Old pictures of our Atari 8-bit setups

[joeventura]

I was very fortunate,  I had a Atari 800, ATR8000, Drives, two 810s (1 had a Happy enhancement) and a 520ST (monitor in pic but CPU was out for repair as I recall)

[Max_Chatsworth]

3 minutes ago, joeventura said:

I was very fortunate,  I had a Atari 800, ATR8000, Drives, two 810s (1 had a Happy enhancement) and a 520ST (monitor in pic but CPU was out for repair as I recall)

Very cool!

 

How old were you when you had this setup and was it yours or your dad's?

[joeventura]

15 minutes ago, Max_Chatsworth said:

Very cool!

 

How old were you when you had this setup and was it yours or your dad's?

This was mine.

 

I started at age 17 (1980) my first Atari 800 and 810 were $1200 (BOING!) 

This pic was taken in 1985, I had the first 520ST on the east coast I worked for an electronics distributor and we were the exclusive Atari distributor that year so I got a monochrome unit with loose CPU chips and no software.

It was useless for a month.

[Max_Chatsworth]

1 hour ago, joeventura said:

This was mine.

 

I started at age 17 (1980) my first Atari 800 and 810 were $1200 (BOING!) 

This pic was taken in 1985, I had the first 520ST on the east coast I worked for an electronics distributor and we were the exclusive Atari distributor that year so I got a monochrome unit with loose CPU chips and no software.

It was useless for a month.

Cool.  We go the 400 with a tape drive xmas 79..but it was the whole family's.  My brother got his own 800XL with 1702 monitor and conversion cable and Indus GT disk drive for xmas 83..but luckily by that point he was a junior in high school and soon out of the house along with 2 other older siblings...which left those 2 machines pretty much to me!   

 

Had to wait until I joined the navy in 90 to have my own money to buy an ST.  

Edited December 21, 2021 by Max_Chatsworth

[Mazzspeed]

On 12/22/2021 at 8:03 AM, Max_Chatsworth said:

Very cool!

 

How old were you when you had this setup and was it yours or your dad's?

Very cool. I love 'in the day's retro shots like this!

 

May I ask, what's the ATR 8000 actually sitting on? Is it the case of the Atari 800?

[joeventura]

No it was a little custom plexi shelf as I recall

 

[Schadret]

Not a great picture, its at my friend's house where we ran one of our BBS's from (looking for pictures of my stuff).. I think we did that on a 130xe, Percom DS/DD drive (maybe 2).. I can't remember the modem, very common one that someone will probably be able to name by the button colors.

 

That was probably around '86 or '87

[moonlight_mile]

19 hours ago, Schadret said:

Not a great picture, its at my friend's house where we ran one of our BBS's from (looking for pictures of my stuff).. I think we did that on a 130xe, Percom DS/DD drive (maybe 2).. I can't remember the modem, very common one that someone will probably be able to name by the button colors.

 

That was probably around '86 or '87

I think that was an avatex 300/1200 modem. I remember a friend had one with those buttons on the front. 

[_The Doctor__]

Yes that would be the case, used one for a bit with a supra/mpp rverter... mine had one white button and one blue button though... or did it??

[Beeblebrox]

@Schadret loving that old style telephone (we used to have an avacado green one with the dial) - and that panelling.......... ah yeah and the Atari.. (heh heh)

[Jugger69]

Hi there!

 

I found one (!) picture from 1986. Atari 800XL (under that self-made dustcover) with 1010, 1050 and a lot of disks. I love(d) my Atari.

I managed to keep all the atari hardware (the 800XL and the 1050 are still kicking) only the disks have gone missing.

Greetings from germany!

Alex.

 

[pixelmischief]

On 10/26/2021 at 5:52 PM, Max_Chatsworth said:

I think if all you've known is Halo, Call of Duty, Red Dead redemption, Battlefield series, etc...it's pretty hard to take interest in an old 8 bit game. It's just underwhelming for them and there's no nostalgic attachment for them.  

My experience was pretty much the same, until I put on Yoomp!  I had 10 teen/20-somethings killing each other to get the joystick.  Pretty cool.

[djglish]

Back in the the late 90's our local computer club ran a MidiMaze event at Gencon in Milwaukee.  Atari would send us the STs and we'd run the games splitting the proceeds with GenCon.  We would have two rings of 16 machines running the whole time that the show was going on and usually had all 32 seats taken.  It was a fun time trying to keep all of those machines connected and running throughout the show.

 

[Sugarland]

On 12/21/2021 at 3:59 PM, joeventura said:

I was very fortunate,  I had a Atari 800, ATR8000, Drives, two 810s (1 had a Happy enhancement) and a 520ST (monitor in pic but CPU was out for repair as I recall)

This is Great!! We had the same printer - Gemini Star 10x. They are great. Have two of them now. Still work, too. Want to buy one? ;')

Edited March 27 by Sugarland

[Max_Chatsworth]

16 hours ago, pixelmischief said:

My experience was pretty much the same, until I put on Yoomp!  I had 10 teen/20-somethings killing each other to get the joystick.  Pretty cool.

Yoomp! ??

[toddtmw]

5 minutes ago, Max_Chatsworth said:

Yoomp! ??

This looks pretty cool. Have to check it out. 
 

 

[joeventura]

On 3/27/2022 at 12:38 AM, Sugarland said:

This is Great!! We had the same printer - Gemini Star 10x. They are great. Have two of them now. Still work, too. Want to buy one? ;')

How much?

I am recreating the whole setup either on purpose or by accident and a Gemini 10X would be nice to have

[joeventura]

Where I am today. I have my Atari 822 out for repair/assessment. Would like an 825 but can't seem to find one.

Have the Keypad and the Old version 410 and a 400 somewhere. I think unless an 815 becomes available that is all the beige devices

 

 

 

[DjayBee]

8 hours ago, joeventura said:

Where I am today. I have my Atari 822 out for repair/assessment. Would like an 825 but can't seem to find one.

Have the Keypad and the Old version 410 and a 400 somewhere. I think unless an 815 becomes available that is all the beige devices

 

I am not sure I would trust this valuable equipment to that table.

[StickJock]

8 hours ago, DjayBee said:

I am not sure I would trust this valuable equipment to that table.

The table's fine.  He just needs to paint it beige to match!

 

Oh, and get some woodgrain contact paper to put on the bezel of that monitor!

😀

 

[+Tillek]

10 hours ago, DjayBee said:

I am not sure I would trust this valuable equipment to that table.

I have some of those tables... They actually do warp a bit in the middle, but they really do hold a lot more weight than you expect.

[joeventura]

Yes the table that is so important!

😐

 

[Alfred]

Not quite Atari, just a young 20 year old Alfred in white about to be left in charge of running forty million dollars worth of IBM mainframes and equipment. Kirby was there checking on me. Got my first 800 XL a couple of years later.

[ClausB]

4 hours ago, Alfred said:

in charge of running forty million dollars worth of IBM

Midnight shift at the college?

[Alfred]

5 hours ago, ClausB said:

Midnight shift at the college?

No, this was one of the data centres for the province of Ontario, in Toronto. Two IBM 3033's, and a pair of Amdahl 470/V8's plus ancillary hardware. I was perhaps the youngest person there, but most of the operations staff was in their early twenties. Only the hardware guys were older.