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Atari 7800

The Atari 7800 (a.k.a. ProSystem) is a home videogame console developed by Atari. It was released in 1986. It is the successor to both the Atari 2600 and 5200.

It was capable of running Atari 2600 games, making it the first backwards compatible home console.

In an attempt to curb the flood of low-quality games that caused the NA videogame crash previously, the cartridges had to be digitally signed by Atari to function on the console.

This system scrapes metadata for the “atari7800” group and loads the atari7800 set from the currently selected theme, if available.

Quick reference

BIOS

BIOS files are optional.

MD5 checksum Share file path Description
bios/7800 BIOS (U).rom

ROMs

Place your Atari 7800 ROMs in /userdata/roms/atari7800.

Emulators

RetroArch

RetroArch (formerly SSNES), is a ubiquitous frontend that can run multiple “cores”, which are essentially the emulators themselves. The most common cores use the libretro API, so that's why cores run in RetroArch in Batocera are referred to as “libretro: (core name)”. RetroArch aims to unify the feature set of all libretro cores and offer a universal, familiar interface independent of platform.

RetroArch configuration

RetroArch offers a Quick Menu accessed by pressing [HOTKEY] + South button (B SNES) which can be used to alter various things like RetroArch and core options, and controller mapping. Most RetroArch related settings can be altered from Batocera's EmulationStation.

Standardized features available to all libretro cores: atari7800.videomode, atari7800.ratio, atari7800.smooth, atari7800.shaders, atari7800.pixel_perfect, atari7800.decoration, atari7800.game_translation

ES setting name batocera.conf_key Description ⇒ ES option key_value
Settings that apply to all cores of this emulator
GRAPHICS API atari7800.gfxbackend Choose which graphics API library to use. Vulkan is better, when supported.
⇒ OpenGL opengl, Vulkan vulkan.
AUDIO LATENCY atari7800.audio_latency In milliseconds. Can reduce crackling/cutting out.
⇒ 256 256, 192 192, 128 128, 64 64, 32 32, 16 16, 8 8.
THREADED VIDEO atari7800.video_threaded Improves performance at the cost of latency and more video stuttering.
⇒ On true, Off false.

libretro: ProSystem

A libretro port of ProSystem, an Atari 7800 emulator.

libretro: ProSystem configuration

Controls

Here are the default Atari 7800's controls shown on a Batocera Retropad:

Troubleshooting

Further troubleshooting

For further troubleshooting, refer to the generic support pages.

  • systems/atari7800.txt
  • Last modified: 16 months ago
  • by atari