The late, great TRS-80

[Fred Cisin]

> > Here we go again.
> > What does "First Off-the-shelf Microcomputer" mean?
> > First to go into design?
> > First announced?
> > First demo'd?
> > First prototyped?
> > First to enter production?
> > First "released"? (what does THAT mean?)
> > First that could be ordered?
> > First delivered?
> > First that could be purchased for cash in a store?
>
On Mon, 25 Jun 2007, Liam Proven wrote:
> Fair point and some good questions.

but far from a complete list of the variant ways to define "first"

I had never thought that my personal issue of price was valid for
determining "first", but,  . . .

> For me, personally, what mattered was the first one under £100. (At
> that time, in the early 1980s, under US$100 would have done as a
> comparison.)

I remember one time in the ealry 1980s checking into exchange rates,
particularly dollar/yen for Epson HC20, RC20, etc.  At that time, a USD
was about 300 yen, and there were IIRC 2.85 USD per British Pound.  It
sounds like Timex was giving us an exceptional deal, relative to Sinclair
in the UK.

> As far as I heard back then, Apple did the first machine
> for under $1000. Very nice for those rich Americans in the prosperous
> north or coastal states. Pure fantasy for a middle-class English kid
> in the Europe. That was possibly the family's net income for several
> months.

ISTR a base price for Apple around $1200 USD
I was running a successful business at the time, so my funds for following
up that particular fantasy were substantially better than when I was a
kid.

> For a more formal definition, though, I'd say "the first personal
> computer" that mattered would probably be the first
> microprocessor-based machine, with a QWERTY keyboard and an actual VDU
> of some form - i.e., more than a single line of text - that ordinary
> customers could pay money for and receive in return. Not pre-order,
> but buy and receive. How or where doesn't matter.

Well, there does seem to have been some game-playing with prices in other
markets.  The TRS80 was $599 in the USA, but $399 without monitor and tape
recorder.

Were ALL micros cheaper in the US than in the UK?


--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com