Control chair

"The second I shut my eyes, I could see. I felt power I've never had before."

- Carson Beckett

Control chairs are chairs created by the Alterans for the purpose of activating and controlling their most vital systems.

Ancient uses
"This chair controls the most powerful weapons known to humankind. I'm afraid of the thing."

- Elizabeth Weir

When a person with the ATA gene stands on the platform, the platform and base of the chair glows. Once a person sits down, the chair can be activated with thought. When this happens the chair glows, reclines, and the white hand panels light up, signifying the chair is ready for interfacing. The ease of use of the chair depends on the user's Chair Interface Aptitude (or CIA), a ranking system used by the Atlantis Expedition. Although afraid to sit in the chair at first, years of using the Ancient systems via his natural ATA gene have made Carson Beckett the second highest ranked person on the CIA list of the Expedition, second only to John Sheppard.

The Ancients used control chairs to interface with key systems in their ships and some of their outposts, such as drone weapons and the holographic star map system. Control chairs can manage systems ranging from power distribution to sensors, depending on the desired function. The chair will only respond to those who possess the ATA gene, both to initialize the chair and maintain continued use. They also require massive amounts of power to even initialize (possibly as a safety measure to prevent drones from firing with too little power, though it probably does not actually use that power unless actually firing the drones), typically provided by a Zero Point Module, though some limited success with an advanced Naquadah Generator has been able to activate the chair and launch a small amount of drones a very limited number of times.

The Ancients also used the control chairs to control the flight of city-ships. While a vital system, the control chair of Atlantis is not located in the control tower, but in a separate location entirely; one city-ship had its control chair located in the central tower itself in place of a Stargate. The Asurans were able to activate Atlantis' drone weapons and flight subroutines without using the chair, as their nanites are able to infiltrate the system and create a neural link without the need for neural interface; the Tau'ri require the use of the chair to activate the flight subroutines. The control chair has also been used to improve the power distribution of the single ZPM powering Atlantis at the time, which was incredibly useful as it meant more power would be available for systems such as the shield and the stardrive. It also allowed for more power to be allotted to the drone weapons if they were ever needed.

As well as interpreting mental commands, control chairs also appear to be capable of interpreting data in the user's mind to perform a precise function. For example, the Time-Jumper would activate when the user pictured a specific date in his mind, and the control chairs on Aurora-class warships could activate the ship's hyperdrive when the user either willed the ship to either a specific set of coordinates after searching the ship's database or pictured the destination. If the user pictured a destination then it is possible that the destination imagined by the user is used as parameters to search the ship's entire database, and advanced star mapping technology combined with planetological data would determine the desired location. The user's mind can also adjust the ship's targeting computers, identifying ships as either friendly or hostile and altering that designation if necessary.

It has been implied that the chair also relays sensor data back into the user's mind, as when Jack O'Neill destroyed Anubis' fleet with his eyes closed and no screen or holographic display visible. Also Carson Beckett knew when he had shut off the rogue drone when there were no displays.

Aurora-class warships use a variation of the control chair, several in fact: one near the rear of the vessel for control of drone weapons, one somewhere in the centre to act as an auxiliary chair, and some designs feature one on the bridge to control navigation and power the inertial dampeners. The bridge chair also may be capable of controlling the ship's drones as well, but it has never been seen and it should also be noted that the handful of times an Aurora-class ship was seen firing drones was from either the weapons control chair or a control console on the ship's bridge just a few feet away from the control chair. Gateships also possess a control panel with a neural interface which is used by the pilot for more advanced navigation and maneuvering, firing drone weapons, and calling up sensor readings via holographic heads-up display.

The chair on Earth was destroyed when two Wraith Darts flew themselves into Area 51; it is unknown if the ZPM powering the Antarctic outpost was moved with the chair.

Ori uses
The control chairs in Ori motherships also contain a neural interface (as used by Daniel), but can also be controlled using the staff of the ship's Prior as the link with the ship. The back of the chair is formed in the symbol of Origin, though this appears to be purely cosmetic. The arm rests, however, feature small panels with buttons on them.

The platform containing the chair lies in the center of the bridge of the mothership, and there are no other crew stations present. A small window is placed before the control chair, allowing the Prior controlling the vessel to target enemy vessels and maneuver in battle. While keyed to the Prior controlling the vessel, Daniel Jackson gave Samantha Carter the necessary information to control the vessels.

Ori control chairs are also needed to align vessels into position. The Prior controlling the vessel does not need to be in the chair to activate the primary weapon on the mothership, using their staffs to activate the weapons, though they may need to at least be on the platform to do this.