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The price for bleeding edge technology?


JohnW

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I was just curious as to how much some of you paid for bleeding edge technology for the Atari 8 bit system. My Atari 800 with 16K was $720 (extra memory boards was extra later on) and my 810 drive was $530. But hey it was so cool to have back then. I managed to make enough money off of games I wrote to pay for them which kept the wife happy.

 

 

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I had to wait 5-6 years until I was old enough for a paper route, and the prices had dropped to my paper route income level. For me that meant a $149 130XE with a $25 after-market tape drive, until a year later when I also got a 1050 for $150. Of course it was hardly bleeding edge by then. Still no bleeding edge ST or Amiga for me, they were at the prices like you paid JohnW. In fact, I always stuck with the "last generation" with computers all my life, never paying more than a few hundred for any one. I still buy reconditioned and just upgrade as I go. I did pay bleeding edge prices for several game consoles, but luckily they were always only $200-300 anyway.

Edited by Gunstar
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Ah yes the Amiga (Actually the Atari 800's big brother). I purchased a Amiga 1000 and floppy drive very early and then moved up to a Amiga 2000HD (my first hard drive at a whopping 20MB size). I actually started with an OSI C4P computer (8K of RAM and built in 8K Basic). My First couple games were published on the OSI. Later I purchased an Atari 400 with a tape drive (and Star Raiders cartridge!!) but soon sold it off and got my 2000. Those were some exciting times.

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We got ripoff prices here, my first 400 was I think about $600 for the computer alone and the 1010 was a criminal $160 extra in mid-1983.

 

Under a year later I got a 600XL with intention to get the 1064 but it ended up cheaper to just buy an 800XL, I think it was around $600 as well in late 1984.

Got my 1050 probably mid 1985, I think that was about $450.

 

1988 I got a new ST. The 520ST I got blew it's PS so I took it back and decided to pay extra for a 1040ST/FM. From memory including the monochrome monitor it came in just under $2,000. At the time the Amiga still cost somewhat more and software was a bit thinner on the ground.

 

1993 I got a used Amiga 500 with 1 Meg RAM, I think I paid about $450 including a 1084 (non-stereo) monitor.

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Hard to convert given historical exchange rates, etc. but I‘d say my father spent the equivalent of a nice used VW Golf/Rabbit on an 800/810 Combo + a color monitor in late 81/early 82 (the latter so I‘d return the portable kitchen TV to my mother).

 

Around 40.000ATS in late 81 would have been around 2500 USD, I had an allowance of around 20USD a month, so it was >3 months for Star Raiders and one month for 3 SD floppies, couldn‘t afford a Ten-Pack after Star Raiders and who‘d need more than 240K of storage anyway?

 

A cone of ice cream (packaged) was about 10 ATS or .67 USD.

 

 

Gesendet von iPhone mit Tapatalk

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Got my first 800 in late '79, $1000 USD, 16K,CTIA. The 410(square version) was free, as was Basic. Got another 8K for $100, and Star Raiders $50(back ordered, had to wait a very long month before I got it)

Got an 810 in early '81 for about $600, 850 for $200, an an Epson MX-80 for about $400, Atari Word Processor for about $150

Total $2500 in 80-81 USD's or $7,554 today!!!

 

Then a 1040ST just after it was released for a $1000 with a color screen

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It was in Dec 82' that I purchased an Atari 800 with 48K - for around 600 Pounds+, Star Raiders, PacMan, 410, Shamus. I would have waited for around a year - looking through computer magazines of that time. Decided not to buy it while in New Zealand - as the importer Ozisoft - seemed to have them marked up a lot (probably due to them having to import them at retail? prices - and adding their markup to it?).

Timing is everything - if you paid a high price - you'll likely to have it sooner than everybody else and enjoy being a visionary - whereas if you bought it on sale at a cheap price - it's at it's decline that comes with it's own advantages/disadvantages.

 

If you had the choice of - an Atari 400 vs Vic-20 - which would you have chose and been happy with? At least with a 400 you could later sell it and moved onto an 800 or whatever - and probably could keep/run whatever carts/etc you purchased for it.

 

Sure - if you had the patience - you could wait a further 2 years and then buy what is the market leader / best buy - and avoid buying a turkey?

Wait too long - then you'll be in the 16-bit era, in which the 8-bit would look seriously dated.

 

Harvey

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