A history of the microcomputer industry in 300 adverts
In a private room at the Winter Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago in January 1977, Commodore showed the world's first complete "personal computer" - the PET 2001 - an "appliance" micro that for the first time could be taken out of the box, plugged in and used by regular people without a soldering iron.
Soon, Tandy and Apple joined in and the market grew steadily, but then Commodore and Sinclair launched cheap home computers in the early 80s that changed everything.
The market exploded from tens of thousands of machines a year to millions, as famous 1970s names like Cromemco, IMSAI, Nascom and MITS were swept away. Micro companies were suddenly worth $1 billion dollars and their employees were millionaires. Hundreds of companies launched hundreds of incompatible machines. Price wars were started, old scores were settled and companies were destroyed.
Eight bits made way for 16 and 32 in the space of a few years. For a while Britain led the world in manufacture and adoption, with 80% of all computers sold in Europe being sold in the UK.
The fate of many microcomputer companies. From a Business Operating Software advert in Personal Computer World, June 1986.
Then the 8-bit market reached saturation and more companies imploded - Sinclair was sold for its name and assets only, Acorn almost didn't make it and a raft of also-rans fell by the wayside - Camputers, Dragon Data, Elan, Oric and Jupiter Cantab to name but a few. Even big names like Timex and Texas Instruments were burned.
Meanwhile, the sleeping giant that was IBM launched its 5150 at the end of 1981 and watched as it slowly but inevitably over the next few years became the standard. Other companies cloned it, copied and improved it and soon the only game in town was the IBM PC.
From the latter half of the 1980s, every micro company and its dog was building generic beige boxes, and people wanted the same beige boxes at home and work. The home computer as a concept was dead, and the "wonder years" were over.
This collection of over 300 adverts attempts to tell something of that story...
NeXT
October 1991
The NeXTStation has landed at Sign Express
After Apple had released its Macintosh in 1984, it was almost immediately found to be slow, thanks to its limited memory and disk space, and by 1985 there were already plans for a "fast Macintosh". ...
Cromemco
January 1981
MicroCentre introduces... System Zero
Cromemco's System Zero was a small Z80A-based machine primarily intended in process control situations, which was first released in 1980. It was designed primarily to take ROM-based software, although...
EuroMicro
March 1983
EuroMicro's answer to high-performance and flexibility
EuroMicro Ltd of north London, apparently a UK offshoot of EuroMicro Inc, is another one of those value-added reseller companies that seems to have left no trace. Here it is offering two systems, the...
ACT/Apricot
April 1981
95% off the cost of financial modelling
Although this advert is for software and not a microcomputer, it does come from Applied Computer Techniques (ACT) of Birmingham - a company that had been importing Computhink's MiniMax and selling it...
Shelton
April 1981
If you think you've seen it all before, then take a closer look at the Sig/Net
This is the first known advert for Chris Shelton's Sig/Net, the range of hardware which is considered as perhaps the first ever modular multi-user personal computer system. With its budget monochrome...
Gemini Micro
March 1983
Fifteen 80-Bus solutions
Gemini Microcomputers had been founded by John Marshall towards the end of 1980 after his previous company - Nascom/Lucas - had called in the receivers. Since its founding, Nascom had produced the Nascom...
Bromcom
March 1983
Future-proof multi-user CP/M system
Here's an early advert from Bromley Computer Consultancy - trading as Bromcom - for its Superstar CP/M-based multi-user system, which would be around until at least the summer of the following year. ...
Apple
March 1983
Evolution. Revolution.
With Apple's famous "reality distortion field" in full effect with the the oft-made but incorrect claim that Apple invented the personal computer, and that since the release of the Apple II the world...
TDI/Pinnacle
April 1985
The new TDI Pinnacle - the fastest micro in the world
TDI, based in Clifton, Bristol, was a technology distributor and a VAR - a Value Added Reseller - which had become the largest customer of Sage Computer's "speed machine" micros - the Sage II and later...
Jarogate
April 1985
How much persuasion do you need to buy a world-beating business computer?
With an amusing still from what looks like a 1930s film featuring a Vickers Machine Gun comes this advert from Jarogate, of Brixton, London, for its Sprite 286 multi-user system. Unlike Jarogate's earlier...
Alpha Micro
April 1985
Make your XT multi-user
Alpha Microsystems Inc, or more commonly Alpha Micro, was one of relatively few multi-user manufacturers that made it through the era of the IBM PC and beyond, trading as AlphaServ during the dot-com...
Morrow Designs
August 1984
Get XT performance at a Jr. price
The MD-11 from Morrow Designs - a company founded by George Morrow which traces its roots back to the Homebrew Computer Club of the mid 1970s - was the last of the Micro Decision range of machines first...
Sanyo
July 1985
It must be axactly right for my needs but no more
Caught in the oncoming headlights of IBM's 5150 juggernaut comes this advert from Sanyo for its MBC-550 and 550 microcomputers. Continuing the "See Sanyo, the decide" theme of its earlier adverts, it's...
Hotel Microsystems
April 1985
Minstrel 2: TurboDOS power for multi-user networking
This advert, from July 1985's PRAC, announces the new Minstrel 2 from HM Systems, formerly known as Hotel Microsystems. Released less than a year after HM's Minstrel 68K and the Minstrel Turbo, the advert...
IBS/Synamics
July 1985
The multiuser systems that also networks IBM PCs
Here's an apparently short-lived advert for the Ultraframe multi-user systems from Synamics Business Systems Ltd of London. Actually built by OEM manufacturer IBS Incorporated of the US, and assembled...