A history of the microcomputer industry in 300 adverts

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...

Future-proof multi-user CP/M system

Here's an early advert for 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. Essentially...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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 Independent Business Systems (IBS) Incorporated...

Who says you can't improve on the best?

Announced in July 1985 in this glossy gate-fold four-page magazine insert, the BBC Plus, or BBC Micro B+ to give it its full name, was the long-awaited update to the original BBC Micro - the influential...

When you're left on your own, you're not alone.

1993 might have marked the tail end of the home computer era - only Commodore's Amiga and Atari's ST were still on the market - but it also marked the dawn of another: the World Wide Web. Although you...

There is a place in this world for DOS and Windows. And you're looking at it.

OS/2 was an operating system originally intended to replace Microsoft's PC-DOS on IBM's then-latest IBM PC - the PS/2. Intended as a multi-tasking and windowing operating system, it was initially co-developed...

No wonder our customers love us

It's another advert for Dell, and one which effectively sums up the end of the home computer era. The entry-level Dell System 333 s/L shown in the advert was available for £859 plus VAT, which is around...

The new Apricot Xen-LS II. Everything you could unreasonably demand from a computer.

Apricot, or ACT - Applied Computer Techniques - had started out as a mainframe accounting bureau in 1965. The company launched its first computer - the ACT Series 800, in 1980. This was actually built...