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The Atari Accountant series, Copyright (C) 1981 by Atari, Inc. and BPI Systems, Inc. and Arthur Young & Co.#

The Atari Accountant series, Copyright (C) 1981 by Atari, Inc. and BPI Systems, Inc. and Arthur Young & Co.
Foreword
Requirements
CX401: General Accounting System (4 SSDD Diskettes)
CX402: Accounts Receivable System (4 SSDD Diskettes)
CX403: Inventory Control System (5 SSDD Diskettes)
ATR images
Manuals
Afterword
The story behind the getting of the The Atari Accountant
Outlook
Thank you
References
Images
ADs

The ATARI Accountant brings sophisticated computerized accounting to the small business or professional person and has been priced at $1,499.85. Each of its three components, which are available separately, is priced at $499.95. They include systems for accounts and inventory control. All prices mentioned are manufacturer's suggested retail prices in the U.S. only. The three packages are: General Accounting System CX401, Accounts Receivable System CX402 and Inventory Control System CX403. Each package consists of several diskettes, please see below. The software requires an ATARI 800 Computer, an Atari 815 Dual Disk, an Atari 850 Interface Module and an Atari 825 80-Column Printer. Minimum RAM requirement: 48 K

In sum The Atari Accountant Series consists out of 13 SSDD diskettes, which is equivalent to 26 SSSD diskettes! This makes The Atari Accountant the most expansive Atari program of all times and the largest of it's time. Just box CX401 is found up to now only (2019). Any help in completing the 'The Atari Accountant' is very welcome, anytime, anyplace and everywhere.

The Atari Accountant - binder, top view ; thanks to Kevin Savetz for taking the picture!

Foreword#

Before we intend to go further, you really have to read Bill Lange's incredible investigation about The Atari Accountant series. If you do not, you won't understand anything of The Atari Accountant, not even a single bit! Please take the time, you won't be disappointed. Bill has done a deep, deep investigation, which only a few Atari users are able to do. That is scientific investigation and deep knowledge at its best. AtariWiki highly(!) recommend this site. The site is vital for a deeper understanding of the boxes Atari made. You would miss a big part of Atari's history by not reading it! Bill, AtariWiki says soooo much thank you for your help in this lost be believe case.

The Atari Accountant - screenshot 1 taken from In-Store Demonstration Program

on diskette only, not cartridge! ; thanks to Bill Lange for sharing this with the community!

Requirements#

The prices are taken from lists published in 1981, please see below under ADs

- Color TV or monitor, of course: take it as given ;-)
- Atari 800: $759
- 48 KiB-RAM: 2 x $149 = $298 ; SI-unit meanwhile has changed from KB to KiB !
- Atari 815 Dual Disk Drive: $1199 ; frop down from $1499 a little earlier!
- Atari 825 80-Column Printer: $779
- Atari 850 Interface Module: $179
- Atari BASIC Cartridge: $46
- Atari CX401 General Accounting: $499
- Atari CX402 Accounts Receivable: $499
- Atari CX403 Inventory Control: $499
- Atari CX89 Color Monitor Cable, else Atari CX82 B&W Monitor Cable: $50
- Atari CX86 Printer Cable: $42
- a lot of Atari double density diskettes (CX8202) for storage: $21
- a credit card, which can take all of the above :-)

In sum: $4,870 as value from 1981. Assuming an inflation rate of 4 % over the decades (just multiply with 1.04), we come to:

$4820 * 1.04 ^ (2019 - 1981) = $21,617.02

of today’s money, which is in Euro: €19,140.27 (exchange rate from: 02/19/2019)

CX401: General Accounting System (4 SSDD Diskettes)#

The General Accounting System is all many business need to automate their accounting functions. The program produces financial reports, including a balance sheet, profit and loss statements and subsidiary ledgers for account receivable, accounts payable and payroll. It consists of:

General Accounting System - Users’s Manual
Business Manager’s Companion Guide
Reference Card
2 Data Entry Program Diskettes (Model CX8203) Master and Backup
2 Posting Program Diskettes (Model CX8204) Master and Backup
1 Sample Master Data Diskette (Model CX8205)
1 Sample Training Data Diskette (Model CX8206)
1 Blank Diskette (Model CX8202)

Estimated availability second quarter 1981

The ATARI Accountant - screenshot 2 from General Accounting System; Thank you so much Bill Lange! Great finding! :-)

CX402: Accounts Receivable System (4 SSDD Diskettes)#

The Accounts Receivable System is for businesses with a large volume of active accounts requiring either an open-item or balance forward system. With this program you can print statements and customer mailings automatically.

Estimated availability third quarter 1981

The ATARI Accountant - screenshot 3 from Accounts Receivable System; Thank you so much Bill Lange! Great finding! :-)

CX403: Inventory Control System (5 SSDD Diskettes)#

The Inventory Control System allows you to monitor a large or rapidly turning inventory, employing either the LIFO, FIFO or Average Costing methods. This program allows you to print invoices, purchase orders, packing slips and stock lables automatically.

Estimated availability third quarter 1981

The ATARI Accountant - screenshot 4 from Inventory Control System; Thank you so much Bill Lange! Great finding! :-)

ATR images#

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Manuals#

From 32 GB, you know, down to ~22 MB.., with OCR and index and without quality loss...

Each address has the hyperlink to the shown address, so this makes the pdf an edu-pdf. Up to 5 jumps in just one row, please see the colored arrows below.

The ATARI Accountant - General Accounting System - CX401 - User's Manual - hyperlinks in the index pages with visible frames

The ATARI Accountant - Business Manager's Companion Guide - description from Arthur Young & Company

Afterword#

The project has shown clearly and without any doubt, how important the preservation is and that time is key! It seems, that 35 years at best possible storage is the upper limit for 5.25 in diskettes. Therefore, if there is someone out there, who is in the possession of the remaining boxes CX402 and CX403, please be so kind and contact us. We appreciate your support very, very much! The time is now or never. :-)

The story behind the getting of the The Atari Accountant#

Coming soon...

Outlook#

With The Atari Accountant the evidence is given, the Atari computer is not just a game machine. Indeed, it is much more than this! If some decisions have been made different, we now would speak of HCs instead of PCs. The 1982 movie of Blade Runner showed the vision and outlook the creators had at that time.

Thank you#

AtariWiki would like to thank the following persons for the help in this very special project. Without their contribution, this would never have been possible:

- Curt Vendel and his Atari museum atarimuseum.com for lending of the box, so we could do the restauration and afterwards the investigation
- Kevin Savetz for scanning the hundreds of pages in best 600 dpi color quality and for creating the 815-ATRs with a Happy. What a bunch of work, thank you so much Kevin! :-)
- a good soul from Utah (prefers to stay in the dark and is still under the Atari witness protection program) for vital information to the project
- Bob Woolley for all his informations about the 815 double disk drive
- Bill Lange for all his help, support and commitment to realize this project as well as for his findings and investigations. Great work Bill, really!
- Allan Bushman for all his help, support and commitment to realize this project, especially with assisting with the Kryo
- Floppydoc for all his help, support, time and commitment to decipher the secrets of the 815 and how to get the data from it
- Sascha Kriegel, especially for his fight at the hot spot, locally and in person. This work got the most boost in the project! Thank you Sascha!
- Ryan Goolevitch and Joachim Baßmann for their genius on how to get the f… data from the very special disks of the 815 double drive; a milestone!
- Joachim Baßmann for making the disks runnable with 'normal' drives. :-) With this and others major performances (e. g. SynCalc+ from 1985), it is fair to appoint him as the King in this very important field
- AtariAge, without their work and platform, we could never have connected us to make this all possible. Thank you really so much!
- Roland B. Wassenberg for creating the pdf files for easy in use
- Michael Current and his ATARI FAQ, without it, we might have never heard, that the project existed
- Bradley Coda
- GoodByteXL from AtariAge
- Andreas Kahlenberger
- and many more...

References#

From Bill Lange's website we can take over a book, which describes more general information on the BPI Systems, Inc.’s family of accounting software, by Dale N. Flanagan published by Tab Books in 1986. As of February 2019 a copy is available for just: $1,858.85