Jack began his career by being in the wrong place at the wrong time: he was a Jew in Poland during World War 2. He was thrown into the Auschwitz concentration camp, where he learned to view life as a war to survive. When he escaped from the camp, he moved to Canada and started an aggressive, ruthless company called Commodore, whose motto to survive was, "Business is war!".

In Commodore’s calculators, the CPU was a microprocessor chip manufactured by MOS Technology, a company with a troubled past:

Back in 1974, the most popular microprocessors were the Intel 8080 and the Motorola 6800. But one of the 6800’s inventors, a guy named Chuck Peddle, quit Motorola in 1975 and started a new company with his friends. That start-up company, MOS Technology, began manufacturing the 6501 microprocessor, which resembled Motorola’s 6800.

When Motorola threatened to sue, MOS Technology stopped making the 6501 and switched to the 6502, which Chuck Peddle designed differently enough to avoid a suit. That 6502 chip became very popular and was used in many devices, including Commodore’s calculators. Commodore was one of MOS Technology’s biggest customers.

Though the 6502 was legal, Motorola sued MOS Technology for its illegal predecessor, the 6501. The suit dragged through the courts for two years and cost MOS Technology many thousands of dollars in lawyers’ fees. Finally, in 1977, Motorola won $200,000. The lawyer fees and $200,000 put MOS Technology in financial trouble.

Rebuffed by Apple and Radio Shack, Jack Tramiel decided to fight back by building a computer better and cheaper than anything Apple and Radio Shack had. Commodore called its new computer the Pet, because Commodore’s marketing director was the guy who invented the Pet Rock. He reckoned that if folks were stupid enough to buy a Pet Rock, they’d really love a Pet computer! He was right: folks loved the idea of a Pet Computer. Sales skyrocketed.

Disappointments Commodore raised its price from $495 to $595 before taking orders. To order the Pet, the customer had to send $595, plus shipping charges, then wait for Commodore to deliver. Many folks mailed Commodore the money and waited long, but Commodore didn’t ship. Folks got impatient. Computer stores that had advertised the Pet got worried: customers who’d prepaid complained to the stores, but the stores couldn’t get Commodore to ship.

Meanwhile, Radio Shack entered the market with its TRS-80 model 1 priced at $599 — about the same price as Commodore’s Pet. Radio Shack was kinder than Commodore:

Radio Shack asked customers for just a 10% deposit. Commodore required payment in full.

Radio Shack didn’t charge for shipping. Commodore did.

Radio Shack set up repair centers throughout the USA. Commodore’s only repair center was in California.

Radio Shack delivered computers fast. Commodore still wasn’t delivering! Finally, Commodore admitted that the $595 Pet would not be delivered anytime soon! Commodore would deliver instead a $795 version that included 4K of extra RAM. So if you already sent $595 to Commodore and wanted a computer soon, you’d have to send an extra $200. That was a rip-off, since 4K of extra RAM was not worth an extra $200; but customers were so desperate that they sent the $200 anyway.

Radio Shack shipped its computers on a first-come, first-served basis; if you ordered a Radio Shack computer, Radio Shack gave you an accurate estimate of when you’d receive it. Commodore gave preferential treatment to its "friends"; if you ordered a computer from Commodore, you hadn’t the faintest idea of when it would arrive, since you didn’t know how many "friends" were on Commodore’s list.

Radio Shack’s computer came with a 232-page manual that was cheery and easy. Commodore’s computer came with just 10 loose pages that were incomplete and hard to understand.

Commodore developed a souped-up Pet, called the Commodore Business Machine (CBM), but it wasn’t enough to let Commodore rise above the number 3 spot. As Commodore’s fortunes dipped, Chuck Peddle and his friends quit. Apple hired them but treated them as second-class citizens, so they returned to Commodore.

The problem with RAM Commodore came out with several Pet versions, each containing a different quantity of RAM. If you bought a cheap version and wanted to increase its RAM, Commodore refused to install extra RAM: instead, Commodore insisted you buy a whole new Pet.

The problem with tape Commodore changed the Pet’s tape-handling system. The new system was incompatible with the old: tapes created for the old Pet wouldn’t work on the new Pet. Commodore didn’t tell customers of the change. Customers who wrote programs for old Pets and then bought additional Pets discovered that their programs didn’t work on the new Pets. They thought their new Pets were broken.

MOS Technology, owned by Commodore, had already invented the amazing Video Interface Chip (Vic), which could handle the entire process of sending computer output to the TV screen. Since that chip was cheap, Commodore decided to use it in the under-$300 computer. Unfortunately, it put just 22 characters per line on the screen. (By contrast, the Pet had 40 characters per line, and most computers today have 80 characters per line.) So the under-$300 computer would display just 22 characters per line.

Naming the computer Since the new computer was feminine and foxy, Commodore wanted to call it the "Vixen". But Commodore discovered that a "Vixen" computer couldn’t sell in Germany, because "Vixen" sounds like the German word "Wichsen", which is obscene.

Price Commodore began shipping the Vic in 1981 at $299.95. Over the years, the price gradually dropped to $55.

Ads To sell the Vic, Commodore tried three kinds of ads.

Popularity The Vic’s low price, fun colors, and effective ads made it become popular fast in the USA, England, Germany, and Japan. Commodore quickly sold over a million Vics! The Vic became the world’s best-selling computer!

In 1982, Commodore began selling an improved Vic, called the Commodore 64 because it included 64K of RAM. (The original Vic had just 5K.) The Commodore 64 also improved on the Vic by displaying 40 characters per line (instead of just 22) and including 20K of ROM (instead of just 16K).

Price The Commodore 64’s price went through 4 phases.

In phase 1, $599.95 was the recommended list price, and Commodore tried to force all dealers to charge that. If a dealer advertised a discount, Commodore refused to send that dealer any more computers. (Commodore’s policy was an example of price fixing, which is illegal.)

In phase 4, the Commodore made an improved version, the Commodore 64C, which discounters sold for just $119. It came with a copy of the Geos operating system, which made it resemble a Mac; and its keyboard contained extra keys.

Why so cheap? Here’s why the Commodore 64 cost so much less than an Apple 2c or IBM PC.

The Commodore 64’s advertised price did not include a disk drive or monitor. Moreover, Commodore’s disk drives and monitors were terrible:

Commodore’s original disk drive, the Model 1541, needed repairs often (because its head went out of alignment), ran slowly (because its cable to the computer contained just one wire to transmit data, instead of several wires in parallel), and put few bytes on the disk (just single-sided single-density).

Commodore’s original color monitor, the Model 1702, produced a blurry image (because the monitor was composite instead of RGB). Since the image was not sharp enough to display 80 characters per line clearly, most Commodore 64 software displayed just 40 characters per line. IBM PC software displayed 80 instead. Another problem with Commodore’s video was that the M looked too much like N, and the B looked like 8.

Eventually, Commodore developed an improved monitor (the 1802) and improved disk drives (the 1541C and 1541-2).

Popularity Because the Commodore 64 was cheap, Commodore sold over a million of them.

After Jack quit, Commodore tried selling two new computers — the Commodore 16 and Commodore Plus 4 — but they had serious flaws. Then Commodore invented two great computers: the Commodore 128 and Amiga.

The Commodore 128 ran all the Commodore 64 software and also included a better version of BASIC, better keyboard, and better video. To go with it, Commodore invented a better RGB monitor (Model 1902) and better disk drive (Model 1571). Later, Commodore invented the Commodore 128D computer, which included a built-in disk drive.

The Amiga is even newer and fancier. It contains three special chips that produce fast animated graphics in beautiful shades of color. Like the Mac, it uses a mouse and pull-down menus.

The Amiga’s first version was called the Amiga 1000. Later, Commodore replaced it by newer versions: the Amiga 500, 600, 1200, 2000, 3000, and 4000.

In 1994, Commodore filed for bankruptcy. What was left of Commodore was purchased by Escom, which is now selling Amiga Technologies to Visual Information Services Corp. (Viscorp).

Radio Shack was the first big chain of stores to sell computers nationally. It was the first chain to reach rural areas.

Radio Shack invented the first low-cost assembled computer. That was the TRS-80 model 1, which cost $599, including the monitor.

Radio Shack sold the first notebook computer. That was the Tandy 100, invented by Tandy with help from Microsoft and a Japanese manufacturer, Kyocera.

Radio Shack sold the first pocket computers. They were manufactured for Tandy by Sharp and Casio.

Radio Shack invented the first cheap computer having fancy graphics commands. That was the Color Computer, whose BASIC was designed by Microsoft as a "rough draft" for the fancier BASIC in the IBM PC.

But when the IBM PC came out and became the standard American computer, Americans became conservative and wanted to buy just traditional IBM PC’s and clones. Tandy had difficulty figuring out how to be profitably innovative. Tandy tried building IBM clones innovatively, but in 1993 gave up: it stopped manufacturing computers and sold all its factories to another computer company, AST. Now Tandy sells computers built by AST and IBM.

Instead of buying computers from Commodore, Radio Shack hired Steve Leininger to design a Radio Shack computer and keep the cost as low as possible:

Steve wanted his computer to handle lower-case letters instead of just capitals. But since attaching the lower-case chip would have added 10¢ to the cost, management rejected lower case: Radio Shack’s computer handled just capitals. (In those days, lower-case letters weren’t considered important. Later, when customers began demanding lower-case letters, Radio Shack regretted not spending the extra dime. Customers were spending $50 to rip open the Radio Shack and rearrange the chips to get lower-case.)

The monitor was a modified black-and-white TV built for Radio Shack by RCA. RCA told Radio Shack that the standard color for the TV’s case was "Mercedes silver"; any other color would cost extra. Radio Shack accepted Mercedes silver and painted the rest of the computer to match the TV. When you use a Radio Shack computer, you’re supposed to feel as if you’re driving a Mercedes; but since Mercedes silver looked like gray, Radio Shack became nicknamed "the great gray monster". Californians preferred Apples, whose beige matched their living-room decors. (Later, in 1982, Radio Shack wised up and switched from "Mercedes silver" to white.)

Radio Shack’s original computer listed for just $599 and consisted of four devices: a keyboard (in which hid the CPU, ROM, & RAM), a monitor (built for Radio Shack by RCA), a cheap Radio Shack tape recorder, and an AC/DC transformer. Wires ran between those devices, so that the whole system looked like an octopus. Radio Shack wanted to put the AC/DC transformer inside the keyboard, to make the computer system consist of three boxes instead of four; but that internal transformer would have delayed approval from Underwriters Laboratories for 6 months, and Radio Shack couldn’t wait that long.

Radio Shack named its computer the TRS-80 because it was by Tandy’s Radio Shack and contained a Z-80 CPU.

Problems with DOS Radio Shack hired Randy Cook to write the DOS. My friend Dick Miller tried DOS version 1.0 and noticed it didn’t work; it didn’t even boot! He told Radio Shack, which told Randy Cook, who fixed the problem and wrote version 1.1. Dick noticed it worked better but still had a big flaw: it didn’t tell you how much disk space was left and — even worse — as soon as the disk was filled it would self-destruct! Then came version 1.2, which worked better but not perfectly.

Dealing with the public In 1977, when Radio Shack began selling the TRS-80, customers didn’t understand what computers were.

Other Z-80 computers After the TRS-80, Tandy invented improved versions: the TRS-80 Models 2, 3, 4, 4D, 4P, 12, 16, & 16B, and the Tandy 6000. Like the Model 1, they contained a Z-80 CPU and included a monochrome monitor.

Coco To compete against the Commodore 64, Tandy invented the Color Computer, nicknamed the Coco. Like the Commodore 64, the Coco could attach to either a monitor or an ordinary TV, and it could store programs on either a disk or an ordinary cassette tape (the same kind of tape that you listen to music on).

The original Coco was called the Coco 1. Then came improved versions (the Coco 2 and Coco 3) and a cheap, tiny version (the Micro Coco).

Pocket computers Tandy sold 8 different pocket computers, numbered PC-1 through PC-8. They fit in your pocket, ran on batteries, and included LCD screens.

Notebook computers In 1983, Tandy, Epson, and NEC all tried to sell cheap notebook computers. Just Tandy’s became popular, because it was the cheapest ($499) and the easiest to learn how to use. It was called the Model 100.

Later Tandy sold an improved version, the Model 102, which included more RAM (32K), weighed less (just 3 pounds), and listed for $599. It including a nice keyboard, a screen displaying eight 40-character lines, a 32K ROM (containing BASIC, a word-processing program, some filing programs, and a telecommunications program), and 300-baud modem (for attaching to a phone, after you bought a $19.95 cable). It was 8½ inches by 12 inches and just 1½ inches thick. Reporters used it to take notes and phone them to the newspaper.

In 1972, Atari invented the world’s first popular video game, Pong. Next, Atari invented the game called Asteroids, then dozens of other games. Atari’s games were placed in arcades and bars. To play the games, you had to insert quarters. In 1975, Atari invented a machine that could play Pong on your home’s TV.

In 1977, Atari invented the Video Computer System (VCS), a machine playing many games on your home TV. Each game came as a ROM cartridge. Later, Nintendo and Sega invented machines that were similar but fancier.

In 1979, Atari began selling complete personal computers. Atari’s first two computers were the Atari 400 (cheap!) and the Atari 800 (which had a nicer keyboard). They were far ahead of their time. Of all the microcomputers being sold, Atari’s had the best graphics, best music, and best way of editing programs. Compared to Atari, the Apples looked pitiful! Yet Atari charged less than Apple!

But Atari made two mistakes:

The first mistake was that Atari didn’t hire Bill Gates to write its version of BASIC. Instead, it hired the same jerk who invented Apple’s DOS. Like Apple’s DOS, Atari’s BASIC looks simple but can’t handle serious business problems.

The second mistake was Atari’s belief that personal computers would be used mainly for games. Atari didn’t realize that personal computers would be used mainly for work. Atari developed spectacular games but not enough software to handle work such as word processing, accounting, and filing.

Atari developed some slightly improved computers (the 600 XL, 800 XL, and 1200 XL) but still lost lots of money.

Jack replaced Atari’s computers by two new computers (the 65 XE and the 130 XE), which ran the same software as Atari’s earlier computers but cost less. Then in 1985, he began selling the Atari 520ST, which was cheap imitation of Apple’s Macintosh computer, and therefore nicknamed the "Jackintosh". It used the Gem operating system, invented by Digital Research for the Atari and the IBM PC. Gem made the 520 ST look like a Mac but did not run Mac software: you had to buy software specially modified to work on the 520 ST.

When Apple announced the Mac Plus, which contained 1 megabyte of RAM, Atari retaliated with the 1040 ST, which contained 1 megabyte also. Then Atari announced a 2-megabyte version (the Mega-2) and 4-meg version (the Mega-4).

Atari’s had difficulty competing in the USA, but Atari computers remained popular in Europe for a while. Eventually, Atari’s fortunes declined. Finally, in 1996, Atari died: it got merged into another company, JTS, which makes disk drives.