Re: Computing Editorial (please read)

[Richard Plinston <riplin@Azonic.co.nz>]

Sam Gillett wrote:

>>Few people would run and and spend $3,000 for an IBM PC/XT just so they
>>could run CP/M - esp. since they had to buy extra hardware in order to
>>be able to do that.
> 
> And if I remember correctly, the street price for the IBM XT was only
> about
> half that in the 1985 time period. 

In the Byte 'Guide to the IBM PC' at the end of 1984:

    IBM PC/XT                   $ 4395
        including 256Kb, FD and 10Mb HD
    CGA Adaptor                    244
    Colour Monitor                 688
    PC-DOS                          65

'Street price' in the adverts is as low as 2599 + 199 + 599 for XT, still 
well over '$3000' and not all IBM hardware.

And it may still need a printer port or extra memory, plus allow several 
hundred for software to make it useful.

> And the clones would soon be only
> about half the price of "real IBM" hardware.

That's correct.  'about half the price' of IBM's $ 5400 (above) is still 
$3000. They weren't 'half the street price' simply because a lot of the 
cheap IBMs were already using many non-IBM clone parts.

The 'extra hardware' to run CP/M may be a V20 when they later became 
available, or it may have been a Z80 add on card such as Xedex Baby Blue 
for $ 600 including CP/M, or $ 980 if it includes WordStar and other 
software.

The June '85 Byte shows the street price for a Compaq clone at #3495 
including mono monitor, 640Kb and 10MByte HD. Complete no-name PCs with HD 
could be had for around $2500 but with no software.