ANTIC Interview 464 - Walt Klappert, Atari Advanced Development Group
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
Walt Klappert, Atari Advanced Development Group/WCI Labs Walt Klappert worked at Atari's Advanced Development Group/WCI Labs in New York, and later at Take One Enterprises in California. He worked with Nancy and Steve Mayer on a variety of projects with a concentration on creating software for girls. He is credited as Director of "Fisher Price Dance Fantasy", a dance choreography game for small children. He also worked on a system for authoring CD+G, an enhancement to the compact disc spec that allowed graphics and lyrics to be displayed synchronized with music. This interview took place on...
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ANTIC Episode 130 - The Tongue-Twister Episode
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
ANTIC Episode 130 - The Tongue-Twister Episode In this episode of ANTIC The Atari 8-Bit Computer Podcast… We trip all over our own tongues trying to bring you all the news fit to print in the Atari 8-bit computer world… READY! Recurring Links Interview index: What we’ve been up to Diskmenu manual - 30th anniversary of Classic Computer Magazine Archive - : Discussion - Atari Yahoo Groups archives: Atari Usenet group archive additions - MPP MicroportXL board manual -...
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ANTIC Interview 463 - Steve Bryson, game programmer
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
Steve Bryson, game programmer Steve Bryson was a programmer for EPYX and The Connelley Group, where he ported many games to various 8-bit systems. He ported Dragonriders of Pern, an action/strategy game based on the Anne McCaffrey novels, to Atari and Commodore 64. He ported Jumpman to the Apple II, and Lower Reaches of Apshai, Upper Reaches of Apshai, and Temple of Ra to the C64. This interview took place on August 5, 2026. Video version of this interview: Steve's personal web site: Randy Glover, Jumpman interview: Tom Zimmerman, AMY chip interview: Jon Freeman, Freefall...
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ANTIC Interview 462 - Bob Fraser, APX Insomnia, Supersort, De Re Atari
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
Bob Fraser, APX Insomnia, Supersort, De Re Atari Bob Fraser worked at Atari for four years: he worked on the early CX70 light pen, helped write the specs for an unreleased database manager for the Atari 8-bits. and later moved into Atari's Games Design Research Group under Alan Kay, where he experimented with 3-D graphics. He wrote a chapter of De Re Atari — chapter 7, all about sound — and two applications that were published by Atari Program Exchange: Supersort, a data sorting routine; and Insomnia, a sound editor. Supersort was APX catalog number 20030, and was for sale starting...
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ANTIC Interview 461 - James W. Burley, APX Data Base/Report System
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
James W. Burley, APX Data Base/Report System James W. Burley is the programmer of Data Base/Report System, which was sold by Atari Program Exchange beginning with the Summer 1982 APX catalog. It was catalog number 20134 with a price of $22.95. APX sold it for about a year, through the Summer 1983 catalog. APX awarded Data Base/Report System first prize for new software in the "Business & Professional Applications/Personal Finance & Record Keeping" category: for that, James was awarded an Atari Star plaque and $2000 prize. (He received the plaque, but says he never received the...
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ANTIC Interview 460 - Tim Jenkins, Cheating at Roulette
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
Tim Jenkins, Cheating at Roulette with an Atari Computer Tim Jenkins is the author of several humorous memoirs: "Missions Accomplished: And some funny business along the way", "More Missions Accomplished: And a lot more funny business", and "Business Missions Accomplished: Silly travel tales on the corporate dime". I wanted to talk to Tim about one chapter in his 2018 book More Missions Accomplished: the chapter is titled "Gaming the System" and it tells the tale of him trying to cheat a roulette using his Atari 800 computer. A brief excerpt from that chapter: "Las Vegas — 1989. Shortly...
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ANTIC Interview 459 - Mike Lorenzen: Atari Program-Text Editor, Pitfall II
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
Mike Lorenzen: Atari Program-Text Editor, Pitfall II Mike Lorenzen worked at Atari, Activision, and Accolade, creating games for the Atari 2600, Atari 8-bit, and Commodore 64 computers. At Atari, Mike coded Golf and Circus Atari for the Atari 2600. For the 8-bit computers, he wrote MEDIT (which he told me stands for Mike’s EDITor.) Atari got a lot of mileage from MEDIT, using versions of that text editor in several products: first, in Atari Program-Text Editor (which was bundled with Atari's Macro Assembler), and in two Atari Program Exchange products: APX 20075, Atari Program-Text Editor;...
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ANTIC Episode 129 - SDX and FNSlots
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
ANTIC Episode 129 - SDX and FNSlots In this episode of ANTIC The Atari 8-Bit Computer Podcast…Brad plays around with SDX, Kay and Randy bring you news from some vintage computer shows, we drool over all the new hardware news, and we bring you FujiNet news, including FNSlots… READY! Recurring Links Interview index: What we’ve been up to Box of stuff from Bob Fraser Light pen - Disks! Six early versions of MEDIT - Prerelease version of DOS 2.0S - INIT HELLO at System Source Computer Museum Print...
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ANTIC Interview 458 - Allan Bushman, Atari archivist
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
Allan Bushman, Atari Archivist If you've ever looked up an Atari computer manual at Internet Archive, chances are you've come across some of Allan Bushman's scans. For well over 13 years, Allan has been uploading scans of Atari-related catalogs, manuals, and books to the archive. Before that, since 1995 or before, Allan contributed to and AtariMania. With a particular emphasis on finding and archiving Atari Program Exchange manuals, Allan has helped save the vast majority of the APX library. This interview took place on April 19 2026 at Vintage Computer Festival East. As of this recording,...
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ANTIC Interview 457 - Atari at the Science Fair: Lisa Link Melville, Weather Prediction
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
Atari at the Science Fair: Lisa Link Melville, Weather Prediction The Herald Times newspaper, April 17 1984: "March 24 proved to be an exciting day for several area students participating in the South Central Indiana Regional Science Fair which was held in Bloomington. Lisa Link, an Edgewood High School junior, and Maxwell Brothers, a Bloomington North senior, took top honors in the advanced division. Programming an Atari 800 computer to forecast the weather was Link's project. The computer's entire 48K memory system was needed to develop the long and complicated program which predicts...
info_outlineANTIC Episode 121 - Dongle Disaster
In this episode of ANTIC The Atari 8-Bit Computer Podcast… Special guest Brent Carroll joins as we bring you the Atari news and narrowly avoid disaster with our dongle talk …
READY!
Recurring Links
New Atari books scans at archive.org
Atari interview discussion thread on AtariAge
Interview index: here
What we’ve been up to
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CX40+ Wireless Joystick:
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Harry Stewart died:
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his daughter sent me documents https://bsky.app/profile/savetz.bsky.social/post/3lyj77tjtns2j
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Kay’s 2017 interview with Harry - ANTIC Interview 295 - Harry Stewart, Pilot and WSFN
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VCFMW - https://www.vcfwm.org
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Video interview of Cynthia Solomon and Brian Silverman - https://youtu.be/lWmXPEyl9T8
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FujiNet-enabled Atari800Macx:
News
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Nick DiMasi (SCAT) passed way:
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Interview with Nick at VCFMW 13 - https://ataripodcast.libsyn.com/antic-the-atari-8-bit-podcast-episode-5-connect-your-atari-to-a-pc (Nick’s interview is near the end of the show)
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SCAT - http://www.scatarians.org/
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Rare sighting of a working 1027 printer at latest TACO meeting - https://www.facebook.com/share/v/16vmTRRzHD/
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Modified Atari 800 with a custom cpu board and a hp 1611a logic analyzer would plug into the external port - https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1Fv8FM9yxz/
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RM800XL update on X - https://x.com/rm_800xl/status/1964665547821637818
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Microsoft open-sources the 6502 BASIC coded by Bill Gates himself:
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Atari XL/XE -=Elite=- beta version:
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From AtariTeca - https://www.atariteca.net.pe/2025/09/inesperado-beta-jugable-de-elite.html
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Saberman Retronews - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yi8Fr9XFxKQ
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Download - https://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-400-800-xl-xe-elite_44548.html
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5.25" Floppy Envelope Generator from Pawel “Lexx” Kawka:
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From Atariteca - https://www.atariteca.net.pe/2025/09/nuevo-generador-de-fundas.html
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online tool for designing covers - https://ataricovers.com/generator-kopert/?lang=en
Newsletter News
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September, 2025 issue of Atari Insights - https://www.ataribasics.com
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ABBUC magazines 162 and special mag 56 - https://www.abbuc.de
Upcoming Shows
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Portland Retro Gaming Expo - October 17-19 - Oregon Convention Center, Portland, OR - https://retrogamingexpo.com/
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Vintage Computer Festival Montreal - Jan. 24-25, 2026 - Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, QC - https://vcfed.org/vcf-montreal/
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Vintage Computer Festival SoCal - February 14-15, 2026 - Hotel Fera Events Center, Orange, CA - vcfsocal.com
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Indy Classic Computer and Video Game Expo - March 20-22 2026 - Wyndham Indianapolis Airport Hotel, Indianapolis, IN - https://indyclassic.org/
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VCF East - April 17-19 2026 - InfoAge Science and History Museums, Wall, NJ - https://vcfed.org/events/vintage-computer-festival-east/
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Southern Fried Gaming Expo - July 31-Aug 2 2026 - Atlanta, Ga - https://gameatl.com/
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Event page created by Chicago Classic Computing - http://chiclassiccomp.org/events.html
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Event page created by Floppy Days on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/VintageComputerShows/
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Event page on Floppy Days Website - https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vSeLsg4hf5KZKtpxwUQgacCIsqeIdQeZniq3yE881wOCCYskpLVs5OO1PZLqRRF2t5fUUiaKByqQrgA/pub
YouTube Videos
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How did the Atari beat the Commodore 64 in Chile thanks to Coelsa? - Frognum - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NW2ZkWQ-nw
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Atari Now! News and Homebrews, September 2025 - Into the Vertical Blank - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKlmVrEHhhI
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Atari 800XL FujiNet and Sega Genesis Retro.Link Networking Test - Greg Gallardo - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdYFlnNGm9o
New at Archive.org
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Ted Skrecky continues uploading XIO3 newsletters - https://archive.org/details/@ted_skrecky
Listener Feedback
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O'Shea limestone cave - http://www.oshealtd.com/atari.htm
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Long Island Gaming Expo in NY - https://liretro.com/