A history of the microcomputer industry in 300 adverts

Zenith: The leading light

Zenith Data Systems had started out in 1979 as a division of the Zenith Radio Company, after the latter had bought the famous Heath company from Schlumberger. Heath - trading in the microcomputer industry...

Altos Computer Systems offer you the drive to succeed absolutely free

Altos was one of relatively few microcomputer manufacturers that made the transition from the 1970s through the era of the IBM PC and was still around on the other side. From 1978 until at least 1980...

Tulip: Pick the one that stands out from the rest

To its credit, it took Tulip a good eight years since its founding in 1979 to use the most obvious metaphor in its adverts - a field of actual tulips. In this case, it goes one step beyond by adding...

Archimedes: 1987 Microcomputer of the year

Acorn's Archimedes - also known in at least some parts of the press as the ARM - had been launched in 1987 and first started shipping to dealers in early Autumn. Acorn's Stephanie Newman noted that:...

We asked our designers for a portable PC. They got completely carried away.

Launched at Comdex Fall '87 in Las Vegas and at the UK's Which Computer? Show, the PPC range of not-quite-laptops was Amstrad's entry into the portable market. It was fully IBM compatible and ran an...

How good are Tandy computers? Ask someone who's bought two million of them

Tandy's TRS-80 - the Tandy Radio Shack/Z80 - was one of the first three "appliance" computers - those you could take out of a box, plug in and use right away - ever, when it was launched in the August...

Mission 386.2: The world's first 20MHz 80386 machine.

Here's another nice example of how it seemed every company even vaguely related to electronics was getting into the microcomputer game, in this case UK high-end hifi manufacturer Mission. It had set...

At Micronet we're really talking

Launched at the beginning of 1983, Micronet was a Viewdata dial-up service created as a Prestel project of East Midland Allied Press, the publishing and printing group. Micronet had its roots in the...

They may be smiling now, but they are about to encounter... Psyclapse and Bandersnatch

Imagine had formed when programming wunderkind Eugene Evans and two other senior staff left well-known software house Bug-Byte, which had been famous for Commodore and Sinclair games. The company expanded...

The New Tandy 102: Technology ni yoru shinpo

It's three years since Tandy launched its TRS-80/100 portable computer, and it's back with an updated model, which is smaller and now comes with a built-in modem. It's also completely lost the TRS-80...

Amstrad CPC 6128: While other computers are still under starters orders, you're off and running

The Amstrad CPC 6128 (although the CPC part seems to have been dropped) was first launched in the US in June 1985, before appearing in the UK in August the same year. It had only been six months since...

Kaypro PC

The earlier Kaypro 2 luggable, built by Andrew Kay's Non-Linear Systems as a direct competitor to the Osborne 1, was very successful, selling around 10,000 units a month at one point. Its popularity was...

Concurrent CP/M - Multiplies the power of your microcomputer

Digital Research had been set up in 1976 to capitalise on the popularity of Gary Kildall's CP/M operating system - the popular and de-facto standard OS for most serious microcomputers during the 1970s....

Kaypro: Our Winchesters have been winning the West

Microcomputer adverts are never shy of going with the most obvious simile or metaphor, and this one certainly does that with the placement of an actual Winchester shotgun against a Kaypro 10 - the 10MB...

They're both analytical and calculating

It's not that common for microcomputer adverts to get political, but this one from Victor is getting stuck right in, with a comment on the lack of action for small businesses from the prime minister,...