Amstrad PPC 512/640

“You’re acquired!”. We can’t help wondering if that’s the little joke Rupert Murdoch muttered to himself, shortly after wresting Amstrad from Alan Sugar. Of course, the sale of Amstrad comes as no surprise — these days the firm makes little else other than digital TV set-top boxes, and Sky is pretty much its only customer. Looked at another way, thanks to The Apprentice, Alan Sugar is a bigger star now than his company could ever again hope to be. However, things weren’t always so marginal for Amstrad.

Twenty years ago Alan Michael Sugar Trading — or AMSTrad — ruled the UK computer market. And by rule, we really mean utterly dominated. If you wanted a word processor in the 1980s, it had to be the Amstrad PCW. Fancied a ‘proper’ business PC instead? During the Thatcher era, the Essex-born Amstrad PC 1512/1640 was the only acceptable choice. And for home computer enthusiasts? Well, okay, Amstrad’s 8-bit CPC range turned out to be duds, but Sugar overcame that little inconvenience by buying Sinclair and taking control of the then-hugely-popular Spectrum brand.

Riding this wave of success, Amstrad decided to chance its arm in the portable computing arena. As it turned out, it was buyers’ arms that were to be chanced — at nearly 6kg, the Amstrad PPC was barely more portable than a desktop PC with a handle. And in several respects, that’s exactly what it was.

A major hint was the keyboard — a full-size 102-key affair with little attempt at miniaturisation. This was hinged to form a lid for the computer itself, which had a flip-up LCD screen. Even closed, the thing seemed enormous. But as noted, there was a handle on the side — surely Amstrad’s sole justification for marketing the PPC as a portable computer.

However, such criticisms must be considered in context. For the time, the Amstrad PPC was really quite novel. It may not have been lightweight or pretty, but it was cheap and effective. And in 1988, the prospect of a fully IBM-compatible PC for a pound under £400 appealed to many.

The first 512Kb model sold well enough to prompt Amstrad to launch several updated models, with the ‘best’ having 640Kb of RAM, two integrated 3.5" disk drives and a modem. This was capable of transferring data at 2.4Kbit/s, which is just about 1,000 times slower than a current run-of-the-mill 2Mbit/s broadband connection.

However, other modems of the day could manage only 300bit/s and given that this was a time when even something as apparently so simple as changing screen resolution required fiddling with tiny DIP switches on the motherboard, such a speed probably seemed amazing to the half-dozen Prestel subscribers that ever made use of it.

Product: Amstrad PPC 512/640
Released: 1988
Price: From £399

Specifications

Processor: NEC V30 (8MHz)
Memory: 512Kb (at launch) or 640Kb
Size: 450 x 230 x 100mm (closed)
Weight: 6kg
Screen: 640 x 200-pixel greyscale LCD with CGA emulation
Storage: One or two 3.5in, 720Kb floppy disk drives
Other notables: Built-in modem (up to 2,400bps/V22bis)