Amiga.org
Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: tokyoracer on July 05, 2008, 05:08:02 PM
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Check this LINK (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Commodore-Pentium-PC-retro-computer-RARE_W0QQitemZ120276811941QQcmdZViewItem?hash=item120276811941&_trkparms=72%3A12%7C39%3A1%7C65%3A12&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14) out, looks fake to me. I do hope i'm right in thinking someone has just stuck a "C=" sticker on it.
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I don't know whether that particular one is real or not, but Commodore *did* make PCs.
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moto
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Well Commodore did make PCs... though I have no idea what they looked like, I never had one.
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hmmm...at first glance looks like a fake one.
Check out this site for some pictures of original commodore PCs. They all looked more like C128D or A2000:
http://www.homecomputer.de/pages/f_commodore.html
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Ah yes, the Commodore Colt. I repaired them along with other clone systems of the day. (circa 1990) I don't recall them releasing a Pentium model, but it must have been near the end of their days. 286/386 Colts were never 100% IBM compatible despite the claims. I used to run side by side comparisons for customers to prove where their software problems were coming from.
It was one of my theories of the day that Commodore lost so much money trying to crack the clone market with an inferior unit, that Amiga developement suffered and eventually the product failure helped crash the company.
Plaz
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Actually, come to think of it I knew they did but I thought they had similar (if not, the same) cases to their Amiga ones. I cant think why a computer company would want to compete with themselfs. :-?
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When I went to high school the school had some 286 Commodore machines.
They looked just like Amiga 2000 machines, so the first time I saw them my heart went racing like crazy, but then I was dissapointed...
Dunno how amiga compatible the Commodore PC Case was in respect to house an Amiga 2000 motherboard, naturally I never took those apart. But the only differences you see was in the lower left hand corner of the front it said Commodore Business Machines and some PC model name 286 blah blah.
Some pics of other CBM PCs, amogst these the here (could not find the one I saw): linky (http://www.zimmers.net/cbmpics/)
There is for instance a pic of the CBM PC-50-II which case ended up being adapted for the Amiga 4000.
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This one's definitely too new for something out of West Chester. Commodore finally dumped their PC division some time in fiscal 1993 when they realized what a bad idea it was. Could be an Escom machine - they were supposedly using the Commodore brand to hawk PCs in parallel with Amiga Technologies' development.
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There were more or less 2 different series of C= PCs, the 1st well known one consisted of 8088-80386 looked abit like an A2000 and even allowed the use of Amiga-mice. Those were named PC10,PC20 ....
The later one featured Pentiums and maybe 486s, and came in standard AT-format and cases. Were sold as "Commodore profeesional" or something like.
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Commodore did 286, 386, 486 PC's too
I happen to own one of thw above, the case looks like an A4000 case slimmed down
I've also seen C= branded Pentium I PC's which aren't fake, I guess it's that company Tulip or whatever they were called that bought the C= brand the put together and sold these "later" C= PC's
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I am pretty much sure it's fake.
A 100MHz Pentium processor would have been 1994/1995.
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This is from the Escom days and there badged PC's. They came with Commodore branded mouse, keyboard and amplified speakers(Which where pretty good)
Our next door neighbour had one these which I had to set up for them along with a Laserjet 4L which they gave to me. Great little printer that worked well with my A1200. Still works now.
There's a time line here:
Escom History (http://www.amigahistory.co.uk/escomhist.html)
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I thought Escom only owned the "Amiga" name and the permission to build the machines (A1200 for example)?
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tokyoracer wrote:
I thought Escom only owned the "Amiga" name and the permission to build the machines (A1200 for example)?
Escom bought everything Amiga, and formed Amiga Technologies, to keep all Amiga IP together... I have no idea what happened to the Commodore IP...
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Pitty, I think "Commodore" has much more badge then the Amiga name. But why would such a small company make PC's? Wouldn't it have been safer to just concerntrate on the Amiga brand?
I'm guessing now but am I right in thinking the PC's were named "Commodore" and the Amiga's were just named "Amiga" by Escom?
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If I recall, they had a change of management and the new CEO (?) wanted in on the PC clone market which was (of course) magnitudes larger than the Amiga business.
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tokyoracer wrote:
Pitty, I think "Commodore" has much more badge then the Amiga name. But why would such a small company make PC's? Wouldn't it have been safer to just concerntrate on the Amiga brand?
Commodore wasn't such a small company... it was was one of the biggest computer companies of the 80's!
The PC market was massive, bigger than Amiga. Commodore wanted a slice of that pie. I think that was a mistake, and history suggests I'm right... but we don't actually know what happened back then...
I'm guessing now but am I right in thinking the PC's were named "Commodore" and the Amiga's were just named "Amiga" by Escom?
Once EsCOM set up Amiga Technologies, the Amiga was its own company and brand. It was not a Commodore Amiga.
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I recall a trip to Amsterdam with my wife (was my girlfriend back then) in 1998 and the Travel Agency Office in Dam Street had 8 Commodore PCs looking exactly like this one! I believe it is real. I may be able to find a picture of the office, the manager was a greek guy (from Thessaloniki) and we took some pictures all together :-D
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@tokyoracer
Wouldn't it have been safer to just concerntrate on the Amiga brand?
I think it would have been better. I think they even had the chance to market millions of C64/128's to a waiting Asian market. Unfortunately Commodore had no idea how to market the Amiga. So instead they ended up with a case of PC envy. "Every one thinks the Amiga is a game machine (because we're idiots) so lets go out and make PC clones like all the "real" computer companies. Duhhhhhhh"
If they had to pick an alternate platform, even some thing unix would have been a better choice than a 98% compatible PC clone.
Plaz
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It is not a fake. Look at the chickenlips logo. It is the one with two red lips.
This is post CBM and was when the name/logo was licensed out for all sorts of goods. There was even a range of telephones that were to be branded Commodore.
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tokyoracer wrote:
Check this LINK (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Commodore-Pentium-PC-retro-computer-RARE_W0QQitemZ120276811941QQcmdZViewItem?hash=item120276811941&_trkparms=72%3A12%7C39%3A1%7C65%3A12&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14) out, looks fake to me. I do hope i'm right in thinking someone has just stuck a "C=" sticker on it.
Commodore did infact make PC's with the commodore sticker on it. I believe i have seen both 386 and 486 commodore pcs.
I do find this ebay listing very strange though..
Commodore went bankrupt in 1993 afaik, which was well before pentium pcs and there was surely no commodore pc released in 1995.
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Etho wrote:
This is from the Escom days and there badged PC's. They came with Commodore branded mouse, keyboard and amplified speakers(Which where pretty good)
But didnt Escom just buy the Amiga name and rights?? Surely this would not allow them to use the Commodore brand...
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Escom bought all of Commodore. The Commodore brand name was slapped onto PCs, and the Amiga brand name continued with the new batches of 1200s, 4000Ts, and the Walker.
It was Gateway who bought only Amiga, leaving the Commodore brand to hop between similarly useless owners.
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I have no idea what happened to the Commodore IP...
After Escom AG's bankruptcy, Escom Netherlands performed a succesful MBO and continued to sell Commodore badged PC's until about 1997. They themselves went bust and the Commodore name/logo was bought by Tulip NV (amother Dutch company). They just parked the IP until about 3 or 4 years ago when they started to market various products under the commodore brand. Eventually they sold the name to another investment company who formed Commodore Gaming (http://www.commodoregaming.com/) to sell high spec gaming PC's under the Commodore logo.
TrevorDick
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yep Commodore made some 486 machines here in Canada back in 93 or so ..my university engineering lab had 2 of them and I almost fainted when I saw Windoze 3.1 running on a commy :-?
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klx300r wrote:
yep Commodore made some 486 machines here in Canada back in 93 or so ..my university engineering lab had 2 of them and I almost fainted when I saw Windoze 3.1 running on a commy :-?
Mudt have been that model whith the case which looked very much like the A4000 case but just a bit lower?
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Quite a few companies do it,
Pepsi and Coca-cola
Currys and PC World
at the end of the day they are making money from 2 separate revenue streams although in Commodore's case it was a stupid idea. The PC's themselves were crap and if they focused all their energy on improving the Amiga (and didnt take on Irving Gould) then we could have been typing these on new Amigas today. Nevermind, don't go through life thinking "what if", it will drive you mad. :-)
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Tomas wrote:
tokyoracer wrote:
Check this LINK (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Commodore-Pentium-PC-retro-computer-RARE_W0QQitemZ120276811941QQcmdZViewItem?hash=item120276811941&_trkparms=72%3A12%7C39%3A1%7C65%3A12&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14) out, looks fake to me. I do hope i'm right in thinking someone has just stuck a "C=" sticker on it.
Commodore did infact make PC's with the commodore sticker on it. I believe i have seen both 386 and 486 commodore pcs.
I do find this ebay listing very strange though..
Commodore went bankrupt in 1993 afaik, which was well before pentium pcs and there was surely no commodore pc released in 1995.
It could be a Commodore-UK Machine, Commodore UK continued for a while after CBM went under I believe?
My friend has some 200watt Commodore speakers hooked up to his PC :-)
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Actually, Commodore had been in the IBM PC clone business for a long time before this unit. Starting if memory serves with the PC-1 around 1988 or a little before. After Jack Tramiel stupidly ignored Chuck Peddle's push to go into this market with their own hardware, they knew that they had to have something in the market to compete once the PET became obsolete.
This model would be from the seprate company that retained the rights to the Commodore name. They still make PeeCees and to be honset - their packaging is quite good. Also, the components that they choose by todays standards are usually good as well.
If they had a presence in the US, I might consider some of their gaming PCs. I like the retro Commodore paint jobs.
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HopperJF wrote:
Quite a few companies do it,
Pepsi and Coca-cola
Currys and PC World
:-?
Sure Currys and PC World are both owned by The Dixons Group... But Coca-cola and Pepsi are two unrelated companies...
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COMMODORE PENTUIM! :-o WTF?!
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Commodore actually have high-end gaming pcs and some of the cases have a awesome painting on it.
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My thoughts were right about the labeling used by Escom, but didnt Commodore go bust in '94?
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Matt_H wrote:
Escom bought all of Commodore. The Commodore brand name was slapped onto PCs, and the Amiga brand name continued with the new batches of 1200s, 4000Ts, and the Walker.
It was Gateway who bought only Amiga, leaving the Commodore brand to hop between similarly useless owners.
Thanks for clearing that up.
I really wonder why they did not use the commodore brand on their amigas though.
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My school had GENUINE commodore PC's.
They were in the same casing as the a4k, well maybe not the exact same case, but it looked exactly the same from the outside!
So I think this was a fake.
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AMIGAZ wrote:
klx300r wrote:
yep Commodore made some 486 machines here in Canada back in 93 or so ..my university engineering lab had 2 of them and I almost fainted when I saw Windoze 3.1 running on a commy :-?
Mudt have been that model whith the case which looked very much like the A4000 case but just a bit lower?
nope they looked like generic pc cases with the old commodore chicken lip logo...
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Plaz wrote:
It was one of my theories of the day that Commodore lost so much money trying to crack the clone market with an inferior unit, that Amiga developement suffered and eventually the product failure helped crash the company.
Plaz
I remember going to one of the big annual computer shows around 1990 and being disappointed by what seemed like Commodore's determination to push their pc computers to the detriment of the Amiga which wasn't represented at all well, and my recollection is that the punters didn't seem interested - meanwhile Atari were comparatively bringing on the dancing girls with ST bras.
Well, you know what I mean. :-)
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I have a Commodore 386SX laptop.
Got it on flea market cheap, but broken.
photo (http://www.amiga.org/gallery/index.php?n=2621)