How Lord Alan Sugar's Amstrad CPC 464 changed the face of computing forever

[dcdrac]

How Lord Alan Sugar's Amstrad CPC 464 changed the face of computing forever -

[chinnyhill10]

Shame about the comments on that article. As usual newspaper article comments sections attract utter pond life with an opinion for every situation but not actual braincells. Just loud vile opinions.

[robcfg]

It's amazing how much hidden hate can surface by one simple article...


Ok, maybe Lord Alan wasn't the super genius of the time, but reading a Sinclair die-hard fan call the CPC 'cheap crap' is really ironic because no one used that many cheap and crappy components as Sir Clive (Hello? Microdrives anyone?).


Besides, having its own monitor allowed us to play and program a lot instead of arguing with the family, and I find that the keyboard and monitor quality were absolutely top notch. I mean, no one sane would dare to say the ZX Spectrum's keyboard was anywhere near good....


The C64 has a nice sound chip, and hardware sprites. But it wasn't also the best in computer horsepower. Even the Spectrum was far better.


So, in the end, the CPC was more than a decent machine, and played reasonably well on all fields. And nothing of this really matters anymore. We have our CPCs, great productions keep coming in, so the fun goes on!

[MaV]

The C64 has a nice sound chip, and hardware sprites. But it wasn't also the best in computer horsepower. Even the Spectrum was far better.

Careful! I've seen Commodore guys go berserk at such a statement. Some of them will likely fight to death with you to refute or relativise this claim (sadly).

[CanonMan]

It's amazing how much hidden hate can surface by one simple article...

True. It's also amazing how much of it is factually-incorrect bollocks too!


Normally, I might consider replying and correcting people but there's too much bullsh*t there for me to bother with it all

[dcdrac]

I had a c64 too in the day as well as a Spectrum, the CPC overall was a good all rounder and I used my original CPC6128 right up to the md 90s for word processing and serious work.

[dcdrac]

It is rather odd how much hate the CPC seems to attract.

[ralferoo]

It is rather odd how much jealousy the CPC seems to attract.

Fixed that for you...

[AMSDOS]

It's amazing how much hidden hate can surface by one simple article...


Ok, maybe Lord Alan wasn't the super genius of the time, but reading a Sinclair die-hard fan call the CPC 'cheap crap' is really ironic because no one used that many cheap and crappy components as Sir Clive (Hello? Microdrives anyone?).


Besides, having its own monitor allowed us to play and program a lot instead of arguing with the family, and I find that the keyboard and monitor quality were absolutely top notch. I mean, no one sane would dare to say the ZX Spectrum's keyboard was anywhere near good....


The C64 has a nice sound chip, and hardware sprites. But it wasn't also the best in computer horsepower. Even the Spectrum was far better.


So, in the end, the CPC was more than a decent machine, and played reasonably well on all fields. And nothing of this really matters anymore. We have our CPCs, great productions keep coming in, so the fun goes on!

When I originally read that article I didn't have any problems with it and I thought it was quite good, but after having another look at it since people have start to rant about it, it appears to have changed a little bit. Initially I saw no hate in it.

[robcfg]

The article is not really the problem, but the comments.


One thing is to joke as we do here, and another one is to rant so bitterly.


You know, I have over a hundred machines at home, and each and every one has its own beauty. I have a soft spot for the Atari 800XL for being my first computer, and the CPC for being the computer that made me enjoy computing throughout my childhood.

[dcdrac]

The article is not really the problem, but the comments.


One thing is to joke as we do here, and another one is to rant so bitterly.


You know, I have over a hundred machines at home, and each and every one has its own beauty. I have a soft spot for the Atari 800XL for being my first computer, and the CPC for being the computer that made me enjoy computing throughout my childhood.

Pretty much the same for me the CPC was not my first  computer but it I is the one I had the fondest memories of and seeing the ones I have now come alive again has been great

[dcdrac]

Just posted this as a reply to the other comments

I had the full range of 8 bit machines in the 80s and the 16 bits the Amiga and ST.

The Amstrad CPC was a good all round machine it had its faults, but so did all the others, the Spectrum for me was not great but it did have its place.

The C64 good games machine but I used for nothing much else.

The CPC I had 464, 664 , 6128 and a 6128 Plus, a technical tour de force if there ever was one.

two BBCs a B and Master.

Of all those the only ones I have bothered to replace instead of using emulators are the CPCS and the Beebs,

What puzzles me though out of all this is the sheer bitterness directed towards this computer, it is no where near being rubbish, I suspect most of the vitriol on display here is getting directed at Alan Sugar by proxy via this decent all round computer.

[Gryzor]

Good answer. Yeah, that hatred and vitriol doesn't make much sense...   

[Trebmint]

Most of the hate is I'd assume directed at Sugar and the comparison of him and Steve Jobs probably riled a few Apple lovers. I guess they are similar in that they're both fairly dislikeable people. Also Amstrad had a pretty poor reputation before the CPC, so the actually very well built and reliable CPC & PcW ranges are tarnished with the cheapness of the name.


Given that I'd assume that the top 3 British computers ever are  probably 1. PcW (with 7m) 2. Spectrum (with 5m) & 3. CPC (with 3m). Id say the CPC deserves a bit of a write up whatever these idiots who clearly never used the machine think



A few points people make are probably correct, but most are wildly inaccurate

[Sykobee (Briggsy)]

The Raspberry Pi is over 2 million now, I guess that's already the 4th biggest selling British computer?


So sad, how such an energetic and innovative fledgling industry in the 80s went nowhere in the end for the British (and European) companies. Amstrad lasted the longest, but ultimately going the PC route put the writing on the wall.


Sadly the PC20 / PC200 weren't done right - they could have been the "CPC 2", in 1988, if they'd not cheaped out on the graphics and audio.

[AMSDOS]

A lot of interesting things could have been done with the PC20 and was Amstrad's attempt in creating something to rival the Amiga & 16bit Atari's, it might of had more potential if it were more like the PC Jnr I suppose? 

[Gryzor]

Well, the PC Jr was an utter failure and it was marketed by IBM themselves, I fail to see how anyone else would have fared better As for their PC, I don't think PCs could rival 16 bitters for gaming back then... don't forget they also had the 1512/1640 which were targeting PC/business users, and these were big successes.     

[AMSDOS]

Well, the PC Jr was an utter failure and it was marketed by IBM themselves, I fail to see how anyone else would have fared better As for their PC, I don't think PCs could rival 16 bitters for gaming back then... don't forget they also had the 1512/1640 which were targeting PC/business users, and these were big successes.   

The Jnr would have been done in by the price back in 1983/4, though over the years the machine seems to have become sparked interest from groups which suggests to me the machine had some stuff going for it. The PC-20 which would be similar to the Jnr in some regard doesn't have anything like that. 

[Bryce]

I think the people who are interested in the Jnr now are just trying to get it to do anything more than it could originally. It was an absolute failure, copying anything from it would be a bad idea. If it failed for IBM back then, it would have been a flop for Amstrad too.

Bryce.

[chinnyhill10]

The Jnr would have been done in by the price back in 1983/4, though over the years the machine seems to have become sparked interest from groups which suggests to me the machine had some stuff going for it.

Sugar saw the way the market was going in the USA where the Amiga and ST were flops. In the early 90's Amstrad launched a number of gaming bundles as part of their PC ranges usually with press interviews saying that the market was heading towards the PC and the Amiga and ST were failing (check out any number of issues of New Computer Express).


Of course Amstrad were totally correct, but they were simply too early. By 1995 people were coming to accept they would have to spend 800 quid on a PC gaming rig. But when Amstrad were launching the PC bundles in 1991/92 nobody was interested.


As for the PC200 it was a fiasco. They would have been better investing that cash in an updated CPC.

[dcdrac]

It is odd amstrads timing seemed to go completely screwy in the 1990's

[ralferoo]

It is odd amstrads timing seemed to go completely screwy in the 1990's

Asmtrad's original direction was seeing what was selling well in the market (e.g. hifis, computers) and making a mass produced, all-in-one, and more importantly cheaper solution. At some point, they shifted to trying to lead the market and came up with quite a few products that were good but nobody really knew they needed, e.g. the em@iler, which didn't really sell too well.

I guess if you consider chinnyhill's comment that they were just too early, that frames the PC200 in this context - that people at the time thought that PCs were for business and home computers were for more colourful games. Obviously, time showed that business users wanted more colours and home users eventually wanted to do more businessy things, so the migration to PC for everything was inevitable result.

To be fair, Amstrad also probably knew that given the install base of Amiga and Atari, they could never create something to compete in that area and take market share, so looking for a blue water opportunity by applying their already successful desktop PC business to a new area was probably the smartest move, even if it didn't work out.