Acquisition pointing tracking (APT) is the precondition for communications in atmospheric laser communication system. CCD and quadrant detector (QD) which used in APT are deeply studied for their characteristics, and five kinds of turbulence effects such as beam wander, intensity fluctuations, dispersed spot, angle of arrival fluctuation and beam spreading for tracking precision and their mathematical models are discussed. Then, simulation results of turbulence effects under various conditions are analyzed. Both theoretical analysis and experimental results show that tracking error of shape center capturing algorithms is less than that of centroid localization algorithm which combines five kinds of turbulence effects.