The first computer my family owned was an Atari 400, the 8k entry-level machine with a membrane keyboard so kids wouldn’t muck it up with their grubby hands.

I learned to type on that keyboard, ingraining a stompy two-finger typing style that I’ve never been able to shake. On the night my dad brought it home, we all gathered around the portable TV with a 4inch black & white screen that the Atari was plugged into and played Star Raiders.

There was a BASIC cartridge, too, but that was dumb and boring because Star Raiders. A couple years later the 400 was upgraded to 48k.

Our first modem was a 1200 baud Prometheus ProModem, purchased alongside an Atari 800 in the mid 80s. Compared to the 300 baud modem socketed into the back of a friend’s Commodore 64, it was blazing fast, with text appearing faster than I could read it. I used that modem well until after 1200 baud was slow.

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