My dad left me his computer collection and I don't know where to start

[BillC]

1 hour ago, T.A.P. said:

I talked to my dad today. He says he backed up all of his old Atari Floppy disks to an external hard drive.

 

I'm going to get the files from him, and after going through them to remove anything that is just personal data, I'll share the files on here.

The disks may have been converted to DCM or SCP images for storage on the hard drive, if so they would need to be restored to floppy or converted to ATR.

 

DCM is the extension used by Bob Puff's DISCOMM software, it compresses the image for sending via modem, useful when lower speed modems were common.

These images can be mounted on a drive slot in Altirra, then sector copied to an ATR image in another drive slot.

 

SCP is the extension used by the SpartaDOS SCOPY utility, it doesn't use any compression. Use SpartaDOS/SCOPY to copy to drive/ATR image.

[_The Doctor__]

Looks like his Dad clearly knows what he's doing, and has it pretty much covered. He's very lucky to have such a dad!

[T.A.P.]

I also learned today that dad apparently installed a Duplicator device into one of his two 1050 drives to enhance its abilities back in the 1980s, and also copy his floppies. 

 

He apparently got his first machine, an 800XL in 1984, and stuck with the A8 platform until the mid-90s when Atari went under. Which sounds right, since I remember playing with his computers as a very young kid.

[+Stephen]

37 minutes ago, T.A.P. said:

I also learned today that dad apparently installed a Duplicator device into one of his two 1050 drives to enhance its abilities back in the 1980s, and also copy his floppies. 

 

He apparently got his first machine, an 800XL in 1984, and stuck with the A8 platform until the mid-90s when Atari went under. Which sounds right, since I remember playing with his computers as a very young kid.

That's awesome.  I got my 1st Atari in 1982 - a 400.  It had the B-Key when I got it.  We soon upgraded it to 48kB, then I got my 1050 disk drive in 84.  In 88 I got a 130XE, used it until the 1050 died in 91.  Got my 1st PC in 94, but had started using the internet in 93 which led to discovering emulators and the Jaguar, and a vicious collecting obsession which continues to this day

 

Very cool to see your dad preserved his collection, and has passed it on.  Feel free to ask away!

[T.A.P.]

Ok, I sorted out all the PSUs I could find, and this is what I've got:

 

I'm guessing the first picture contains the PSUs for the 1200XL, and the two 800s?

In picture two, there is electrical tape wrapped around the PSU, so I can't read the numbers, anyone know what it is? Does it go to the 400? Picture three looks like the AC adapter for a 2600, is that right? The last two pictures are all the same, five in total, are these all the much-dreaded Ingot PSUs for the 600XL, 800XL, and the XE line that go bad and fry?

Edited February 5, 2023 by T.A.P.

[T.A.P.]

I also took a close-up picture of the printer, it looks like the character wheel has rotted away and a part of it is stuck to the bottom.

 

Does this printer use a CO17945 PSU? I found a spare one of those.

 

On the plus side, I do have a nice dust cover for it, and I think I have the original box for it too.  

[T.A.P.]

I also found a box containing another 30 floppy disks, two language programs on tape, a boxed copy of a floppy game called Rebel Charge at Chickamauga, and a massive pile of cassettes for the Coleco Adams we got rid of over 15 years ago.

 

 

[BillC]

1 hour ago, T.A.P. said:

Does this printer use a CO17945 PSU? I found a spare one of those.

The CO61636 is the correct power supply for the 1027 printer.

The CO14319 is an early power supply for the 400/800/810, it was later determined to have insufficient current and was discontinued.

The CO17945 is the recommended power supply for the 400/800/810/1050/XF551.

The CO61982 is a power supply for the XL/XE computers, but there are multiple versions using the same part number. The version you have shown with secondary number DV-512CM is commonly known as the INGOT and often fails over-voltage, which causes damage to the Atari computer

[TZJB]

2 hours ago, T.A.P. said:

I also took a close-up picture of the printer, it looks like the character wheel has rotted away and a part of it is stuck to the bottom.

 

Does this printer use a CO17945 PSU? I found a spare one of those.

 

On the plus side, I do have a nice dust cover for it, and I think I have the original box for it too.  

 

This is a useful FAQ for Atari PSUs http://www.atarimania.com/faq-atari-400-800-xl-xe-what-are-the-power-requirements-for-my-atari-components_59.html.

[+mytek]

For all intents and purposes the Atari 1027 printer is as good as garbage. Because you'll likely never be able to get a replacement print wheel for it, and even if you could, it had one of the worst looking print results of any supposed letter quality printer ever made. And it is horrifically noisy to operate.

 

The only true letter quality printer they ever sold in my opinion was the XDM121, which was a daisy wheel style printer that you can still get parts and ribbons for to this day.

 

 

However for most things you would want a printer to do on the Atari, you'd be far better off getting a dot matrix one where you'd have speed and still get a decent print quality for printers built BITD. Also better yet use an SIO2PC device and suitable software to output to your PC where you can use whatever printer is connected (e.g, Laser).

 

@T.A.P. nice amount of Atari equipment you got your hands on 👍

[mutil8]

3 hours ago, T.A.P. said:

I also found a box containing another 30 floppy disks, two language programs on tape, a boxed copy of a floppy game called Rebel Charge at Chickamauga, and a massive pile of cassettes for the Coleco Adams we got rid of over 15 years ago.

 

 

wow rebel charge at chick - i worked on that game back in the 80s. the civil war series by chuck and dave were actually the best stuff to come out off SSI IMO. That is due to the fact that they actually put some effort into the AI in those games.

[T.A.P.]

3 hours ago, mytek said:

For all intents and purposes the Atari 1027 printer is as good as garbage. Because you'll likely never be able to get a replacement print wheel for it, and even if you could, it had one of the worst looking print results of any supposed letter quality printer ever made. And it is horrifically noisy to operate.

 

The only true letter quality printer they ever sold in my opinion was the XDM121, which was a daisy wheel style printer that you can still get parts and ribbons for to this day.

 

 

However for most things you would want a printer to do on the Atari, you'd be far better off getting a dot matrix one where you'd have speed and still get a decent print quality for printers built BITD. Also better yet use an SIO2PC device and suitable software to output to your PC where you can use whatever printer is connected (e.g, Laser).

 

@T.A.P. nice amount of Atari equipment you got your hands on 👍

Thanks!

 

Honestly, I wasn't planning to write anything on the Atari or print stuff, so I am not too concerned about getting a printer for it.

 

I just want to play games, really.

[T.A.P.]

2 hours ago, mutil8 said:

wow rebel charge at chick - i worked on that game back in the 80s. the civil war series by chuck and dave were actually the best stuff to come out off SSI IMO. That is due to the fact that they actually put some effort into the AI in those games.

That's really cool! What were your contributions to it?

[JagChris]

On 8/20/2021 at 9:46 AM, _The Doctor__ said:

Just make sure to plug into the power strip/wall outlet last, the number of blown internal center tap fuses from not doing so kept me too busy at one point in life

You mean I shouldn't be plugging and unplugging a 600XL PSU's from a hot power strip? I do that all the time and I've not had a problem. Er, yet.

[mutil8]

4 hours ago, T.A.P. said:

That's really cool! What were your contributions to it?

on the civil war series I mostly assisted in play testing the ai and bug testing. This was because that dave landry the programmer of the civil wargames was proficient in apple atari and commodore 64 thus no conversion programming was

needed on his games. I did conversion programming on mech brigage atari, roadwar 2000 c64, kampfgruppe IBM and a couple others. At some pt SSI got the rights to do TSRs AD&D and pretty much all staff was put onto that project.

 

To this day I feel that the civil war series, as well as the revolutionary and napoleonic games using the same system, were SSIs best products. Again this was due to at least some for of AI making the game a challenge.

[_The Doctor__]

no I mean don't be plugging in the power transformer to main wall/live power strip first and then into the disk drive, etc.

Edited February 6, 2023 by _The Doctor__

[T.A.P.]

I found what I think is the last box of Atari stuff.

 

This one had two CX85 numeric key pads

An 810 Floppy Drive

A 1030 modem

A bag of cables I need to sort through.

I also found a thing with a bunch of 3" floppy disks and what looks like a drive thing for it. I don't think that is an Atari thing, is it?

 

I'll take some pictures later.

Edited February 6, 2023 by T.A.P.

[T.A.P.]

I started testing out the computers.

 

For the machines that have ingot PSUs, I'm instead using a modern replacement I ordered online.

 

So far everything I have tested has started up!

 

Here is what I have tried so far:

 

1200 XL - keyboard was showing the usual non-response issues that seem to plague these, otherwise fine

130 XE

800 XL

Another 800 XL

600 XL - does this have the self test? I couldn't get it to go into that.

 

Honestly, I'm amazed all of this stuff has started.

[_The Doctor__]

You can type BYE from BASIC and get the selftest even when the option key does not work.

Yes the 600XL has the self test so you either have a keyboard issue or PIA issue or...

Edited February 6, 2023 by _The Doctor__

[T.A.P.]

I have to hold down Option to bring up the menu, right?

[T.A.P.]

I also found this stuff in the last box. Is this Atari stuff too?

 

 

[+Allan]

7 minutes ago, T.A.P. said:

I also found this stuff in the last box. Is this Atari stuff too?

 

 

No. It's just useless PC stuff. If you send it to me, I will get rid of it for you.   Just kidding.

 

A supper cool Atari 8-bit device. Always wanted one of those back in the day.

 

Nice and congrats.

[+Allan]

Here is a flyer.

 

 

[T.A.P.]

4 hours ago, Allan said:

No. It's just useless PC stuff. If you send it to me, I will get rid of it for you.   Just kidding.

 

A supper cool Atari 8-bit device. Always wanted one of those back in the day.

 

Nice and congrats.

 

If you or anyone else is interested in it, let me know, I'm not planning to keep it.

[T.A.P.]

So here's a full list of everything I've rounded up so far. Outside of one last container that I hope has manuals and the like, I think this is everything:

 

Accessories (all untested):

810 Floppy Drive with MPI mechanism - I love the look of this thing

2x 1050 Floppy Drives - dad says one is modded with a Duplicator

3x XF551 Drives

Amdek Disk Drive w/ 10 disks

850 Interface Module

1010 Tape Drive w/10+ Tapes

1027 Printer w/ damaged print head

1030 Modem

XEP80

XM301 Modem

MPP1000C Modem

MAX232 version of the SIO2PC - wires appear damaged

220+ Floppy disks

 

Computers:

400 - was modified with extra RAM, although dad doesn't remember how much. I haven't tested it yet.

2x 800s - I have not tested either yet.

1200 XL - tested it, the keyboard is mostly non-responsive, but otherwise seems to go through the self-test fine.

600 XL - has its box. Powered up and seemed to go through the self-tests fine. 

3x 800 XLs - tested two of the three. The two I tested mostly seem to work fine with the self-tests, although the shift keys seem rather sluggish? The power LED on one seemed to flicker, any thoughts on what that problem could be? How serious is it? The third one is dad's original. Something's rattling inside it, so until I can take it apart and check, I'm not going to power it on.

130 XE - got through the self-test. I notice the Shift keys don't seem to respond on the keyboard test though. Is this a sign of a larger problem?

XEGS

 

I'm noticing in general that Option / Help / etc keys all seem to kind of stick a little on all of the machines I test. Is this normal for their age, or a sign they need some work done beyond just simple cleaning?



Out of the list above, at this point, this is my plan for stuff:

Keep:

Computers:

400 - I might want to hold onto this for some sentimental reasons, but it seems like a redundant system to have, especially if I have an 800.

2x 800s - one for me, one for my brother

2x 800XLs - one for me (dad's original, it has sentimental value to me), maybe another one for my brother, if he wants it.

XEGS - this has sentimental value to me, so even if it is redundant, I'm planning to keep it.

 

Accessories:

I'm really just interested in cartridge games, and a Fujinet for disk and tape stuff, so I have no desire to hold on to any of this stuff.

My brother may take the 1010 Tape Drive and the modded 1050 Floppy Drive and maybe some or all of the software for those, but other than that, I am currently planning to part with the rest of this stuff.

 

I love the look of the 810 floppy drive, but I assume since it is the oldest of the floppy drive types, it is the worst in terms of functionality?

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 7, 2023 by T.A.P.