Dutch legend has been running his campsite since 1986 using an Atari ST

If there's one thing YouTuber Viktor Bart likes, it's retro computers: his channel is dedicated to videos about building old machines, their functions, cool oddities, and just generally the joy of these beige things. Even Mr. Bart, however, was surprised by what he found in Koningsbosch, in the Dutch province of Limburg: a campsite that's been run since 1986 on an Atari ST.

The owner of the campsite, Dutchman Frans Bos, bought this Atari ST (the 1040 model) in 1986 to help run his camping business: Camping Bohmerwald. At this time the Atari ST was impressive hardware, with 1MB RAM and a 70Hz monitor (as Bos notes, most PCs of the time offered only 512Kb RAM), and in Europe the machine was seen as a serious professional computer rather than a games machine.

The Atari ST running Frans Bos's software for managing his campsite.

The Atari ST running Frans Bos's software for managing his campsite. (Image credit: Viktor Bart)

Bos bought the machine to manage bookings on the site and register guests, and then sat down and wrote his own software to do so, iterating upon it over the years. Due to the seasonal nature of the business the Atari ST is in use day-and-night for six months of the year. An amusing point in the video is Bos's argument that he likes using the machine still because it starts up so quickly: he says by the time his more modern desktop PC would be useable, he's already completed the task on the Atari ST.

One element of the video is down to a slight memory lapse: Bos says he bought the machine in 1985, but the 1040 model of the ST came out in 1986. I think after 35 years we can all let that one slide.

Rich Stanton
Senior Editor

Rich is a games journalist with 15 years' experience, beginning his career on Edge magazine before working for a wide range of outlets, including Ars Technica, Eurogamer, GamesRadar+, Gamespot, the Guardian, IGN, the New Statesman, Polygon, and Vice. He was the editor of Kotaku UK, the UK arm of Kotaku, for three years before joining PC Gamer. He is the author of a Brief History of Video Games, a full history of the medium, which the Midwest Book Review described as "[a] must-read for serious minded game historians and curious video game connoisseurs alike."

Read more
Various creations in Minecraft, including computers and calculators.
This Minecraft creation blots out the sun for the villagers below, they surely praise it as God, but we know it really to be a functioning 32-bit computer with 2 kB of RAM
Image of a digitally-rendered aquarium screensaver including the SereneScreen logo in the center
A former Air Force pilot was so disappointed with Windows 95's aquarium screensaver that he established a 25-year dynasty of digital fish that continues to this day
A pasta "display" on a table showing the word "keep" surrounded by fruit. Obviously.
Penne for your thoughts: This pasta display can show three individual frames and it's trying its best, okay
An image of a prototype of the Ink Console e-ink handheld reader/console device
Remember those 'choose your own adventure' fantasy books? Well, now they're coming back in this delightfully chonky e-ink console
gotg llama
Blasting AI into the past: Modders get Llama AI working on an old Windows 98 PC
An artistic image where a digital progress bar is represented by a physical wooden block.
The nail-biting, 100-hour BIOS update stream which garnered 88,000 peak views ends with a cut to black
Latest in Gaming PCs
HP Omen 45L gaming desktop
This Redditor rocked up to Best Buy and bought an RTX 4060 gaming PC for cheaper than its extended warranty, saving $1,195 and their friend from buying a console
A gaming PC with RGB lighting enabled on a desk.
This gaming PC build smashes together the very latest components but if I did it again, I'd do it differently
Skytech Shadow gaming PC on a blue background
Screw waiting for GPU restocks, with an AMD RX 9070 gaming PC going for as cheap as this I'd hop on the pre-built bandwagon
Cobratype RTX 5070 Ti gaming PC on a blue background
This RTX 5070 Ti gaming PC is about as cheap as we've seen so far, and it's got me all nostalgic for PC prices long past
Framework Desktop with AMD Strix Halo mainboard
iFixit has pulled apart Framework's mini PC and it looks to be the AMD Strix Halo-powered desktop device I've been wanting for at least a week and more
Framework Desktop with AMD Strix Halo mainboard
Framework's first desktop PC is giving us the AMD Strix Halo machine we've been craving, and the opportunity to build our own
Latest in News
An Enshrouded player in a recreation of Erebor from The Lord of the Rings
Kings under the Mountain! 33 Enshrouded players spent 10,000 hours to recreate this iconic location from The Lord of the Rings
A mech awakens.
Mecha Break developer is considering unlocking all mechs following open beta feedback
Lara Croft Unified Art
Tomb Raider developer Crystal Dynamics lays off 17 employees 'to better align our current business needs and the studio's future success'
A long bendy arm stealing money from people in a subway car
'You're a very long arm. You steal things. It's a comedy game,' explains developer of comedy game where you steal things with a very long arm
The heroes are attacked by monsters
Pillars of Eternity is getting turn-based combat to mark its 10th anniversary, and that means PC Gamer editors will soon be arguing about combat mechanics again
Image of Ronaldo from Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves trailer
It doesn't really make sense that soccer star Ronaldo is now a Fatal Fury character, but if you follow the money you can see how it happened