Mega STE
The Mega STE was released in 1991 and was designed to replace the aging Mega ST design. The enhancements found in this machine were mostly a mixture of features from the standard STE (from a software compatibility perspective) and the TT (from a hardware and design perspective).
Features
- Software switchable 68000 CPU speed between 16Mhz and 8Mhz, and switchable cache, for both performance and compatibility
- All STE features, including
- 4096 colour palette, 16 colours on screen
- 8-bit DMA Stero sound, output through RCA connectors
- 30-pin SIMM slots for easily upgradable RAM
- Genlock support.
- A much improved version of TOS, with versions from 2.0, 2.05 and 2.06 available in it's lifetime.
- TT style case with detachable keyboard and base which also acted as a monitor stand.
- Support for a 1.44Mb floppy drive, which was added to later models as standard.
- Internal SCSI hard drive support.
- Appletalk compatible network port.
- A VMEbus slot.
Models
There were three models available with 1Mb, 2Mb and 4MB RAM. The 1MB model lacked the high resolution mono monitor and built in SCSI hard drive.
Impact
- Insert information here, how much faster could it be than a normal STE, software made for it. Not a commercial success really? Anounced too close to Falcon, not cheap enough compared to Falcon
Programming Information
- Link to articles on how to switch CPU speeds with your program, Hardware registers etc
Magazine References
- ST Format, issue 38, p64-67