4-bit-Atari 2600
8-bit-NES
16-bit-SNES/Genesis
32-bit-Playstation 1
64-bit-Nintendo 64
128-bit-Dreamcast

Why did you post the topic as a question only to answer it in your own post? Why did you post this info at all? Has someone asked before? Sorry for all the questions. I'm just a bit confused here, that's all.

Bits measure the amount of information a CPU can handle at once I believe. There's much more to it than that, but I'm not going to go into that kind of detail. Mainly because I can't.

They are also multiplied by the power of 2, thus why it goes 2,4,8,16,32,64,128,256,512,1024--> which is 1gigaBIT which is smaller then a 1gigaBYTE as bytes are in the power of 8 due in part of 1 byte being 8 bits. So, when you get that new iPod and it says it is 80gigaBITS, it doesn't show its true about when you hook it up to a modern computer that shows everything(mostly) in bytes. I love when they do that.

The Atari 2600 was 8-bit, but then I think I went on about that enough in various comments threads for the news items!

Assuming there is a question here, the bits refer to the largest "word length" that the CPU of the system in question could process at any given time, hence the 4-bit entry making no sense, since as far as I'm aware the smallest word on a digital computer is 8-bits long (or 1-byte).

If I remember correctly from my machine language class, the first X bits in the word (called the opcode) tell it what operation to perform (X depends on the number of operations the machine can perform) and the rest of the word tells it what registers to perform the operation on. So while it might be possible for a machine to have a 4-bit word length, it would be so severely limited in the number and complexity of operations it could perform that it would be useless for any type of computing tasks.

Saturn should be in the 32-bit section... I like how you leave MasterSystem out of your 8-bit list as well OP.

Atari Jaguar was 64-bit...

Atari Jaguar was 64-bit...

Loosely speaking...

In a last ditch effort to rescue the Jaguar, Atari Corp. tried to play down the other two consoles by proclaiming the Jaguar was the only "64-bit" system. This claim is questioned by some[9], because the CPU (68000) and GPU executed a 32-bit instruction-set, but sent control signals to the 64-bit graphics co-processors (or "graphics accelerators"). Atari Corp.'s position was that the mere presence of 64-bit ALUs for graphics was sufficient to validate the claim.

The OP also neglected to mention the TurboGraphix, but I think it's pretty obvious that he was only concerned with listing the quote "popular" systems of each bit number.

@Corb

well, most speech about that console is loose anyway....More people remember the R-Zone than the Jag

Btw, if you remember the R-Zone...I'm sorry. Didn't mean to bring that memory back.

Thanks for bringing the R-Zone back to mind. And I still have my Jaguar and CD attachment in the closet here. I just remember the great debate, 32 or 64-bit. In reality, who cares. It bombed.

I still have a Jaguar (with CD attachment) hooked up in the living room, but I've never even HEARD of this "R-Zone" thing. Unless you're actually talking about what Toys R Us called their gaming area for a while, which I sincerely doubt.

The R-Zone was a handheld gaming system produced by Tiger Electronics. It was garbage. I should know, I tired one out.

I wiki'd it. You should to, that thing screams Virtual Boy wanna be.

Here's a pic of the R-Zone. I cringe just looking at it.

Oh, that's the XPG. Corbie, that's the good version. Look and cringe at this one and there's another I can't find right now.

Edit- Fixed some BB Code.

R-Zone Superscreen. So hilarious--look at your pre-animated lcd stills ON DA SUPERRSCRIIN!!!

Holy crap, that looks HORRIBLE! Then again, it IS from Tiger! Never did like that company or ANYTHING they made.

Oh, but as bad as that is you look like more of a dork playing the Virtual Boy.