production run of the older standard WD1772 Disk Controller chip in a VLS labeled chip package for Atari. 

But the writing was on the wall.  Atari Engineering had to find a new ST Disk Drive Controller chip and do some ST Major chip set changes or whole new redesign on future Atari ST Computers in regards to the ST Floppy Circuit design.  What Atari Engineering came up with was a new custom made Upgraded / Smart Disk Controller chip which was backward and forward compatible on all older ST computers and fully compatible on Falcon computers and future ST computers.  That new smart chip is the Atari Ajax High Speed Floppy Disk Controller chip.  

Ajax Chip

The New Atari Custom made Ajax Disk Controller chip is 100% pin to pin fully backward compatible with the older WD1772 chip on all older ST and other Computer and devices that use the WD1772 Floppy Disk Controller chip.  It is also a Smart Disk Controller Chip that can auto sense the input chip Mhz Clock speed and auto switch into the Newer HD 1.44 Floppy Mode standard.  So a new state of the art Atari Ajax Disk Controller chip can be plugged into the first 1985 Atari 520ST computer made and drive the ST 720K SSSD / DSDD floppy internal or external Disk drive Mech.  The same exact Atari Ajax chip can be plugged into the Floppy Disk circuit on the last state of the art Atari ST computer made, the 1992 Falcon 030 68000 16Mhz Computer and drive the Falcon 1.44 HD Floppy Circuit without any hardware changes.

Atari MegaSTE and the Ajax Chip

The only exception to this Ajax Disk Controller chip upgradeability is the Atari MegaSTE Computer.  The Atari Ajax Disk Controller chip works fine in the normal 720K DSDD Floppy mode on the Atari MegaSTE.  But to upgrade a stock MegaSTE from 720K Floppy mode to the newer HD 1.44 mode, you have to change out the 720K Disk Drive Mech to a HD Floppy Mech., install an Atari Ajax chip, upgrade to the newer TOS 2.06 OS Chip set, flip on the #7 Dip switch on the MegaSTE motherboard and install a newer Atari MegaSTE HD Floppy C301901-002 custom PAL Chip.

But over the years Best Electronics has found that not all of the MegaSTE Computers made can be upgraded to the HD 1.44 internal Floppy Disk Drive successfully.   It seems there were a lot of Motherboard changes, updates and production line changes to the Atari MegaSTE motherboards over the production run.  Just open up a MegaSTE and inspect the bottom of the motherboard.  You will see all kinds of changes, wire jumps and upgrades to the bottom of the MegaSTE motherboard.   It seems that no two MegaSTE motherboards look like on the bottom side in regards to the production line changes / upgrades installed.   Besides the MegaSTE motherboard differences, the MegaSTE HD floppy circuit has a problem with RF Interference from the Internal MegaSTE Power supply which causes HD read write Floppy errors.  Best Electronics have installed MegaSTE HD Floppy kits into one MegaSTE and have it work fine.  Install the same MegaSTE HD Floppy Upgrade kit into a second MegaSTE and cannot get the same kit work at all or get flakey HD Disk Drive results.  To Best it seems the Atari MegaSTE computers were designed to be upgraded to a HD Floppy Disk Drive but never fully tested for proper HD Floppy Disk Drive operation during MegaSTE production line assembly process. 

But on the older 520ST / 1040STF / 520STFM / Mega ST 1/2/4 Computers because of the fixed ST Chip set Mhz clocking and older versions of ST TOS without the HD Floppy Disk Drive coding, these ST computers can not be easily upgraded (just plug in an Ajax chip) to the HD Disk Drive standard without major rework.  Now an older ST Computer upgraded with a Wizztronics TOS 2.06 TOS upgrade board or Atari 1040STE computer upgraded to TOS 2.06 might be able to be upgraded to a HD Floppy Disk Drive by a good Atari tech. 

Toward the end of the ST / MegaSTE / TT computer new production, the Ajax chip was almost 100% used as the Atari Floppy Disk Controller chip.   So if you have a late / last produced Atari ST Computer, you might check your motherboard to see if you have the state of the Art, Atari Ajax Disk Controller chip installed.

Best Electronics has a good supply of the new Atari C302096 / C302434 (two different manufactures) Ajax upgrade chips in stock.  Cost is $40.   To introduce this upgraded Atari Disk Controller chip, we have put them on sale.  Sale price is $29.95

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