I appreciate the amount of research and polish going into these. As a 23-year-old American I've had zero exposure to microcomputers, so hearing about them from someone who was there is a real treat.
It's refreshing to see your comment it's good to know that young people are open minded enough to take an interest in the humble beginnings of microcomputers. I feel blessed that I lived through these times it's a generational thing we all go through I guess. I say this because I am 44 and sometimes I've wished I was born earlier so I could have lived through the swinging sixties. We all take everything for granted in a way and we should embrace and enjoy every minute we are on this Earth and make the best of all opportunities that come our way otherwise you will look back with regret (I advise NEVER to regret anything even if you are justified to do so because all the time we are alive there is still time to make good )
@@TheFusedplug I'm 50 and I'm glad to have enjoyed the era of the microcomputers. Back then my father bought me a CPC-464 with color monitor. Those were the days...
I'm from France and the CPC was the microcomputer we needed at the time. C64 was unheard of, Thomsons were in the schools (but not really comparable to what the CPC had to offer) and all the DOS/Apple II stuff was crazy talk.
The Amstrad CPC was released the same year as Sinclair QL, Commodore C16, Commodore plus 4, Enterprise, Sinclair ZX Spectrum+ and Spectravideo 728. The one with success was the Amstrad CPC. The magazines were very impressed with the build quality of the Amstrad CPC. The return rate because of faulty equipment was much lower than the competition including the ZX Spectrums and Commodore C64.
+Ivar Fiske I think Kim is being far too harsh on the CPC in his videos. The CPC is actually well made on the whole and has a large database of great games and also serious software, with some of the games being technically good; infact many of them were beyond what the Commodore 64 was capable of with graphic resolution and colour, or wire frame 3D or racing games etc. I owned a rubber key Spectrum 48K and had to return it under guarantee about four times, before I received one that worked and lasted without going faulty. However my CPC never needed returning and was used for thousands of hours without once going wrong. I think the CPC was a very well rounded computer, which could cover many areas competently; something you could not say about the C64 or others.
In 1987 we got our first Amstrad. The Amstrad PC1512, quite a popular MS-DOS (with Gem Desktop) PC. The magazine "PC PLUS" was actually originally called "PC PLUS Amstrad". There was quite a high uptake of that machine and I remember playing lots of games on it such as Arkanoid, Wizball, Bruce Lee etc
When it comes to the build quality of the Amstrad CPC range, I'd say they were top quality. I had all sorts of problems with the Spectrum and C64, including overheating, cassette issues etc.. But my Amstrad never had problems - and I know it was the same for my friends and other Amstrad users. From what I've heard/read, you can buy an Amstrad and it will still work fine. But I don't know if the monitors still work, but probably not. Anyway, you can buy an RGB scart cable these days. Also, as much as the Amstrad had lots of Spectrum ports, games that were specially made for the machine were often very colourful and impressive.
I've got about 5 of those fucking Amstrad Em@ilers (been intending to do a video on them for years), Thought they didn't work but it turns out any machine that wasn't registered by the time the servers went down are essentially bricked. Also, typical scummy Sugar practices, yup you could play spectrum games on them, but you could only RENT them for 70p a day (of £3.50 for a week) also the entire catalog was Ocean games strangely. Annddd they didn't have a built in answer machine, every day it would automatically call in to a premium rate number to retrieve calls and emails, if you wanted it to or not, loads of complaints from OAP's who had run up an extra £70 a month phone bills from simply having it plugged in.
Kim Justice It was an absolute bomb, Tesco bought all the remaining stock and were flogging them off for £7.99 each according to an old Hotukdeals page I found when searching for info. As savvy as Sugar was in the 80s, he turned into a complete moron from the 90s onwards, just like him pushing those YouView boxes now that no one wants.
Just noticed that the QL advert mis-spells Macintosh. That would stand out a mile these days, but I guess at the time most people wouldn't have noticed or cared as it wasn't really a household name.
It was only ever shown at the launch event. Never shown on TV. Never shown at cinemas as planned. So hardly anyone saw it until the modern era when it became ubiquitous thanks to micro men.
i have realy enjoyed your series,i think the UK and euro game scenes are completly forgotton,and there very important,just imagine no ARM chips for a start,thanks so much
I don't know why you basically skipped the three most successful Amstrad lines. The Amstrad PCW sold 8 million computers with monitor and printer. A huge success and big money maker. The total sale of Sinclair ZX Spectrum including Amstrad sales of the Spectrum, was only 6 millions. Amstrad dominated the PC market in Europe for several years from 1986 to around 1990 with 12 million machines sold. The Sky decoders sold really well too. A small number of was tried sold in the USA through their Spanish importer Indescomp, it failed badly. But it gave us and the French the Amstrad CPC 6128. The Amstrad CPC 6128 was the best selling Amstrad CPC in France. A disc based machine with 128 kB memory. One of the reasons for its success was that France had its own TV standard. As the Amstrad CPC came with its own monitor included, that was not a problem.
I've put this one off as I loved my Amstrad growing up; it's hard to reconsile personal affection for the machine with the nature of Alan Sugar's strategy of maximum profit for minimum input and bugger the quality. It feels like unrequited love! Still the Amstrad all in one idea was a goody, even if the tech wasn't. Great video, though: thank you once again for taking the time to make.
The CPC464 was my first computer when I was a kid. I remember trying my hand at BASIC, typing what seemed like 100's of lines of code just to get a blue and yellow flashing circle - that's if I was lucky and didn't get a lad of syntax error messages. Also, waiting for donkeys trying to load a game on a tape with that whirly noise, then watching it crash and having to start again. We must have had a load of patience back then!
I loved my Amstrad CPC 6128 when I was a kid. I learned to code BASIC and Z80 assembly on it, which gave me my love of programming (which is my job these days). Mind you, a part of it was that it was a present from my granddad for Christmas 1990, not long before he died in 1991 - so I have a personal reason for my fondness of the CPC.
I would like to add another point of view. Here in Germany in the mid 80ies the CPC and the C64 were the main popular computers, at least among my friends. The keyboard of the CPC 6128 was a great business type keyboard. The programming language basic (Locomotive basic) was good. Shipped with the cpc also was CPM, which helped me switch to DOS and linux later on. In my opinion the CPC was a great jumpboard for later programmers and IT-guys into the world of modern PCs. The programming handbook (basic) of the german Schneider CPC was one of the best guides I have read in my whole life as a programmer. Regarding gaming there were better machines, yes. Your great documentary did miss one thing. The CPC's death was the rare 3 inch floppy drive. In his biography I read, that they got hands on a cheap stock of lots of these drives, and so they built them into the CPCs (and their textprocessing computer Joyce). The floppy disks were robust and cool, double sided, but expensive. I bought my cpc6128 with green monitor for 799 Deutsche Mark in 1987. 10 floppy Disks (3 inch) did cost addional 100 DM. Too expensive compared to the cheap 5,25 floppies of the c64 or the upcoming 3,5 floppies of the Amiga and the PCs.
I'm from the rubber key era. I actually started with a zx81 which had a membrane keyboard! Then a speccy 48k, then an AMstrad CPC 464 with colour monitor, I actually quite liked the machine. Excellent vids btw. Cheers.
not really, Trameil would sue to death people who quit his company and then started another company that would or could compete with him and he also literally fucked all the people that worked for him that did not belong to his inner circle(his sons and his sycophants)
Thanks, I've enjoyed your video, but, like many others have commented here also, I'm rather surprised you did not mentioned the great cheap amstrad PC compatible series Pc1512 and PC1640, they were very popular here in Portugal. With the Intel's 8086 at 8mhz rather than the stock Intel 8088 used in xt's. I grew up with the spectrum and had a PC1512, both very popular and cheap here. Thanks again for the videos.
God, that fucking BBC micro. A suspicious looking teacher with a dodgy mustache tried to get us to use those in the "technology" class when I was 12. Was sure he had put me off computers for life. I hated that damn BBC. Had no clue what I was doing. Now I'm a game developer... shrug!
Another great documentary Kim, I think you've really hit your mark when it comes making videos. I just hope more people get to see them because with quality of your releases, you deserve to be having a 100k subs and more :)
The Amstrad CPC, which is also remembered as "Schneider" as it was distributed by them (Belgium, Germany, etc), did have its personality gaming-wise. It had a mascot, Roland. Many Roland games, some of which were rebranded ports (like, Fred became Roland on the Ropes). And it's apparently this Alan Sugar guy who's behind that character & game range, so it looks like he did care.
+mattyfox666 Agreed, love these vids. History about computing is incredible. Kim, you ought to visit the computer museum in Cambridge.. you would have an incredible time there as they have every, and I mean *every* old computer and console which you can play with.
I was not yet a glint in the milkman's eye in 1983, but had I been about I probably would have eschewed the Speccy of the time for its dead flesh keyboard alone.
I will say that the Locomotive BASIC that came with the CPC was easily one of the best versions BASIC that came with any of the 80s home computers. Certainly leagues ahead of that awful Commodore BASIC. It really got me into programming.
I really do enjoy these types of documentaries you put out. I'm not really informed on the old Micro computers, but I've been really finding them interesting and your stuff is really informative to a newbie like me, especially when its mostly about the British market. Anyway love your work, keep it up :)
The CPC was my first computer - my Dad bought it for me and my siblings around 1989. Although I thought it was okay at the time, I never loved it as much as I loved my future gaming machines such as the Nes and Snes. My favourite game on the system was probably Contra, although there were a couple of other "okay" games such as Dan Dare and Impossible Mission.
Thanks. Would have liked to have seen more on Amstrad's PC compatibles - and an honourable mention should go out to their gloriously awful CP/M business machines of the early 1990s - remember them? They weren't PC compatible, but they looked like PCs. They came with a printer, monitor, Wordstar and LocoScript - or something.
I am 14 and recentley helped my grandad to restore his 1987 amstrad 1640 with a hard drive (fancy) because it wqs all yelow but now it is the correct color after spending probably 23 hours cleaning and re installing the operating system. I realy enjoyed it and hope to try and code on it.
Oh god the Amstrad PCW. My mother, of all people, had one of those and worked from home. It used 3 inch (not 3 1/2 inch) floppies that NOTHING ELSE seemed to use, and she had the 9512 which looked like it had emerged from a car crusher.
Very Interesting. Thanks for that. A CPC6128 was my 2nd computer, after a Vic. I always saw it as better than the spectrum, because mainly I hated the awful keyboard on the speccy. Too me the Spectrum always seemed like it had been cobbled together (especially the early ones). The Amstrad CPC just worked. There was no drama with it, it was built well enough, the software was good enough etc... The Monitor was OK too. I do think you spent too much time on the CPC464 though, the PCW range was hugely successful, and I know people in business today that STILL use them. Thanks.
No mention of the Sorcery game, nor Nonterraqueous, nor of the excellent and quite performant Locomotive BASIC, nor the brilliant concept of copy cursors and the Copy key? And how about underestimating the utility of a RGB monitor I used for over 12 years, first with the CPC464, then with my Atari ST and a quickly soldered 6-pin RGB adapter, and also as a PAL TV monitor for my VHS VCR? That CPC464 (distributed by Schneider in Germany) was such a great first computer to use and study, easily better than the C64 or Speccy. I still have mine in working condition. Anyway, thumbs up from me. Cheers!
Great work, very interesting. The speccy wasn't particularly popular here in Australia, but the CPC systems sold well enough. I didn't have one, but I knew a few who did. I remember seeing the MegaPC thing for sale alongside Amiga 600s, Amiga 1200s and crap Commodore PCs and little black and white compact Macs. I got an A1200, despite Commodore having just gone under when I got it - it still seemed like the best option unless I just wanted to play games - and we had a Sega Master system 2 for that...
Great video! However if you're doing a story of Amstrad in the 80's-90's then you've missed out a huge chunk here - specifically their PC's from the mid 80's onwards - they were hugely successful and market leader for a good number of years. It's kind of ironic that most articles or documentaries about Amstrad - much to my annoyance - they always focus entirely on their PC range and only have a small footnote mention of the CPC, here it's the opposite! lol
My mum used to have an Amstrad 464 Plus, she bought it back in 1989 or so when she decided to go to college once me and my brother were in school and my sister was close to starting school at the time. Played quite a few games on it, I think she's still got the old thing in the attic with all of the games that were bought for it. Feeling old now after watching a few of your videos.
The green monitor was smaller = more practical (to me) and you could use it in a completely dark room. I would have to try the 640 resolution on a colour one, but the screen seemed very much like a tv, so I'm not sure you could study your basic or assembler listings for as long as on a green monitor.
What can I say another master piece, you should honestly consider making video gaming documentaries full time, I couldn't stop the movie out if sheer joy, keep up the amazing work my queen of documentaries.
Nah. Alan Sugar made money on his own without daddy’s help-definitely not a parallel to Trump. Plus, most people in the UK hate Alan Sugar. And they’re leaning Labour now and lost their shit (in a good way) when Corbin won the early general election this year. So yeah. Sugar as PM? Not likely. EDIT: ...oops.
Oh yes. Looking forward to this. The Amstrad 464+ was my computer as a kid, so can't wait to watch this video when I get home from work. Keep up the great work Kim.
The unsung hero is the PCW which sold more than the CPC and speccy combined, or the Amiga and ST combined. Probably the most popular 8bit PC outside the c64.
There is a slight inaccuracy. Many people believe the 128k was solely produced in Spain. This is false. My 126k (toast rack) was built in the UK. These existed before the buyout of Amstrad.
Hey Kim, love the vid. You may be interested to know that Steve Coogan's commentary on the Alan Partridge DVD actually mentions the Amstrad Emailer being used as a prop and why they chose it for Alan's character. It's not much more detail but you may want to check it out.
In a way, yes, but it didn't apply to everything. The Sinclair Executive calculator was quite expensive, costing half an average monthly salary; it undercut the Western products but was a few times more expensive than Japanese ones. That is rich people toy. The Sinclair Black Watch was also not necessarily cheap. And then there's this not so subtle difference. Sinclair computer products were very bare bones, they were the cheapest single item you could buy, but also pretty much the worst. Amstrad is different, it's a very capable full fledged machine which wouldn't have you pay for one extension after the other. Think of the things you'd need to hang onto the cheapest Spectrum to make it whole: cassette recorder, 32K ram expansion cart, soundcard, a joystick adapter... But the basic Amstrad came fully loaded, it even came with the monitor. Amstrad was all about convenient ready to roll packages that were on the whole still in the impulse price range. I think Sinclair's marketing decisions are actually born from a kind of slightly naive pragmatism. If, as alleged, he didn't think computers were of any actual use, it made total sense to make them bare bones and cheap. But it's Sugar who mastered the marketing of impulse purchase.
I'd say that while there are some similarities, there are huge differences, too. Sinclair was an innovator (that's not to say all of his inventions were successful, of course!) with his pocket calculators, micro televisions and computers - and I think saw himself as a benevolent force for bringing new high-technology to "the man in the street". But that affordability inevitably meant quality compromises, particularly in terms of electronic components. Sinclair's greatest failing was that sometimes he simply assumed that there would be market demand when a little research would have told him there was actually (almost) none - notably the C5. Sometimes he'd try to convince the public that their lack of interest was due to their ignorance: ie "You don't realise it yet but you *need* a C5". Those products that did sell well largely did so through luck and good marketing as much as anything. Whether his products were successful or not, Sinclair wasn't interested in personal wealth: ironically a lot of the profit from his successful products was ploughed into R&D for subsequently unsuccessful ones (eg the QL and the C5). Sugar, on the other hand, is no innovator, simply jumping on a number of existing bandwagons (hi-fi, computers, set-top boxes). Sugar did carry out market research and found a gullible public. You might argue that the PCW range was innovative in its day but all Sugar did was to cobble together some old hardware, a cheap monitor and some (actually very good) Wordprocessor software. But most of Sugar's products were of deliberately poor quality in order to undercut competitors and dominate the budget market to fund his plutocratic lifestyle. Sinclair's take on "affordability" was borne of benevolence - Sugar's was borne of cynicism.
Dave Matthews You're not wrong, but numerus products that are and were immediately successful and changed how we view things were introduced under circumstances that would show negligible market interest in prior research. Some company heads are simply more successful with that than the others.
Sir Sinclair was a visionary, inventive guy, Cury was the University programmer, and Alan Sugar was only the businessman, can you imagine what would have been the computer world today if these 3 would have worked together? Now we live in a IBM driven world with software written Windows...others occupy a small fraction
From a Belgian point of view, Amstrad barely made any impact here and had the name for making shoddy stuff that didn't last long. The problem with Sugar's approach, is that he considers consumers as walking bags of money and not people with memories. If they buy something and it breaks down in no time or is obviously made out of cheap parts, they won't forget. It would only take so long before people would stop buying his stuff because even though it looks good on paper, if it's not reliable, people steer clear.
Yes, they were rubbish. But they were priced accordingly. If you bought an Amstrad you didn't expect it to sound great and last forever, but if you hadn't got much money, you had got something that would play your records, cassettes and the radio, which was literally much better than nothing. He filled the vital gap between "expensive quality" and "nothing". Just like Sinclair's computers had. People don't understand it seems that Britain has always, even when it had the world's largest empire, been a country of relatively poor people. We still are, though it is less evident thanks to ubiquitous cheap electronics. We live in tiny old houses that should have been knocked down decades ago, we have always managed to engineer our economy to disadvantage the masses. As an example, by the 1970s, Germany who had "lost the war" had a far better standard of living than Britain, which "won the war". It has always been like this and, thanks to the idiocy of the British public being fooled into shooting themselves in the foot (e.g. ridiculous planning controls that make housing of a decent standard unaffordable, supported by nonsense about protecting the countryside), it probably always will be like this. Hence, we need companies that produce cheap crap products for cheap crap people. And thus Amstrad, Sinclair and, these days, the rise and rise of shops selling tat for a pound. And you may remember that your last Amstrad was cheap and nasty and the cassette players ran at the wrong speed, but most of all it was cheap. So you buy another one. Because it's that or nothing.
Your argument would be correct if Amstrad was really that cheap but its computers weren't that much cheaper than more solid brands. Especially later when they made IBM-PC compatibles, they were only 10% cheaper compared to much more reliable alternatives and the cost savings usually meant cheap lower-end-brand parts which caused all sorts of compatibility issues.
redavatar And the Amstrads were pretty good, too. They were typical of the reasonably priced computers which kids with less money could afford. If your parents were middle class, you might have a BBC or a Commodore 64, with disk drives and all sorts. If you were working class, you had a Spectrum or Amstrad, and a heap of cassette tapes. And my argument was actually focussing on the stereo systems, really, anyway.
***** not strictly true there were 100s of thousands of UK working class kids hat had a C64 and a tape deck with the machine hooked up to the colour tv. OK though I agree very few working class kids had a C64 disk drive and even fewer had a proper monitor.
While I appreciate the research that's obviously gone into this, you've missed several important points: 1. the CPC isn't as technically unnoteworthy as you made out, as the computing magazines of the time attested; and 2. the experts in the field at the time were not saying Amstrad were coming in too late - in fact, the CPC was widely praised prior to its launch, with many experts considering it the best machine coming to market. No, Amstrad didn't produce a machine that beat all comers but that was clearly not its purpose. It did change things though, as the all-in-one systems we all have these days clearly shows. In many ways, the CPC is a victim of timing; and if it had been quicker to market, the fanboy legions would be singing a different tune to the one we are all so tired of hearing now.
I imagine many mainland Europeans will say a different thing too about the CPC. If nothing else, I think Lord Sugar's push into that untapped market was the big thing he should be remembered for. Not trying to pig-headedly tap into an American market that was essentially on lock-down between the C64 and, later on, IBM compatibles. The idea that anything from Sinclair would succeed here is laughable, and even the BBC wasn't going to break the hold IBM had. Interestingly, the IBM PC was also an all-in-one piece of kit, as were many PC compatibles. Lord Sugar was clearly onto something. Something "good enough" with all the bits and bobs you need from the getgo, will always win the day.
+Jesus Zamora Amstrad didn't try to enter USA with the Amstrad CPC 6128. It was the Spanish distributor that had a go at the US market. If Kim Justice is saying that Amstrad was having a go at the US market, he hasn't researched that part good enough
dartsma464 She also made the point that Amstrad made no effort for the US, which was part of why Amstrad were so successful. They saw how Sinclair (with the Timex Sinclair models) and Acorn (with the BBC Micro) failed, and decided not to jump into the meatgrinder. I can tell you as an American who grew up post-crash, any attempt would have been just as disastrous as Sinclair and Acorn. Hell, I hadn't even KNOWN Sinclair and Acorn tried to break America until I started watching these videos. When I grew up, you had "computers" (IBMs) and Apples. That's how consolidated the market was after the gaming crash and the microcomputer price war.
Kim, you're on fire with these videos! The research, the editing, the topics, the wealth of information; and they grip you, they're fascinating! Thank you so much for making them for us all. I hope big things come your way, you deserve it. it's so good seeing the history of videogames and computers from the British perspective, a viewpoint which has seemingly been neglected or pushed aside on youtube and 'games media' due to the passion our American cousins have for Atari and Nintendo. Please keep up the good work, it's great to listen to someone so intelligent, knowledgeable and passionate about this stuff : )
loved my cpc 664 still play the games on my PC now. stock market and classic racing my fav games and a few others. still funny playing football manager. loved my vic20 and c64 before my amstrad
Really interesting, well made and insightful video. Surprised you have relatively few subs so far, I can see huge potential in your channel if you keep this kind of quality up!
Nice video ;) I recall one of the major selling point of the 464 was the included Easy Amsword wordprocessor. Today we dont think much about getting a wordprocessor, but back then getting one for free & along with a good keyboard computer really was something. When i had to step up from my belowed ZX81 back then it was a tough choice, however the colourfull amstrad screenshots in mags won me over. I think i recall Sugar saying that to him the 464 was just a big calculator & it was never really supposed to be a gaming machine, something that is quite apparent when you read thru early amstrad mags & get one gray page after another with spreadsheets & databases & pcw blue pages.
Whats that tune playing over most of the section about sugar buying sinclair? It sounds like what I can only describe as '8 bit PiL'...in other words bloody demented brilliance!
These documentary style bio vids have become my favorite of all the guys who do this kind of thing within the gaming genre. I've watched a ton of them, from many different people, and these are the best blend of information, humor, and personality. The gaming historian could maybe learn a thing or 2 :) Both great, but I think you grab the lead buddy :) Thanks for the great content!
To be fair, I don't think Kim is essentially ill-informed - I've NEVER gotten that from any of her videos. I just think that she's let her personal opinion of Lord Sugar get in the way of her opinion of the CPC line.
So enjoyable, I love being taken back to my childhood in this way. Like many of us I had friends with Spectrums, CPC's, Commodore +4's and I had to make do with an old and arthritic VIC20. I had the last laugh in 1991 when my parents bought me an A500+ just in time for all of my friends to ditch the Amiga and buy mega drives. I guess I was forever destined to be behind the times but I wouldn't have it any other way. Keep up the top work Kim!
Vectrex here in America was of a similar concept; except it had a monitor with wireframe graphics and it used cartridges instead of disks or tapes. And Vectrex was more of a video game system, and not a computer (hope I am saying this right). This was back in the early 80s (I am guessing around 1982-1983).
Spent a good deal of my time repairing Amstrad Tower Systems and the like, in the 80's, some were relatively new when they died. Now though, people like these things, at the moment I've an Amstrad SM102 stereo in the workshop to restore. The build quality's a king compared to the likes of "Crosley" and the like, with many more features such as Bass and Treble controls. The BSR low-voltage belt drive turntables used in these Amstrads and also Binatones, Murphys, etc, were ghastly things. The speed wouldn't stay spot on, and in the case of Tower Systems, and the SM101/102's was caused by a bloody awful switching arrangement. With the Towers, I'd replace it with a BSR shaded-pole motor driven single-play deck. Easily sourced either new or from the bins ! The SM101/102's needed a different mod, with a new motor with built-in control. The older BSR''s were too heavy for the pop-out motor unit to cope with. Amazing the rubbish I recall :-)
My father bought a Schneider CPC-464 after he sold the ZX Spectrum 48k. As a kid, I thought the CPC had excellent graphics and I kind of liked that the ZX Spectrum ports looked the same as they did on a real Spectrum. It was familiar and I liked both systems. Nowadays I feel that all of those ports were a missed chance to make the CPC stand out more. Graphics-wise it was waaaay better than the Spectrum and it was just lazy programming, if you ask me. I also remember a number of games that looked stunning on the CPC: Fruity Frank, Feud, Gryzor, Renegade, to name just a few off the top of my head.
In the late '80s when I got my first computer the choice I had was either the Amiga or the Atari, I got the Amiga 500 and initially had it hooked up to the TV. The IBM compatible PC or the Apple was just too expensive at the time. I later ended up getting a 1084s monitor and sold my 500 for an Amiga 2000. When I started University in 1991 I was using the Amiga with a PC emulator for schoolwork, was it slow, especially for compiling programs which took about 30 minutes to compile. This didn't last for long and I ended up doing the work at school which at the time from memory was on a 486. Being in Australia at the time I didn't even know an English computer scene existed.
If you liked this then think about having a gander through my social media, and get yourself on my Patreon: www.patreon.com/KimbleJustice
I appreciate the amount of research and polish going into these. As a 23-year-old American I've had zero exposure to microcomputers, so hearing about them from someone who was there is a real treat.
It's refreshing to see your comment it's good to know that young people are open minded enough to take an interest in the humble beginnings of microcomputers. I feel blessed that I lived through these times it's a generational thing we all go through I guess. I say this because I am 44 and sometimes I've wished I was born earlier so I could have lived through the swinging sixties.
We all take everything for granted in a way and we should embrace and enjoy every minute we are on this Earth and make the best of all opportunities that come our way otherwise you will look back with regret (I advise NEVER to regret anything even if you are justified to do so because all the time we are alive there is still time to make good )
@@TheFusedplug I'm 50 and I'm glad to have enjoyed the era of the microcomputers. Back then my father bought me a CPC-464 with color monitor. Those were the days...
I'm from France and the CPC was the microcomputer we needed at the time. C64 was unheard of, Thomsons were in the schools (but not really comparable to what the CPC had to offer) and all the DOS/Apple II stuff was crazy talk.
Brilliant as always. 10/10
Love all the old adverts you manage to dig up.
Cameos by Brian Clough, Alan Partridge and the Mega Powers, it's why I love your videos more than anyone else's on youtube.
Middlesbrough are shite. Stop boring us.
@@tigereye1208 It is not he who is the bore here Sir.
The Amstrad CPC was released the same year as Sinclair QL, Commodore C16, Commodore plus 4, Enterprise, Sinclair ZX Spectrum+ and Spectravideo 728. The one with success was the Amstrad CPC. The magazines were very impressed with the build quality of the Amstrad CPC. The return rate because of faulty equipment was much lower than the competition including the ZX Spectrums and Commodore C64.
+Ivar Fiske I think Kim is being far too harsh on the CPC in his videos. The CPC is actually well made on the whole and has a large database of great games and also serious software, with some of the games being technically good; infact many of them were beyond what the Commodore 64 was capable of with graphic resolution and colour, or wire frame 3D or racing games etc. I owned a rubber key Spectrum 48K and had to return it under guarantee about four times, before I received one that worked and lasted without going faulty. However my CPC never needed returning and was used for thousands of hours without once going wrong. I think the CPC was a very well rounded computer, which could cover many areas competently; something you could not say about the C64 or others.
In 1987 we got our first Amstrad. The Amstrad PC1512, quite a popular MS-DOS (with Gem Desktop) PC. The magazine "PC PLUS" was actually originally called "PC PLUS Amstrad". There was quite a high uptake of that machine and I remember playing lots of games on it such as Arkanoid, Wizball, Bruce Lee etc
Wow wizball I had totally forget that one, what a weird game
Surely the PCW deserved a mention. Average piece of CP/M kit, but Locoscript was an excellent word processor. .
When it comes to the build quality of the Amstrad CPC range, I'd say they were top quality. I had all sorts of problems with the Spectrum and C64, including overheating, cassette issues etc.. But my Amstrad never had problems - and I know it was the same for my friends and other Amstrad users. From what I've heard/read, you can buy an Amstrad and it will still work fine. But I don't know if the monitors still work, but probably not. Anyway, you can buy an RGB scart cable these days. Also, as much as the Amstrad had lots of Spectrum ports, games that were specially made for the machine were often very colourful and impressive.
+kingstonlj The monitors tend to still work very well today.
I really liked my Amstrad colour monitor, so it's nice to know that some of them are still working well.
My CPC-464 and its colour monitor are both work working flawlessly after all these years...
I've got about 5 of those fucking Amstrad Em@ilers (been intending to do a video on them for years), Thought they didn't work but it turns out any machine that wasn't registered by the time the servers went down are essentially bricked.
Also, typical scummy Sugar practices, yup you could play spectrum games on them, but you could only RENT them for 70p a day (of £3.50 for a week) also the entire catalog was Ocean games strangely.
Annddd they didn't have a built in answer machine, every day it would automatically call in to a premium rate number to retrieve calls and emails, if you wanted it to or not, loads of complaints from OAP's who had run up an extra £70 a month phone bills from simply having it plugged in.
+Larry Bundy Jr What a truly astonishing product. I would call it the best electronic product ever made - no discussion required.
+Larry Bundy Jr That is incredible lol. Screw everyone over as a business plan doesn't really work any more.
Kim Justice
It was an absolute bomb, Tesco bought all the remaining stock and were flogging them off for £7.99 each according to an old Hotukdeals page I found when searching for info.
As savvy as Sugar was in the 80s, he turned into a complete moron from the 90s onwards, just like him pushing those YouView boxes now that no one wants.
Wow really? fuck sake
can this emailer be modded to work on a LAN or local phone network? it would be fun to find other uses for them and rewrite roms
Just noticed that the QL advert mis-spells Macintosh. That would stand out a mile these days, but I guess at the time most people wouldn't have noticed or cared as it wasn't really a household name.
That _might_ have been deliberate to avoid being sued or for copyright reasons.
But it probably was more likely an oversight.
It was only ever shown at the launch event. Never shown on TV. Never shown at cinemas as planned. So hardly anyone saw it until the modern era when it became ubiquitous thanks to micro men.
Once again your docs style is detailed comprehensive and gripping. You have nailed it well done!
i have realy enjoyed your series,i think the UK and euro game scenes are completly forgotton,and there very important,just imagine no ARM chips for a start,thanks so much
I don't know why you basically skipped the three most successful Amstrad lines. The Amstrad PCW sold 8 million computers with monitor and printer. A huge success and big money maker. The total sale of Sinclair ZX Spectrum including Amstrad sales of the Spectrum, was only 6 millions. Amstrad dominated the PC market in Europe for several years from 1986 to around 1990 with 12 million machines sold. The Sky decoders sold really well too. A small number of was tried sold in the USA through their Spanish importer Indescomp, it failed badly. But it gave us and the French the Amstrad CPC 6128. The Amstrad CPC 6128 was the best selling Amstrad CPC in France. A disc based machine with 128 kB memory. One of the reasons for its success was that France had its own TV standard. As the Amstrad CPC came with its own monitor included, that was not a problem.
I've put this one off as I loved my Amstrad growing up; it's hard to reconsile personal affection for the machine with the nature of Alan Sugar's strategy of maximum profit for minimum input and bugger the quality. It feels like unrequited love! Still the Amstrad all in one idea was a goody, even if the tech wasn't.
Great video, though: thank you once again for taking the time to make.
Excellent! Informative! Funny!! You definatly have an amazing talent for the infomentarys!! I love watching them. Keep up the good work!!
The CPC464 was my first computer when I was a kid. I remember trying my hand at BASIC, typing what seemed like 100's of lines of code just to get a blue and yellow flashing circle - that's if I was lucky and didn't get a lad of syntax error messages. Also, waiting for donkeys trying to load a game on a tape with that whirly noise, then watching it crash and having to start again. We must have had a load of patience back then!
I loved my Amstrad CPC 6128 when I was a kid. I learned to code BASIC and Z80 assembly on it, which gave me my love of programming (which is my job these days). Mind you, a part of it was that it was a present from my granddad for Christmas 1990, not long before he died in 1991 - so I have a personal reason for my fondness of the CPC.
I would like to add another point of view. Here in Germany in the mid 80ies the CPC and the C64 were the main popular computers, at least among my friends. The keyboard of the CPC 6128 was a great business type keyboard. The programming language basic (Locomotive basic) was good. Shipped with the cpc also was CPM, which helped me switch to DOS and linux later on. In my opinion the CPC was a great jumpboard for later programmers and IT-guys into the world of modern PCs. The programming handbook (basic) of the german Schneider CPC was one of the best guides I have read in my whole life as a programmer. Regarding gaming there were better machines, yes.
Your great documentary did miss one thing. The CPC's death was the rare 3 inch floppy drive. In his biography I read, that they got hands on a cheap stock of lots of these drives, and so they built them into the CPCs (and their textprocessing computer Joyce). The floppy disks were robust and cool, double sided, but expensive. I bought my cpc6128 with green monitor for 799 Deutsche Mark in 1987. 10 floppy Disks (3 inch) did cost addional 100 DM. Too expensive compared to the cheap 5,25 floppies of the c64 or the upcoming 3,5 floppies of the Amiga and the PCs.
I'm from the rubber key era. I actually started with a zx81 which had a membrane keyboard! Then a speccy 48k, then an AMstrad CPC 464 with colour monitor, I actually quite liked the machine.
Excellent vids btw. Cheers.
The CPC machine was good, but I have always despised Alan Sugar. I agree with you, he does only care about money.
Magic, Kim! Frikken TV-documentary quality stuff.
...in the good way.
That's not Ted Rogers...that's that bird from the abattoir who looks like Ted Rogers!
Wow Alan Sugar made Jack Tramiel look like sweet heart.
not really, Trameil would sue to death people who quit his company and then started another company that would or could compete with him and he also literally fucked all the people that worked for him that did not belong to his inner circle(his sons and his sycophants)
Thanks, I've enjoyed your video, but, like many others have commented here also, I'm rather surprised you did not mentioned the great cheap amstrad PC compatible series Pc1512 and PC1640, they were very popular here in Portugal. With the Intel's 8086 at 8mhz rather than the stock Intel 8088 used in xt's.
I grew up with the spectrum and had a PC1512, both very popular and cheap here. Thanks again for the videos.
God, that fucking BBC micro. A suspicious looking teacher with a dodgy mustache tried to get us to use those in the "technology" class when I was 12. Was sure he had put me off computers for life. I hated that damn BBC. Had no clue what I was doing.
Now I'm a game developer... shrug!
Another great documentary Kim, I think you've really hit your mark when it comes making videos. I just hope more people get to see them because with quality of your releases, you deserve to be having a 100k subs and more :)
The Amstrad CPC, which is also remembered as "Schneider" as it was distributed by them (Belgium, Germany, etc), did have its personality gaming-wise. It had a mascot, Roland. Many Roland games, some of which were rebranded ports (like, Fred became Roland on the Ropes). And it's apparently this Alan Sugar guy who's behind that character & game range, so it looks like he did care.
Roland is named after the designer. Roland Perry. The prototype cpc was called arnold, an anagram of Roland.
You would love my dad, he was IBM for 30 years, I was lucky growing up with computers, I still can remember dos codes.
Your content, unbelievably, improves every video. I was the 464 owner, and games like Oh Mummy shaped me into the degenerate mess I am today
+mattyfox666 Agreed, love these vids. History about computing is incredible. Kim, you ought to visit the computer museum in Cambridge.. you would have an incredible time there as they have every, and I mean *every* old computer and console which you can play with.
I was not yet a glint in the milkman's eye in 1983, but had I been about I probably would have eschewed the Speccy of the time for its dead flesh keyboard alone.
To be fair, the Emailer sounds like he was aiming for the eventual niche that smart phones filled.
“I don’t like Alan Sugar.”
Rarely does the very first line of a video take the words right out of my goddamn mouth.
You Sir are on a roll. Best channel on the TH-cams by far, keep em coming.
Great stuff Kim, enjoyable as always - your output gets better and better. Recently subscribed and binged most of your content - awesome work!
I will say that the Locomotive BASIC that came with the CPC was easily one of the best versions BASIC that came with any of the 80s home computers. Certainly leagues ahead of that awful Commodore BASIC. It really got me into programming.
I really do enjoy these types of documentaries you put out. I'm not really informed on the old Micro computers, but I've been really finding them interesting and your stuff is really informative to a newbie like me, especially when its mostly about the British market. Anyway love your work, keep it up :)
The CPC was my first computer - my Dad bought it for me and my siblings around 1989. Although I thought it was okay at the time, I never loved it as much as I loved my future gaming machines such as the Nes and Snes. My favourite game on the system was probably Contra, although there were a couple of other "okay" games such as Dan Dare and Impossible Mission.
Great video. I love these documentary style videos.
Thanks. Would have liked to have seen more on Amstrad's PC compatibles -
and an honourable mention should go out to their gloriously awful CP/M
business machines of the early 1990s - remember them? They weren't PC
compatible, but they looked like PCs. They came with a printer, monitor,
Wordstar and LocoScript - or something.
I am 14 and recentley helped my grandad to restore his 1987 amstrad 1640 with a hard drive (fancy) because it wqs all yelow but now it is the correct color after spending probably 23 hours cleaning and re installing the operating system. I realy enjoyed it and hope to try and code on it.
Oh god the Amstrad PCW. My mother, of all people, had one of those and worked from home. It used 3 inch (not 3 1/2 inch) floppies that NOTHING ELSE seemed to use, and she had the 9512 which looked like it had emerged from a car crusher.
I had an Amstrad. Cheers for the doc.
Very Interesting. Thanks for that.
A CPC6128 was my 2nd computer, after a Vic.
I always saw it as better than the spectrum, because mainly I hated the awful keyboard on the speccy.
Too me the Spectrum always seemed like it had been cobbled together (especially the early ones).
The Amstrad CPC just worked. There was no drama with it, it was built well enough, the software was good enough etc...
The Monitor was OK too.
I do think you spent too much time on the CPC464 though, the PCW range was hugely successful, and I know people in business today that STILL use them.
Thanks.
No mention of the Sorcery game, nor Nonterraqueous, nor of the excellent and quite performant Locomotive BASIC, nor the brilliant concept of copy cursors and the Copy key? And how about underestimating the utility of a RGB monitor I used for over 12 years, first with the CPC464, then with my Atari ST and a quickly soldered 6-pin RGB adapter, and also as a PAL TV monitor for my VHS VCR? That CPC464 (distributed by Schneider in Germany) was such a great first computer to use and study, easily better than the C64 or Speccy. I still have mine in working condition. Anyway, thumbs up from me. Cheers!
Very well put together, great job. You are the definitive source for all things retro micro computers and deserve more followers
Great work, very interesting. The speccy wasn't particularly popular here in Australia, but the CPC systems sold well enough. I didn't have one, but I knew a few who did. I remember seeing the MegaPC thing for sale alongside Amiga 600s, Amiga 1200s and crap Commodore PCs and little black and white compact Macs. I got an A1200, despite Commodore having just gone under when I got it - it still seemed like the best option unless I just wanted to play games - and we had a Sega Master system 2 for that...
Great video! However if you're doing a story of Amstrad in the 80's-90's then you've missed out a huge chunk here - specifically their PC's from the mid 80's onwards - they were hugely successful and market leader for a good number of years. It's kind of ironic that most articles or documentaries about Amstrad - much to my annoyance - they always focus entirely on their PC range and only have a small footnote mention of the CPC, here it's the opposite! lol
My mum used to have an Amstrad 464 Plus, she bought it back in 1989 or so when she decided to go to college once me and my brother were in school and my sister was close to starting school at the time. Played quite a few games on it, I think she's still got the old thing in the attic with all of the games that were bought for it.
Feeling old now after watching a few of your videos.
My best mate had the green screen version when we were kids. Even as a kid I felt sorry for him.
The green monitor was smaller = more practical (to me) and you could use it in a completely dark room. I would have to try the 640 resolution on a colour one, but the screen seemed very much like a tv, so I'm not sure you could study your basic or assembler listings for as long as on a green monitor.
@@gugplaus1141 I could. There was no problem at all. And for the games...what a difference...
What can I say another master piece, you should honestly consider making video gaming documentaries full time, I couldn't stop the movie out if sheer joy, keep up the amazing work my queen of documentaries.
Better be careful Kim. This guy could be your next Prime Minister. Similar thing seems to have happened to us here in the USA.
Nah. Alan Sugar made money on his own without daddy’s help-definitely not a parallel to Trump.
Plus, most people in the UK hate Alan Sugar. And they’re leaning Labour now and lost their shit (in a good way) when Corbin won the early general election this year.
So yeah. Sugar as PM? Not likely.
EDIT: ...oops.
@@rabidrabbitshuggers this comment aged well...
handymchandface I know fuck all about UK politics and my previous comment proves it.
My CPC-464 is still working like new. Great machine.
The Amstrad E.mailer was being given away free a few years back if you did things like enquire about a pension or get a catalogue shopping book.
Oh yes. Looking forward to this. The Amstrad 464+ was my computer as a kid, so can't wait to watch this video when I get home from work. Keep up the great work Kim.
+purplezebrahoover I hope you could see past Kim's negative opinions on the CPC. Apart from that it was a very good video.
We had one of them double decker Amstrad video players, my dad was a media teacher so would borrow it on a weekend to copy the films we rented
The unsung hero is the PCW which sold more than the CPC and speccy combined, or the Amiga and ST combined. Probably the most popular 8bit PC outside the c64.
There is a slight inaccuracy. Many people believe the 128k was solely produced in Spain. This is false. My 126k (toast rack) was built in the UK. These existed before the buyout of Amstrad.
Crazy to think Amstrad started out as a real life Trotter's Independent Traders.
another brilliant video. never really liked amstrad either myself, but can definitely see why people would have fond memories of the CPC.
You need those links for twitter / facebook / patreon in the description :)
I once borrowed one of this from a friend, oddly I ended up a massive migraine and was laid up for a week or so.
Hey Kim, love the vid. You may be interested to know that Steve Coogan's commentary on the Alan Partridge DVD actually mentions the Amstrad Emailer being used as a prop and why they chose it for Alan's character. It's not much more detail but you may want to check it out.
Another fantastic documentary, Kim! Absolutely loving these. :D
I always thought that Clive shared the similar philosophy of make it cheap, sell it to more people. I guess I was mistaken or something?
In a way, yes, but it didn't apply to everything. The Sinclair Executive calculator was quite expensive, costing half an average monthly salary; it undercut the Western products but was a few times more expensive than Japanese ones. That is rich people toy. The Sinclair Black Watch was also not necessarily cheap.
And then there's this not so subtle difference. Sinclair computer products were very bare bones, they were the cheapest single item you could buy, but also pretty much the worst. Amstrad is different, it's a very capable full fledged machine which wouldn't have you pay for one extension after the other. Think of the things you'd need to hang onto the cheapest Spectrum to make it whole: cassette recorder, 32K ram expansion cart, soundcard, a joystick adapter... But the basic Amstrad came fully loaded, it even came with the monitor. Amstrad was all about convenient ready to roll packages that were on the whole still in the impulse price range.
I think Sinclair's marketing decisions are actually born from a kind of slightly naive pragmatism. If, as alleged, he didn't think computers were of any actual use, it made total sense to make them bare bones and cheap. But it's Sugar who mastered the marketing of impulse purchase.
I'd say that while there are some similarities, there are huge differences, too. Sinclair was an innovator (that's not to say all of his inventions were successful, of course!) with his pocket calculators, micro televisions and computers - and I think saw himself as a benevolent force for bringing new high-technology to "the man in the street". But that affordability inevitably meant quality compromises, particularly in terms of electronic components. Sinclair's greatest failing was that sometimes he simply assumed that there would be market demand when a little research would have told him there was actually (almost) none - notably the C5. Sometimes he'd try to convince the public that their lack of interest was due to their ignorance: ie "You don't realise it yet but you *need* a C5". Those products that did sell well largely did so through luck and good marketing as much as anything. Whether his products were successful or not, Sinclair wasn't interested in personal wealth: ironically a lot of the profit from his successful products was ploughed into R&D for subsequently unsuccessful ones (eg the QL and the C5).
Sugar, on the other hand, is no innovator, simply jumping on a number of existing bandwagons (hi-fi, computers, set-top boxes). Sugar did carry out market research and found a gullible public. You might argue that the PCW range was innovative in its day but all Sugar did was to cobble together some old hardware, a cheap monitor and some (actually very good) Wordprocessor software. But most of Sugar's products were of deliberately poor quality in order to undercut competitors and dominate the budget market to fund his plutocratic lifestyle.
Sinclair's take on "affordability" was borne of benevolence - Sugar's was borne of cynicism.
Dave Matthews You're not wrong, but numerus products that are and were immediately successful and changed how we view things were introduced under circumstances that would show negligible market interest in prior research. Some company heads are simply more successful with that than the others.
I told him off a few years ago, at work. He didn't seem too bothered.
I purchased one of the email phones when they came out purely so I could play some of my old Spectrum games.
Baron Lord General Admiral Sir Emperor Sugar. LOL
Sir Sinclair was a visionary, inventive guy, Cury was the University programmer, and Alan Sugar was only the businessman, can you imagine what would have been the computer world today if these 3 would have worked together? Now we live in a IBM driven world with software written Windows...others occupy a small fraction
From a Belgian point of view, Amstrad barely made any impact here and had the name for making shoddy stuff that didn't last long. The problem with Sugar's approach, is that he considers consumers as walking bags of money and not people with memories. If they buy something and it breaks down in no time or is obviously made out of cheap parts, they won't forget. It would only take so long before people would stop buying his stuff because even though it looks good on paper, if it's not reliable, people steer clear.
he's always made mid range, shabby stuff and shipped it to the ill informed and the strapped for cash in the UK and abroad.
Yes, they were rubbish. But they were priced accordingly. If you bought an Amstrad you didn't expect it to sound great and last forever, but if you hadn't got much money, you had got something that would play your records, cassettes and the radio, which was literally much better than nothing. He filled the vital gap between "expensive quality" and "nothing". Just like Sinclair's computers had.
People don't understand it seems that Britain has always, even when it had the world's largest empire, been a country of relatively poor people. We still are, though it is less evident thanks to ubiquitous cheap electronics. We live in tiny old houses that should have been knocked down decades ago, we have always managed to engineer our economy to disadvantage the masses. As an example, by the 1970s, Germany who had "lost the war" had a far better standard of living than Britain, which "won the war". It has always been like this and, thanks to the idiocy of the British public being fooled into shooting themselves in the foot (e.g. ridiculous planning controls that make housing of a decent standard unaffordable, supported by nonsense about protecting the countryside), it probably always will be like this.
Hence, we need companies that produce cheap crap products for cheap crap people. And thus Amstrad, Sinclair and, these days, the rise and rise of shops selling tat for a pound. And you may remember that your last Amstrad was cheap and nasty and the cassette players ran at the wrong speed, but most of all it was cheap. So you buy another one. Because it's that or nothing.
Your argument would be correct if Amstrad was really that cheap but its computers weren't that much cheaper than more solid brands. Especially later when they made IBM-PC compatibles, they were only 10% cheaper compared to much more reliable alternatives and the cost savings usually meant cheap lower-end-brand parts which caused all sorts of compatibility issues.
redavatar And the Amstrads were pretty good, too. They were typical of the reasonably priced computers which kids with less money could afford. If your parents were middle class, you might have a BBC or a Commodore 64, with disk drives and all sorts. If you were working class, you had a Spectrum or Amstrad, and a heap of cassette tapes.
And my argument was actually focussing on the stereo systems, really, anyway.
***** not strictly true there were 100s of thousands of UK working class kids hat had a C64 and a tape deck with the machine hooked up to the colour tv. OK though I agree very few working class kids had a C64 disk drive and even fewer had a proper monitor.
Yep. .. Amstrad was big in France back then, many people had one
These videos should be made into a DVDs
I will watch this soon. From the your description of the video it seems you left out the PC and PCW line as well as the Sky boxes
While I appreciate the research that's obviously gone into this, you've missed several important points: 1. the CPC isn't as technically unnoteworthy as you made out, as the computing magazines of the time attested; and 2. the experts in the field at the time were not saying Amstrad were coming in too late - in fact, the CPC was widely praised prior to its launch, with many experts considering it the best machine coming to market.
No, Amstrad didn't produce a machine that beat all comers but that was clearly not its purpose. It did change things though, as the all-in-one systems we all have these days clearly shows. In many ways, the CPC is a victim of timing; and if it had been quicker to market, the fanboy legions would be singing a different tune to the one we are all so tired of hearing now.
I imagine many mainland Europeans will say a different thing too about the CPC. If nothing else, I think Lord Sugar's push into that untapped market was the big thing he should be remembered for. Not trying to pig-headedly tap into an American market that was essentially on lock-down between the C64 and, later on, IBM compatibles. The idea that anything from Sinclair would succeed here is laughable, and even the BBC wasn't going to break the hold IBM had.
Interestingly, the IBM PC was also an all-in-one piece of kit, as were many PC compatibles. Lord Sugar was clearly onto something. Something "good enough" with all the bits and bobs you need from the getgo, will always win the day.
+Jesus Zamora Amstrad didn't try to enter USA with the Amstrad CPC 6128. It was the Spanish distributor that had a go at the US market. If Kim Justice is saying that Amstrad was having a go at the US market, he hasn't researched that part good enough
+dartsma464 she.
dartsma464 She also made the point that Amstrad made no effort for the US, which was part of why Amstrad were so successful. They saw how Sinclair (with the Timex Sinclair models) and Acorn (with the BBC Micro) failed, and decided not to jump into the meatgrinder. I can tell you as an American who grew up post-crash, any attempt would have been just as disastrous as Sinclair and Acorn. Hell, I hadn't even KNOWN Sinclair and Acorn tried to break America until I started watching these videos. When I grew up, you had "computers" (IBMs) and Apples. That's how consolidated the market was after the gaming crash and the microcomputer price war.
In his biography, Sugar says he made one or two attempts into the American market, with no avail.
Kim, you're on fire with these videos! The research, the editing, the topics, the wealth of information; and they grip you, they're fascinating! Thank you so much for making them for us all. I hope big things come your way, you deserve it. it's so good seeing the history of videogames and computers from the British perspective, a viewpoint which has seemingly been neglected or pushed aside on youtube and 'games media' due to the passion our American cousins have for Atari and Nintendo. Please keep up the good work, it's great to listen to someone so intelligent, knowledgeable and passionate about this stuff : )
loved my cpc 664 still play the games on my PC now. stock market and classic racing my fav games and a few others. still funny playing football manager. loved my vic20 and c64 before my amstrad
Does this show Alan's famous moment where he states licensed software will never take off and is a stupid idea?
Brilliantly put together as always!
Really interesting, well made and insightful video. Surprised you have relatively few subs so far, I can see huge potential in your channel if you keep this kind of quality up!
The Amstrad Ematailer was a thing of wonder 😁
Nice video ;) I recall one of the major selling point of the 464 was the included Easy Amsword wordprocessor. Today we dont think much about getting a wordprocessor, but back then getting one for free & along with a good keyboard computer really was something. When i had to step up from my belowed ZX81 back then it was a tough choice, however the colourfull amstrad screenshots in mags won me over. I think i recall Sugar saying that to him the 464 was just a big calculator & it was never really supposed to be a gaming machine, something that is quite apparent when you read thru early amstrad mags & get one gray page after another with spreadsheets & databases & pcw blue pages.
Whats that tune playing over most of the section about sugar buying sinclair? It sounds like what I can only describe as '8 bit PiL'...in other words bloody demented brilliance!
+madcapoperator Ben Daglish's 48k speccy theme for "Dark Fusion".
+Kim Justice ta duck...btw you're really excelling with these most recent videos. Currently my favorite video gaming related channel on youtube!
+Kim Justice insane track. that PiL reference is p spot on.
These documentary style bio vids have become my favorite of all the guys who do this kind of thing within the gaming genre. I've watched a ton of them, from many different people, and these are the best blend of information, humor, and personality. The gaming historian could maybe learn a thing or 2 :) Both great, but I think you grab the lead buddy :) Thanks for the great content!
That Operation Thunderbolt footage is nightmare fuel.
the music at the end of this video is probably my favorite gaming BGM of all time: Ace Attorney
Great stuff Kim thanks. If you haven't seen it yet you may enjoy - Cassetteboy vs The Bloody Apprentice.
Thank you for this top quality production! Thank you.
Good thing about the Amastrad is it was the birth of Dizzy.
I'm American, and by chance the first computer I had in the home was an Amstrad. Ironic.
Scott Spencer how did you manage that, if I may ask? Import?
Sugar said in his biography he attempted the American market but had no success. He really tried despite what this video is saying.
Having just seen Chinnyvision's CPC 6128 video, I'd LOVE to see you and him debate Spectrum VS CPC.
yeah, that would be interesting. But I think Kim Justice is afraid that the people finds out that the emperor has no clothes on
To be fair, I don't think Kim is essentially ill-informed - I've NEVER gotten that from any of her videos. I just think that she's let her personal opinion of Lord Sugar get in the way of her opinion of the CPC line.
"Her", Kim is male.
Steve, you haven't been paying attention. Kim came out as trans some time back.
I had totally forgot about that pc that could play megadrive games. And Viole! :D
So enjoyable, I love being taken back to my childhood in this way. Like many of us I had friends with Spectrums, CPC's, Commodore +4's and I had to make do with an old and arthritic VIC20. I had the last laugh in 1991 when my parents bought me an A500+ just in time for all of my friends to ditch the Amiga and buy mega drives. I guess I was forever destined to be behind the times but I wouldn't have it any other way. Keep up the top work Kim!
I don't think I'd be doing what I do as a tech support engineer if it wasn't for my Amiga.
Vectrex here in America was of a similar concept; except it had a monitor with wireframe graphics and it used cartridges instead of disks or tapes. And Vectrex was more of a video game system, and not a computer (hope I am saying this right). This was back in the early 80s (I am guessing around 1982-1983).
Had an Amstrad PC1512 with 8 MB hard card!!!
Yes, it's years after the fact, but GODDAMN you make some great docos, mate! :D
Spent a good deal of my time repairing Amstrad Tower Systems and the like, in the 80's, some were relatively new when they died. Now though, people like these things, at the moment I've an Amstrad SM102 stereo in the workshop to restore. The build quality's a king compared to the likes of "Crosley" and the like, with many more features such as Bass and Treble controls. The BSR low-voltage belt drive turntables used in these Amstrads and also Binatones, Murphys, etc, were ghastly things. The speed wouldn't stay spot on, and in the case of Tower Systems, and the SM101/102's was caused by a bloody awful switching arrangement. With the Towers, I'd replace it with a BSR shaded-pole motor driven single-play deck. Easily sourced either new or from the bins ! The SM101/102's needed a different mod, with a new motor with built-in control. The older BSR''s were too heavy for the pop-out motor unit to cope with. Amazing the rubbish I recall :-)
My father bought a Schneider CPC-464 after he sold the ZX Spectrum 48k. As a kid, I thought the CPC had excellent graphics and I kind of liked that the ZX Spectrum ports looked the same as they did on a real Spectrum. It was familiar and I liked both systems.
Nowadays I feel that all of those ports were a missed chance to make the CPC stand out more. Graphics-wise it was waaaay better than the Spectrum and it was just lazy programming, if you ask me.
I also remember a number of games that looked stunning on the CPC: Fruity Frank, Feud, Gryzor, Renegade, to name just a few off the top of my head.
Very insightful and interesting as always.... keep'em coming!
In the late '80s when I got my first computer the choice I had was either the Amiga or the Atari, I got the Amiga 500 and initially had it hooked up to the TV. The IBM compatible PC or the Apple was just too expensive at the time. I later ended up getting a 1084s monitor and sold my 500 for an Amiga 2000. When I started University in 1991 I was using the Amiga with a PC emulator for schoolwork, was it slow, especially for compiling programs which took about 30 minutes to compile. This didn't last for long and I ended up doing the work at school which at the time from memory was on a 486. Being in Australia at the time I didn't even know an English computer scene existed.
I love that you used monty on the run theme in this!