Control chair

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

- Elizabeth Weir

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

Ancient uses
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 a thought. When this happens the chair glows, reclines, and the white hand panels light up, signifying the chair is ready for interfacing. No physical connection from the chair to the body is made.

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 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 seperate 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 alloted to the drone weapons if they were ever needed.

Aurora-class warships use a variation of the control chair, several in fact: one on the bridge for control systems such as flight and navigation, one near the rear of the vessel for control of drone weapons, and one somewhere in between to act as an auxiliary chair. The bridge chair may be able to control drones as well, but it has never been seen.

Gateships also possess a control chair which is used by the pilot for more advanced navigation and maneuvering, the firing of drone weapons, and calling up sensor readings via holographic heads-up display.

Ori uses


The control chairs in Ori battlecruisers contain no neural interface. Instead, the Priors' staff is the interface and it communicates 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, are made of small panels with buttons on them.

The platform containing the chair lies in the center of the bridge of the battle cruiser, 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 manuever in battle. While keyed to the Prior controlling the vessel, Daniel Jackson gave Samantha Carter the neccessary information to control the vessels.

The 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 battlecruisers, using their staffs to activate the weapons, though they may need to be on the platform to activate it.