Amstrad PCs

Amstrad's initial forays into the Personal Computer market had been highly successful with the likes of the CPC and PCW ranges but neither were PC compatible but that all changed with the arrival of the PC1512 in 1986.

PC1512

By today's standard the specification is rather poor but at the time of the launch it was superior to the 8086 machines that IBM was producing at the time and significantly cheaper. £399 plus VAT would buy you a monochrome display, single 5.25 drive, 512k of memory (upgradeable to 640k) and an 8086 V20 processor running at 8mhz. It was sold with an adapted version of MSDOS 3.2, DOSPlus (an enhanced version of CP/M86) and GEM (a graphical user interface). Some came bundled with a few games or Ability (an integrated package consisting of Word Processor, Spreadsheet and Database). Another £100 got you an MCGA colour monitor capable of displaying 16 colours although only 4 at a time.

The design was somewhat eccentric but allowed for high build quality at low build cost. Everything was hardwired onto the printed circuit board including the serial and printer ports and the display adapter. An area of RAM was set aside called the NVR or Non-Volatile Ram which was kept alive by four household batteries. A special program was supplied to modify system variables and hold Command.Com if required. The mouse driver sometimes gives problems as it is wired via the keyboard somehow. A software patch is required to stop the mouse fouling the clock display. The power supply for the PC is housed in the monitor presumably to allow the main box to run cooler. Originally there was no fan fitted to the machine but unsubstatiated press reports that the machine was prone to overheating forced the company into fitting fans. I know of no machine that has ever given a problem in this respect with or without a fan.

The machines are upgradeable but only just. The PC1512 is an XT rather than the later AT design from which all modern PC's are descended. Therefore later AT style IDE drives won't work and additional drives must be compatible with the existing controller. Therefore, fitting a hard drive isn't as simple on an XT as on an AT as it has to be supplied with a matched controller usually on a card of some kind that fitted into one of the slots at the back of the machine. Hard drives were supplied on later machines (typically 20Mb although some were only 10Mb) with a board already fitted into one of the slots connected by a ribbon connector. The easiest way for a user to upgrade was to fit a hard card (a card that fits into a slot with a hardrive fixed to it). Upgrade to EGA or VGA display is NOT possible as the connections are of the round DIN type rather than the more standard 9 pin D type connector (however the later PC1640 can be upgraded - see below). Upgrading the RAM is a matter of adding extra chips (actual chips NOT SIMM's) to the main board. Upgrading the DOS is slightly more tricky as later utilities don't work well with the hardware of the 1512. KEYBUK must be used for example otherwise the mouse won't work properly. Later versions also tend to take up more memory which could compromise the usefulness of upgrading (MSDOS 3.2 leaves around 600k of free memory whereas 5.0 leaves only 580k approx). You cannot use a standard IBM PC keyboard - only the PC1512/1640 ones will work. The keyboard also has a socket for a joystick - just about any 8 bit micro joystick will work apart from those designed for the Sinclair Spectrum Plus 2.

PC1640

Then along came the PC1640 (PC6400 in the USA) which enhanced the machines basic design in significant ways. It could now be bought with a EGA colour display although the power supply is still in the monitor. It can be upgraded to VGA (by adding another display adapter - XT only type) but the old monitor has to be retained to supply the power. It was supplied with 640k of memory as standard (as the name suggests) but retained the 8mhz processor. DosPlus was dropped and supplied only with MSDOS 3.2. I have heard of 1640's with hard drives being upgraded to run Windows 3.0 but runs rather slowly (Windows 3.1 won't work as real mode was removed). Some were sold with Locoscript PC but they were doctored so that it would only run on a 1640 and would slip into a demo mode on any other machine. 20Mb hardrives were fitted on the more expensive machines although access times were a little slow. It should be noted that the 2086, 3086 and 5086 were all XT designs based on the PC1640.

PPC512/PPC640

Based on the PC1640 technology, the PPC512/640 family of 'portables' which were too heavy to carry for any distance (I know 'cos I've tried it) and were too big to be called laptops. Nevertheless, they are excellent machines and sold well at the time particularly as laptops at the time were very expensive.

The basic machine had 512k of memory, a single 3.5 inch drive and an LCD screen that was difficult to read in bad light as it was not backlit. It came with a proper version of MSDOS 3.3 and personal organizer software that would only run on the PPC. There was the usual serial and parallel ports but no expansion slots so the thing couldn't be upgraded (there are expansion ports but no one was able to make use of them). It was powered either by household batteries (costing some £12 to renew and lasting less than an hour) or by virtue of an external power supply. It could also be plugged into an external CGA colour monitor from a PC1640. No machine was sold with a hard drive (although a third party supplier offered the facility along with a backlight) but could be bought with twin disk drives. Upgrading to 640k of memory is hampered by the fact that the board came without the neccesary sockets unlike the PC1512 and can only be upgraded by an expert.

The PPC640 had not only the added bonus of 640k of memory and a built in modem with software to drive it. This made it a very popular machine both new and second hand although the 2400 speed would be too slow for today's needs except for possibly email. The machine was otherwise identical to the PPC512.

PC20/PC200

These were based on the PC1640 and were designed to be sold as games machines to rival the Atari ST and Amiga which it simply failed to do. The PC20 was beige in colour but otherwise identical to the later PC200 which was black. The PC200 also has the distinction (?) as being badged with the Sinclair name so officially was a Sinclair PC200. It had a similar case to an Atari ST with a built in keyboard with a flap tt th beack to allow access to the slots although boards if fitted would stick out of the top (?). Was sold with a mouse, optional monitor (could be plugged into a TV), MSDOS 3.3, GEM, 640k of memory and a few games on 3.5 inch disk (no hard drive and no way to fit one). Not a particualrly successful machine but now quite rare and therefore collectable.

2000 Series

The PC 2000 series was to be Amstrad's crowning glory. Instead it gave the company a bad name it just did not deserve. For the record, initial batches were sent out with MSDOS 4.0 which were faulty (not Amstrad's fault) and a faulty disk controller (again not down to Amstrad). These were put right without question but the media had a field day and the damage was done. Amstrad never really recovered from this.

So what of the machines. They were and still are excellent machines with a specification that still make it a very useable machine. Principally sold as business machines with either an 80286 (PC 2286) or 80386 (PC 2386) with a replacement for the PC1512/1640 in the form of the 2086. All machines benefitted from VGA graphics and the monitor no longer carried the power supply. Of them all the 2386 was the most impressive sporting a 80386 DX processor running at 20mhz with 4 megs of RAM as standard, 3.5 inch disk drive and a 65 meg hard drive. A 5.25 drive could be added but the casing could not house it so an external design had to be developed. It was bundled with MSDOS 4.01 and Windows 386 (forebear of Windows 3.0) and could best be described as virtually flawless. Yet it sold very poorly in part due to it's peculiar design but mostly due to bad luck.

3000 Series

The next to arrive was the 3000 series with almost an identical line up of processors and displays although it was now housed in a much more standard looking box. Still the same machine but sold much better. Early versions of the 3386 was sold with a processor cache but this was removed for some reason on later models. All 3386 models also only sported a 80386 SX processor and so ran a little slower than the 2386. It also came with MSDOS 3.3 in line with most other manufacturers of the time. Upgrading the memory is possible but a little fiddly as each slot must be filled and have a SIMM of the same size in each.

4000 Series

The next PC to arrive was called the 4386 but confusingly wasn't really an upgrade but instead came in a smaller box but retaining the 80386 SX and sporting an 80Mb drive. Perhaps Amstrad were testing the new box design before going with it across the range. Anyway it was apparently successful as the 5000 series used the same box design.

5000 Series

The 5286 was marketed as games machine, the first PC to be so designated by any manufacturer. Came with an 80286 processor running at 16mhz (which was slow but useable) and a sound card as standard manufactured by Amstrad themselves but soundblaster/adlib compatible. It came with 640k of memory and a few games. Never really sold vey well. There was a 5086 version but not 5386 presumably because there was still a 4386 available. Both the 4386 and 5286 were marketed as 'family packs' just prior to their demise.

The Rest

The 6000 series didn't really have much impact. All I can remember is that the 6486 was an Amstrad machine but the other models were network ready built by Intel.

The 7000 series was probably Amstrad's best machine since the PC1640 but was hampered by bad press reviews which again were undeserved. I remember them being sold off by TANDY not so very long ago. The only other details I can remember were a choice of monitor resolutions and 170 meg hard drives.

That nearly completes this article. Just a few loose ends. There was a 1000 series which were base units sold without monitors. The 8000 series never materialised presumably to avoid mixing them up with the PCW range which were not PC's. The 9000 series was the last of the Amstrad PC's and was a rather dull ordinary PC compatible. One other PC was the MegaPC which was a PC with a slot for megadrive carts so it could be used as both a PC and a MegaDrive. Why on earth this idea did not gain more acceptance is a mystery as it seems such a logical thing to do.

Finally, there was the ALT-286/386 portables which were rather heavy and bulky but vey useable laptops. Sold with either a 80286 or an 80386SX processors rated at 16Mhz with either 20Mb (on the 286) or 170Mb (on the 386) hard drives. The memory on the 386 is limited to 4Mb and cannot be upgraded. Was supplied with MSDos and Windows 3.1 and had an excellent VGA display. A stylish and well presented machine although a little on the heavy side.

All in all, Amstrad were victims of their own success. The PC1512 proved that cheap PC's could be made and could be sold on the high street. Everyone else jumped on the bandwagon and Amstrad became just another PC manufacturer although the Amstrad legacy is still with us to this day. Amstrad made PC's cheaper by putting all the relevent adapters and controllers on the main board instead of supplying them on addon boards something which all motherboard manufacturers do to this day. Amstrad showed that it was possible to manufacture and sell PC's cheaply and without that I doubt PC's would be as cheap as they are today.