ThumpNugget

...the original question was not about the first computer but the first "traditional" computer as we think of it such as the Apple II and TRS-80 with a keyboard, BASIC, and television output. If we go to first "home" computer then Intel had made a computer very similar to the Altair two years prior. I liked the Sphere for the prize because they put it all together in one package including BASIC on an eprom so that the computer would boot right into BASIC with no waiting and no terminal required. They just ended up not doing it very well

Looking at an October 1975 BYTE magazine I saw only two machines being advertised: The Altair and the Sphere. The Sphere was supposed to have BASIC, a keyboard, and a display. There is a Wikipedia article on it: Spere 1. It looks like about 1,300 were built with half of them being sold as complete systems (not in KIT form).. There was also an article in the Oct 1975 BYTE and a 2006 followup about the Sphere: http://www.swtpc.com/mholley/BYTE/Oct1975/are_they_real.htm The guy who built it is still in business: http://www.a-systems.net/company.htm

I ended up only making a few of these.. I think I sent three out. Looking at what DVD sets I have sitting here: three softsides, eight Atari Force, four "Atari Books", and three STart magazines.. Life is really busy right now, when I get a few extra minutes I'll put up a post if anyone wants any of them.

I was curious. Thumpnugget has answered my question and provided the 'missing' Antics. I have the STarts involved. I don't believe there were many STarts without Antic in them. I only have September '89 that doesn't have Antic in it. The next STart I have is October '90, so there is a big gap I don't have of the STarts, between 9/89 and 10/90. Separate Antic was still being published 9/89. Thanks. The last six issues had STart had Antic. Here is the complete run of STart: Issue Date Num Pages Vol 1 No. 01 1986-06 1 92 Vol 1 No. 02 1986-08 2 124 Vol 1 No. 03 1986-11 3 140 Vol 1 No. 04 1987-03 4 124 Vol 2 No. 01 1987-06 5 108 Vol 2 No. 02 1987-09 6 102 Vol 2 No. 03 1987-11 7 100 Vol 2 No. 04 1988-02 8 100 Vol 2 No. 05 1988-04 9 100 Vol 2 No. 06 1988-05 10 112 Vol 2 No. 07 1988-06 11 116 Vol 3 No. 01 1988-07 12 100 Vol 3 No. 02 1988-09 13 84 Vol 3 No. 03 1988-10 14 100 Vol 3 No. 04 1988-11 15 108 Vol 3 No. 05 1988-12 16 108 Vol 3 No. 06 1989-01 17 100 Vol 3 No. 07 1989-02 18 90 Vol 3 No. 08 1989-03 19 100 Vol 3 No. 09 1989-04 20 100 Vol 3 No. 10 1989-05 21 100 Vol 3 No. 11 1989-06 22 100 Vol 3 No. 12 1989-07 23 100 Vol 4 No. 01 1989-08 24 100 Vol 4 No. 02 1989-09 25 100 Vol 4 No. 03 1989-10 26 100 Vol 4 No. 04 1989-11 27 100 Vol 4 No. 05 1989-12 28 100 Vol 4 No. 06 1990-01 29 108 Vol 4 No. 07 1990-02 30 100 Vol 4 No. 08 1990-03 31 100 Vol 4 No. 09 1990-04 32 100 Vol 4 No. 10 1990-05 33 100 Vol 4 No. 11 1990-06 34 100 Vol 4 No. 12 1990-07 35 92 Vol 5 No. 01 1990-08 36 84 Vol 5 No. 02 1990-10 37 124 Vol 5 No. 03 1990-11 38 124 Vol 5 No. 04 1990-12 39 116 Vol 5 No. 05 1991-01 40 108 Vol 5 No. 06 1991-03 41 100 Vol 5 No. 07 1991-04 42 100

Greetings! I have been gone for a while and then have not been active since I got back.. Seems like forever Some time back I redid the Antics (removed page bleed, bookmarked each issue, etc) and also added in the missing Antics that were in the STart magazines. I've never gotten around to making a torrent for the new set, I need to do that Anyway here are the STart Antics that are not in the original Antic torrent: Antic 89 Antic 90 Antic 91 Antic 92 Antic 93 Antic 94

I am anxious to see what books you have to add... Ahh! I found the book that is missing! "Atari for Beginning Beginners" is not in the list but in the tombstones and I have the PDF in my books directory. I don't know how I missed that...

Well crap I missed one.. Best of Softside is not in the tombstones but it is in the list.. I have 96 books in my directory. I wonder what book is in the tombstones but not in list.. ga! I will have to check when I get home.

Someone should really get that reactor cassette and get a .CAS file made, it is not in the AtariMania database. It would be a shame to loose an AIM masterpiece.

Thanks for sticking the torrent up Retrobits! It was a great idea to put both books sets together and have one giant list of books and let people select which ones they want and allow new people to get the full set. Not to quibble but it is 96 books (the Best of SoftSide is missing in the list) I know there are a couple of other books missing that I did not get into the torrent. I ran out of time for now and just had to stop. Also my paper cutter is now dead and waiting for a new blade (Some of Allan's books proved too much for it.. It did last for over 100,000 pages so not too shabby!) Anyway I wanted to thank everyone for the books, including the ones that did not get into the torrent this time around. This felt much more like a community effort which was awesome (and like Christmas getting all those books in the mail and on the FTP server heh!) I'll start on the next round when I get back home in mid June

Hey Shawn.. I absolutely want to scan them! Sorry I have not been keeping up with things lately. I'll send you a PM as soon as I get done with this post.

Hey there.. Analog computing was sold to LFP and went through a hiatus of about six months where no magazines were produced... Analog magazine also went out for six months from Oct-87 to Apr-88, here is the entry from my collection tracking of Analog: 50 Jan-87 Yes-S Fair 104 Cover is off 51 Feb-87 Yes-S Very Good 104 2 52 Mar-87 Yes-S Very Good 104 2 53 Apr-87 Yes-S Very Good 104 54 May-87 Yes-S Very Good 96 2 55 Jun-87 Yes-S Very Good 96 2 56 Jul-87 Yes-S Very Good 96 2 57 Sep-87 Yes-S Very Good 96 2 58 Oct-87 Yes-S Disk Very Good 96 Cover coming off 2nd copy 59 Apr-88 Yes-S Disk Very Good 96 Six months of no magazines? 60 May-88 Yes-S Disk Excellent 98 61 Jun-88 Yes-S Disk Very Good 98 62 Jul-88 Yes-S Disk Very Good 98 If you look at atarimagazines.com you notice they only carry issue #18 and up of ST-LOG. Most likely they could not get permission for the first 17 issues as it was under different ownership (I don't know if that is the case but seems logical).

You're only SIX issues of ST-LOG from a complete collection? Which ones are you missing? Maybe I will see them on Ebay or something and contribute? Thanks! Here is what I have for ST-LOG: ST Log Issue Date Have? Scan? Condition Pages 36 Issues, 6 missing 1 Apr-86 Yes Yes Very Good Exists as Insert Inside of ANALOG 2 May-86 Yes Yes Very Good Exists as Insert Inside of ANALOG 3 Jun-86 Yes Yes Very Good Exists as Insert Inside of ANALOG 4 Jul-86 Yes Yes Very Good Exists as Insert Inside of ANALOG 5 Aug-86 Yes Yes Very Good Exists as Insert Inside of ANALOG 6 Sep-86 Yes Yes Very Good Exists as Insert Inside of ANALOG 7 Oct-86 Yes Yes Very Good Exists as Insert Inside of ANALOG 8 Nov-86 Yes Yes Very Good Exists as Insert Inside of ANALOG 9 Dec-86 Yes Yes Very Good Exists as Insert Inside of ANALOG 10 Jan-87 Yes Very Good 82 11 Feb-87 Yes Very Good 82 slight water damage to back side 12 Mar-87 Yes Very Good 82 13 14 15 16 17 18 Apr-88 Yes Very Good 96 19 May-88 Yes Very Good 82 20 21 Jul-88 Yes Very Good 98 Some Water Damage *label* 22 Aug-88 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 23 Sep-88 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 24 Oct-88 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 25 Nov-88 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 26 Dec-88 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 27 Jan-89 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 28 Feb-89 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 29 Mar-89 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 30 Apr-89 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 31 May-89 Yes Very Good 98 *label* 33 Jun-89 Yes Very Good 98 There was *no* issue #32 34 Jul-89 Yes Very Good 98 35 Aug-89 Yes Very Good 98 35b Sep-89 Yes Very Good 98 No Issue number given 36 Oct-89 Yes Very Good 98 Last Issue *label* so.. Missing 13, 14, 15, 16 17, and 20..

Thank you very much for the sentiment. I really hope that someday all of the written material (at least all of it that can be saved) for these machines will be at my fingertips in a nice easy to browse format. I imagine some archive in the future labeled "The complete Atari" or something similar with everything that is digatizable there.. On the ST-LOG question: I don't actively collect the ST magazines so unless a really good deal pops up in my face or they are part of another lot I purchased I don't get them. Having said that I was able to get all the STarts obviously - I am only missing six ST-LOGs so I imagine in the next year or so I will complete the collection and promptly chop them up . I've mentioned this before but nobody with ST-LOGs has wanted to part with their mags which I can certainly understand. I also have 60 of the ST formats (or is it ST User? one of those two) which I was not even trying to collect so who knows what will be completed. One thing you mentioned - about completing the "big 4" I actually think some others are also very important to complete.. Namely Atari Connection, Atari Explorer, the big U.K. Mags Page 6, Atari User, and Monitor.. and then the really big one size wise: Current Notes. This mag I think was mostly in the Northeast United States (or at least the vast majority) - I have no idea how many issues they put out. I have 95 of them and am still missing a lot. There should also be a set for catalogs/pamphlets - this would have all the APX catalogs, all the separate Atari catalogs they put out for the computers and peripherals and software, etc. One more set for straight technical documentation and manuals which would include of course the official technical documentation, field service manuals, some of the SAMS guides, source code listings for the OS, DOS, the manuals for each piece of hardware and programming languages. Then probably the most important one (to me anyway) and the most time critical as we are probably losing some of them forever everyday: The user group newsletters. There were thousands of different newsletters from 1980 to the mid 90's I think I have at best 100-200 of these. This might be a case where the best method would be website to start collecting and organizing these - They have the advantage that they are usually stapled together so they can be scanned without destroying them, they are small so people with nothing but flatbed scanners could scan them and upload them, and there are no copyright issues. I used to have the BUG (Atari Boise User Group) newsletters - What I would not give to get those back! There is a real sense of the community from the newsletters and a feel for how it was "back in the day". There are also several other magazines where I only have a few issues (Atari Interface, Atari World, etc) Though one that REALLY bugs me is the American AtariUser magazine - I have all of these but two, they are even scanned. I only know of two other people that have the two missing issues I am missing and I can't get them to cough them up :-/ Ga! So frustrating.

Gaa! You are right I left off the FTP site! So there are three books: Hackerbook: Unfortunatly this one has already been done. Best of Softside Atari Edition: I was going to put this on the SoftSide DVD (still going to) but I didn't realize it was an Atari only edition so it belongs in the books list for sure.. Needs some cleaup though Graphics and Animation on the Atari: New one here! This looks like it was created on a flatbed scanner and in a way as to not destroy the book.. It will take a bit of editing but we should be able to get a good PDF file. So we go from 38 to 40 books..

OK, just finishing these up.. Here is what is in the second set: ABCs of Atari Computers Atari 130XE Machine Language for the Absolute Beginner Atari Assembly Language Programmers Guide Atari BASIC Faster and Better Atari BASIC Tutorial Atari for Kids from 8 to 80 Atari for the Beginning Beginner Atari Player-Missile Graphics Atari Software Protection Techniques Basic Atari BASIC Computers for Kids Atari Edition Computes Atari Collection Vol 1 Computes Atari Collection Vol 2 Computes First Book of Atari Games De Re Atari Designs from your Mind with Atari Graphics Dr C. Wacko Presents Atari BASIC Games for your Atari Computer Hackerbook for your Atari Computer Home Applications and Games for the Atari Kids and the Atari Master Memory Map Mostly BASIC Applications for your Atari Book 1 Mostly BASIC Applications for your Atari Book 2 SpeedScript Stimulating Simulations The Atari Playground The Best of Antic Anthology The Book of Atari Software 1983 The Master Memory Map The User's Guide to Atari 400 800 Computers The Musical Atari The Visicalc Book Atari Edition Things to do with your Atari Computer Time Lost - A Computer Adventure Tricky Tutorials #7 Disk Utilities Your Atari Computer Comes Alive Your Atari Computer XL Edition And the covers: 38 Books.. (8000 pages, 2.1 Gigs) 24 of them came from Allan, 6 of them came from Retrobits.. So thanks to those guys! I have some extra stuff to ship you (books are already on the way) I'll be sending them Saturday.. Anyway.. This looks to be it unless anyone has any last minute books they would like to add....

Quick update: I've scanned what was left of my books and have finished scanning retrobits books (Thanks much to retrobits! They are on their way back to you now). Allans books have been mailed so I'm expecting them any day and I have two others books coming in the mail (Your Atari Computer XL Edition and a De Re Atari since I lost mine and can't find the scan I made). There is also a few books on my FTP server people have sent that I plan on going through tonight... As soon as Allan's books are scanned I plan on starting a new thread ad witht he new list and see if we can get a few more stragglers. Point being that the books that have been posted and talked about is all their is so if you have any books that have not been discussed and you would like to get them scanned and into the next torrent please get in touch. Thanks!

You may want to read this thread on GCP: http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/132176-games-computers-play-inc-multiplayer-onlinegame/page__p__1631926__hl__GCP__fromsearch__1#entry1631926 I meant to follow up with this but never got around to it.. I have the email addresses for the two gentlemen that did all the programming and started the company if you are interested.. Very happy that someone is putting some effort into this! GCP certainly seems to be one of those "before its time" ideas. I'm looking forward to reading the fruits of your work Now if we can get someone to do a detailed artcile on PC Pursuit and some of the other old modem stuff like the WWIV network (do the messages stillexist?) I would be so happy.

Ha! You are the second Boise person I've come across here (third from Idaho)

PMs Sent!

I was not even aware they made a second edition.. I ended up with five of these while collecting the books and none of them were the XL edition. I take it they are fairly uncommon in comparison.

I stopped being lazy and printed one up to see how it looks.. A tad plain but OK (the case is scratched so the pics look a little dull): Front Back Inside with disc: Side:

Superb! That is at least another 25 books with the few I have remaining that were not included.. Sounds like a second torrent instead sticking them up one by one Talking with Allan.. I'd like to try and have the next torrent before I go on vacation (May 22). If anyone has books that have not been included now would be a good time to cough them up! Just looking for third party books - no manuals or Atari technical docs or catalogs. It would be excellent if we could hit 100 books

Very Sweet! I've only been aware of two of those before and have never come across any of them..

Hi there This is how the STart PDF disks looked: http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/153475-start-magazine-in-pdf-format/page__view__findpost__p__1904677 ThumpNugget First, thanks once again for putting al these books together and scanned them. I see some titles that should have been in your collection: De Re Atari Master Memory Map Kids & the Atari De Re is still for sale at some Atari online retailers...Is there any reason in particular for those titles not being available? Thanks again for the hard work, I'll put an order for the DVD soon... Regards I have De Re Atari scanned, just forgot to put it in the torrent... I have a "Kids & the Atari" on the way so that should be scanned soon. Unfortunately I don't have the "Master Memory map" - you guys keep outbidding me in the auctions! I do have several other books (ABCs of Atari, Tricky Tutorials 7, etc) that I found when I was hunting my bottom shelf for a DVD case to send out a burned copy a few days ago. I plan on putting these on my site and putting a link to them to directly download from this thread.. I'll also be bugging Allan today to see what goodies he has The mapping the Atari Revised Edition is in the torrent..

Hey there. There is artwork in the same format as was done for the STart PDF disks (half thick DVD cover, double sided cover). Fairly simple stuff.. The front cover is based on the computes first book (just a title change and I splattered the Atari Symbol to give it a nicer feel), the back cover has the usual text explanation of what the DVD contains with the professor from the Tricky Tutorials reading a "Mapping the Atari" PDF on an Atari 800 and 810 disk drive. The inside cover is just a lightened collage of all the book covers and then the disk is similar to the main cover only using computes second book colors instead of the first compute book colors...