Sales numbers for the IBM PC 5150? (or: What was behind the PCjr decision?)

[Eudimorphodon]

I have vague memories of there being enough leftover stock of the Convertible when it was discontinued that the usual liquidator suspects were selling them off dirt cheap for a while, but I don't think it was quite the same level of flop as the PCjr. What's sort of fascinating about it is how many of the Jr's bad ideas carry over to it, though, like the stacked expansion "slices", despite being released over a year after the Junior was canned. (It even uses PCjr-style Berg connectors on its CGA adapter instead of CGA dsub connectors.) The machine kind of reeks of having actually been designed in 1984 but for whatever reason being delayed until well after more "conventional" machines like the Toshiba T1100 came out in 1985 and ate its lunch.

IBM really had issues with laptop/portable designs before they finally nailed it with the Thinkpad.(*) Their next machine after the Convertible, the PS/2 Model L40 SX, was also "weird", a little late to market, and generally perceived as overpriced.

(* What's odd is around the same time they were unleashing the L40 on the US market they started selling the PS/55note in Japan, which was a much more modern-looking system. A year later the L40 was replaced in the US with machines descended from this line clearly leading to the Thinkpad.)

 

[krebizfan]

The Convertible seemed to be an attempt to match the Sharp PC-5000 but with micro-floppies instead of the incredibly expensive bubble memory. The printer slice allowed the user with a desk to have a printer but didn't impose the very unwieldy Sharp design on users that didn't need a printer. I remember there was a veritable flood of new portable designs in 1984 seemingly in preparation for the expected government contracts for a standardized portable computer. Locked down, samples send for government evaluation, and put in production once approval happened. All the convertibles I saw used were in the hands of military press liaisons.

 

[VERAULT]

I have vague memories of there being enough leftover stock of the Convertible when it was discontinued..

I got my Convertible (as well as a couple PCjrs) from Current or Former IBM employees of the New York area. they all told me they were offered to employees at huge discounts.

I might be inclined to repair mine if a drop in modern kit/system ever became available. I honestly hate that casio watch style of early lcd screen.... Even the Nintendo Gameboy was slightly better.

 

[falter]

My Dad brought home a Convertible briefly for work. Wasn't allowed to use it without his direct supervision, it was owned by the company he worked for. It was replaced with a Toshiba. In those days it was worth it to trade stuff in and a lot of the major vendors handled it. I don't remember much other than it was big with a weird name. My Dad stuck with Toshibas for laptops ever afterwards.

 

[offensive_Jerk]

PC Magazine, August 1986:

View attachment 1266278

Funny how they make no mention of the IBM sound quality.

 

[AdamAnt316]

Interesting this thread coming up. I have a rather checkered past with the PCjr. In the late '90s, a family friend gave us an old PCir, don't recall much about it except that it had a couple of sidecars, probably memory expansion and the parallel port, plus the replacement keyboard. When powered up, it came up with a splash screen, plus an error message. Opening the case, I traced it to a small circuit board which had come loose from its slot. Plugged it back in, flipped the switch, and the unit never powered up again. Turned out to have been the IR receptor for the keyboard, and due to a combination of not knowing any better and the proper application of Murphy's Law (no keying notch), I'd managed to insert it backwards. I eventually attempted to repurpose its floppy drive and power supply card/brick as an external drive, but it refused to power just the drive, so the card had probably been fried as well as the main board.

Several years later, I stopped by a local computer surplus store to look for RAM for my iMac G3 when a couple of guys stopped by looking to sell the store some old computer stuff. When asked what they had, the guys rattled off names of classic computer hardware, including an Apple IIe, Apple Lisa and an IBM PCjr. When told that said old computers were too old for the store to buy, the guys asked if they could just leave the stuff in the parking lot, saying they didn't care if some of it had value. I waited several minutes, took a peek outside the store, and the parking lot was lined with computer stuff. Sure enough, there was a PCjr, with the monitor, at least one sidecar, and a 'topcar' of some sort with a 3.5" disk drive in it, plus a few non-chiclet keyboards (including a third party one with an expanded layout!) so I put it in my car. Oh, and I grabbed the Apple IIe and Lisa as well. Dunno if it recognizes any of the add-ons in its default state; I'll have to take a look inside it to remind myself exactly what upgrades it was given by whoever had it last.

More recently, while trolling the (in)famous MIT Swapfest, I encountered a regular seller with a boxed PCjr setup. I asked him if he had any examples of the 'chiclet' keyboard, and he showed me that the boxed one indeed contained such a beast. I wasn't sure I wanted to buy yet another PCjr, but after some hemming and hawing, I gave him $225, and it was mine. Unfortunately, it was probably stored in an attic, and heat/cold over time wasn't especially kind to the keyboard and its overlay. Nevertheless, it's interesting to have an otherwise well-preserved example of the PCjr in its 'deluxe' configuration. Here are some photos:


Oh, and another seller at the Swap saw me hauling the bulky box around, and gave me a NOS PCjr internal modem he had several examples of, still sealed in plastic:

 

[kantexplain]

Try not to reverse-insert anything with these, k?

 

[VERAULT]

I dont know why the chiklet on the pcjr gets such a bad rep. I never even seen one till recently. I have owned I dunno 7 or 8 pcjr's. All with the newer keyboard. And everyone makes the disclaimer that they hate the chiclet so you figure it would be easy to find. Nope. And when it came up on ebay big money. I reached out to Texelec during the computer RESET liquidation and they told me they had one in rough shape. I bought it for a fair price. It had a broken swivel foot which I fixed and swapped off a standard pcjr keyboard and the battery terminals had some corrosion. I got the thing looking like brand new in the end. And I am happy to finally have one. I mean I dont plan on ever doing any real work on it so why not? This is speculation but Id say the majority of chiclet keyboards were thrown out.

 

[kantexplain]

I mean I dont plan on ever doing any real work on it

yup you certainly nailed it. As long as no real (or even imaginary) work is intended to be done, the chiclets are wonderful. But as we know most people intended to do really hard work on their Peanuts.

 

[krebizfan]

The chiclet keyboard was not suitable for the secretarial pool. It was a great keyboard when faced with the jam covered hands of a six year old or the key clogging properties of a sawmill. IBM was justified in being very proud of the keyboard; it just wasn't the keyboard most users wanted.

 

[Chuck(G)]

It was a great keyboard when faced with the jam covered hands of a six year old

I think you're onto something. A EE friend picked up a PCjr strictly on pricing, thinking that it was a better deal than a 5150. He spent a bunch of money expanding it to the point where he could get some real work done on it. I pointed out that he would have been much better off simply buying a PC clone, about which he sheepishly agreed.

My point was that it should have never been perceived as a serious machine suitable for work.

 

[Eudimorphodon]

My point was that it should have never been perceived as a serious machine suitable for work.

The problem there is that IBM was charging $1000 for it, while everything else on the market with a chicklet keyboard was priced like a toy. Even the TRS-80 Color Computer, which was probably the most expensive chicklet computer in the US after the original TI-99/4 flopped, switched to a typewriter-looking keyboard by 1984. That keyboard invited comparisons with toys like the Mattel Aquarius or Timex Sinclair 2068 that cost literally one tenth as much.

IBM really loved that jam and peanut butter line, and maybe they believed it, but it completely ruined anyone taking that machine seriously. And it doesn’t even really hold up from a technical standpoint; you can put sculpted keys over a spill resistant rubber dome mechanism too.

 

[krebizfan]

I think you're onto something. A EE friend picked up a PCjr strictly on pricing, thinking that it was a better deal than a 5150. He spent a bunch of money expanding it to the point where he could get some real work done on it. I pointed out that he would have been much better off simply buying a PC clone, about which he sheepishly agreed.

My point was that it should have never been perceived as a serious machine suitable for work.

The alternate PC Jr keyboard was good enough for anyone not able to win a typing competition and close enough to what the clones were being offered with. The alternate keyboard had to be ready before the PC Jr was announced given how fast the replacement program was launched. I put the problem to no one at IBM testing the prototypes in realistic situations. IBM wanted a system that couldn't be used full time at the office but still good enough for a manager to take work home occasionally. IBM failed.

 

[VERAULT]

The chiclet keyboard was not suitable for the secretarial pool. It was a great keyboard when faced with the jam covered hands of a six year old or the key clogging properties of a sawmill.

I learne when i took apart the chicket to clean and repair it. They both share the same pcb. The overlay(key caps) is different but its the same exact kwyboard functionally speaking.. so i cant imagine larger keys solving problems like sawdust any better. The mechanism was cheap. Seriously open them up and look inside. They are the same.

 

[kantexplain]

If you wanted to run serious software packages of the time the Peanut wasn't likely an ideal solution. Truthfully though how many pkgs required a 2nd floppy, or hard drive. I don't know, but was told in 1985 which required a 2nd floppy. The only answer was a program called Friday. And I wasn't inquiring regarding the purchase of a Peanut. I'm sure many home users of pc's had single drive setups for a span. The Peanut didn't rule out getting some professional work done at home. It just wasn't intended as it's primary use. You could do worse then a Peanut, even with a chicky keyboard. Am I being too optimistic in stating you were a lot better off with a jr then a C64 or Apple II/II+/IIe/IIc?

 

[Chuck(G)]

How about the accountant who wanted to run 1-2-3 with expanded (LIM) memory. "Get a real computer", right?

 

[falter]

I didn't realize the chiclet was a hot collectible or even all that rare. I can't remember if we had that first at home or if it belonged to our dealer friend. Our family friend owned a Compucentre franchise and got one of the first PCjrs. We were introduced to it in his home study during a family dinner. I remember the smell of the new IBM plastic and I do recall being mesmerized by the font used on the chiclet keyboard for some reason. And the waah-waaah noise the floppy made. But what I really cared about was Kings Quest, the likes of which I'd never seen before. Spent a year harping on my Dad to get it for us.. not realizing it wouldn't run on a Commodore 64. He and the store owner friend tried different alternatives to satisfy my adventure game itch. Think the last one was Monty Python's Quest for the Holy Grail, which, being 8 or 9, I hadn't seen the movie, didn't get the jokes and had no idea what was going on. Think I got stopped by some two headed rabbit or something. Anyway after several more months Dad finally gave in and got the Jr. Wish I could remember what keyboard it came with.

 

[krebizfan]

I learne when i took apart the chicket to clean and repair it. They both share the same pcb. The overlay(key caps) is different but its the same exact kwyboard functionally speaking.. so i cant imagine larger keys solving problems like sawdust any better. The mechanism was cheap. Seriously open them up and look inside. They are the same.

The keycaps of the second version can get gunk underneath them while the original chiclet design won't. IIRC, excess chiclet keyboards wound up in industrial settings with good results. I admit I am not sure that having a keyboard that survives all the debris makes all that much sense when the required disk drive will rapidly become unusable. Slightly improved versions of the Advanced Input Devices rubber dome keyboard were available for a number of computers without the same negative press. https://www.nytimes.com/1983/11/26/business/advanced-input-s-ibm-coup.html is a favorable view from before Jr was released.

How about the accountant who wanted to run 1-2-3 with expanded (LIM) memory. "Get a real computer", right?

Wasn't expanded memory after the Jr was removed from the market? The Megaboard sidecar had EMS drivers. For more practical uses, the combination of cartridges and a 512K memory sidecar might have given Lotus more available memory than a 640K 5150.

 

[kantexplain]

How about the accountant who wanted to run 1-2-3 with expanded (LIM) memory. "Get a real computer", right?

Are you serious? I think you need to reread my post. All I said was some professional work could be done. What accountants, and 123, and LIM have to do with what I said is bewilderimg.

But to answer your question, yes buy a professional grade computer. A JR was not a solution for hard core professional work.

Didn't Lotus offer a cartridge for the Peanut LOL? It kind of sounds crazy as I mull it over.

 

[Makefile]

Are you serious? I think you need to reread my post. All I said was some professional work could be done. What accountants, and 123, and LIM have to do with what I said is bewilderimg.

But to answer your question, yes buy a professional grade computer. A JR was not a solution for hard core professional work.

Didn't Lotus offer a cartridge for the Peanut LOL? It kind of sounds crazy as I mull it over.

Wasn't the 640K barrier not really "binding" at the time of the PCjr release, and EMS not even standardized until later?

Hopefully it isn't too anachronistic... but if they could see the future, wouldn't something like the PS/ValuePoint have made more sense than the PCjr, i.e. outsource and sell a rebadged Taiwanese clone with a cheapened case/monitor as the budget model. But I suppose this time period was still too early for the XT clones.