Task: Backup Cartridges to Floppy Disk Using “The Pill” Needed: Floppy disks, disk drive, The Pill, The Pill software Time: 15-30 mins Introduction Software pirating was rampant back in the early 1980s and there were plenty of software and hardware tools that made this easy.
Read moreReplace the Ribbon and Paper in an Atari 820 Printer (15-30 minutes)
Task: Replace the Ribbon and Paper in an Atari 820 Printer Needed: Atari 820 printer with replacement ribbon and paper roll Time: 15-30 mins Introduction I never had an Atari 820 printer back in the day but have always wanted one because it beautifully matches
Read moreConnect Your Atari Joystick to a PC (10-15 mins)
Task: Connect Your Atari Joystick to a PC Needed: Atari Joystick and a USB adapter Time: 10-15 minutes Introduction The Atari 400 and 800 were by far the best gaming computers when they hit the market. This was largely due to the awesome ANTIC graphics chip
Read morePurchase an Atarimax Maxflash Cartridge (30-60 min)
Task: Purchase an Atarimax Maxflash Cartridge Needed: Atarimax Maxflash Cartridge, USB Cartridge Programmer, A to A USB Cable, and Maxflash Studio Software Time: 30-60 mins Introduction I love the ease of use of cartridges compared to cassette or disk. Fortunately, there are some easy modern
Read morePurchase a Harmony Cartridge for the Atari 2600 (10-15 mins)
Task: Purchase a Harmony Cartridge for the Atari 2600 Needed: Harmony Cartridge With SD or microSD Card Time: 10-15 mins Introduction When I was programming my Atari 2600 game “Gene Medic” I wanted to be able to test it on original hardware since there are
Read moreConnect Your Atari Computer to the Internet using the SIO2PC from Atarimax (15-30 mins)
Task: Connect Your Atari Computer to the Internet using the SIO2PC from Atarimax Needed: SIO2PC Time: 15-30 minutes Introduction Although the internet was invented before Atari 8-bit computers were released in 1979 it was not available to most of us until years later. I don’t
Read moreConnect Your Atari Computer to a PC (15-30 mins)
Task: Connect Your Atari Computer to a PC Needed: SIO2PC Time: 15-30 minutes Introduction Cartridges and floppy disks are great but sooner or later you will want to tap into the huge archive of software that is available on the internet. You can certainly boot
Read moreInstall the Happy Board for the 1050 Disk Drive (45-60 mins)
Task: Install the Happy Board for the 1050 Disk Drive Needed: 1050 Disk Drive & Happy Enhancement Time: 45-60 minutes Introduction The Atari 810 disk drive could read and write single-density disks with about 90k of data. Atari’s followup drive was the 1050 that was
Read moreRepair an Atari 1020 Printer (30-60 mins)
Task: Repair an Atari 1020 Printer Needed: 1020 printer, 3D printed gears Time: 30-60 minutes Introduction I had an Epson dot matrix printer with my Atari 800 back in the day. It served me well but wasn’t that great with graphics and was only black
Read morePurge Dangerous Power Supplies (15-60 mins)
Task: Identify and remove dangerous Atari power supply units and label the safe ones Needed: Labels and pen Time: 15-60 mins Introduction If you are like me and have a number of different Atari home computer models and peripherals then you also have a large
Read moreClean an 810/1050 Disk Drive Head (15-30 min)
Task: clean an Atari 810/1050 disk drive head Needed: Phillips-head screwdriver, Q-tip, alcohol Time: 15-30 minutes Introduction I started out back in the early 80s with an Atari 400 computer and a 410 cassette recorder for storing programs. Working with the 410 was tedious and
Read morePurchase an Atari 8-Bit Computer (1-2 hours)
Task: Purchase an Atari 8-Bit Computer Needed: $ Time: 1-2 hours (or longer) Introduction If you are reading this website, it is very likely that you already have one or more Atari 8-bit computers. However, if you don’t own an Atari, and would like to,
Read more