Looking Forward to Touch, A Technology of the Past

You would think, with all the hubbub and spin coming from the Microsoft ad department, that ‘touch screen technology’ was something cooked up in the last few months in the halls of Redmond.

Like everything else, it seems, what is old is new again.

Internet site Technologizer shows us that the idea of controlling a computer by means of a touch screen is not new at all, but an older technology revisited.

It’s not multi-touch. Hey, it’s not even single touch by modern standards. But the Atari Touch Tablet that Vintage Computing and Gaming’s Benj Edwards recently bought was still in its original, unopened packaging. And so Benj took the opportunity to do a new unboxing of a really old gadget–and we’re delighted to publish it here.

The next time you use your shiny new Wacom tablet and Adobe Photoshop CS4, think back to a time before time–a time before blends, morphs, heal brushes, and 10-megapixel images.  A time like 1984, which, for computer graphics, was darker than the Dark Ages. It was a time when you could buy an $89.95 Atari CX77 Touch Tablet for your Atari 8-bit home computer.  Luckily, I bought mine for considerably less last year, although it was still in new, unopened condition.  Safely sequestered in the official Vintage Computing and Gaming computer lab, I recently began the task of unpacking the antique peripheral and documenting the process.  Here’s an account of the experience.

Here it is, folks: a brand-new Atari CX77 Touch Tablet in the original box.  OK, so the box is scuffed up a bit.  But as you’ll soon see, its contents are about as un-scuffed as you can get.

Take One Tablet

The back side of the Touch Tablet box is easily twice as entertaining as the front.  The ergonomic workplace setup depicted here reduces fatigue and promotes long term musculoskeletal health. Maybe.

there are a few pictures that I’ve omitted, for those wanting to see the entire article is is here

Hooking it Up

Without further ado, I plugged the tablet into my Atari 130XE computer.  Seen here on the screen is a menu from my 8MBit Flash Multi-Cart from AtariMax.  That cartridge is quite possibly the greatest Atari accessory you could ever buy (if you get one, tell them I sent you).

Reflections of AtariArtist

Plugging in the included cartridge, I was presented with the main menu of the AtariArtist illustration software.  To make more room for the tablet, I pushed my 130XE to the side.  Luckily, it didn’t fall over until after I finished taking photos.

The point of this is to remind those who, once again, are ogling the pictures from CES and thinking that it is somehow a new thought or design, it is not.

It is a refinement of something from long ago. Also, there were touch screens before the time of the Atari shown above. Wyse was making touch screens that were monochrome green (and amber) back before Microsoft was a name that many knew, and many touch screens are in use already at ATM machines across the country.

Cool, possibly (once the fingerprint and gunk build up is taken care of), new, hardly. (Another thing to remember is that Apple has this already on a phone, which is a computer, so it’s been done, with modern touches, again before Microsoft.)

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