Which systems did you NEVER or hardly ever see back in the day?

[Tickled_Pink]

Like the title says. Looking at the Amiga thread made me realise just how different the European and US markets were during the 8-bit and 16-bit eras. So, just what systems did you never see in someone's home back in the day?

 

I personally never saw any of the following. There are some of these I've still yet to come across.

 

Apple II of any kind (yes, really - didn't come across these until early 90's when I went on a clerical course. They were using Apple IIe machines in the adult learning centre).

PC - didn't see one in someone's home till about '92.

Oric-1

Oric Atmos

Enterprise 128

Jupiter Ace

Camputers Lynx

Atari 400 - a friend started out with one but he'd moved on to the XL by the time we met.

Atari XEGS

Atari Lynx

Atari TT

Atari Falcon

SEGA Game Gear

Sinclair QL

Commodore PET - although my first job was converting PET software to PC.

NES

SNES

[Omega-TI]

Back in the early days of computing I could sure pick the LOSERS!

First it was the TI-99/4A, then later it was my NEC PC-8201 (like the one pictured below). It was a lot like the Tandy 100, but without an internal 300 baud modem. I was the only person I knew that owned one. I enjoyed it for a number of years as I wrote small programs for it, used it in college for taking notes, but it truly SUCKED on the BBS's.

 

[BillyHW]

Back in the early days of computing I could sure pick the LOSERS!

First it was the TI-99/4A, then later it was my NEC PC-8201 (like the one pictured below). It was a lot like the Tandy 100, but without an internal 300 baud modem. I was the only person I knew that owned one. I enjoyed it for a number of years as I wrote small programs for it, used it in college for taking notes, but it truly SUCKED on the BBS's.

 

 

TI-99/4A a loser? But Bill Cosby said it was the one!

[BillyHW]

Never saw in the wild BITD (and some I didn't even know about BITD, or weren't released in North America):

 

Atari 5200

Atari 7800

Atari 8-bit

Atari XEGS

Tandy computers (pretty sure that the Tandy's I remember were all PC-compatibles I think)

TI-99/4A

CP/M machines

Bally Astrocade

Magnavox Odyssey (although I believe I did encounter a dedicated Magnavox Pongish type device that might have carried a *000 number and maybe the Odyssey name).

Magnavox Odyssey 2

Apple II and sequels

Apple IIgs

Lisa

MSX, MSX2

Sinclair, Amstrad, Spectrum and all those other funny European computers.

SG-1000

Vectrex

That NEC sequel to the PC-Engine that was a tower-like computer

 

So those were the ones I missed. But in the area where I lived the most common computers and systems that you'd see around were the following:

 

*indicates most common:

 

*Commodore 64

A few Amigas.

*PCs

A few Macs

Atari 2600

Intellivision

*ColecoVision

*NES

*SMS

TurboGrafx

*Genesis

*SNES

*GameBoy

GameGear

Lynx

 

And here's a bizarre one: The Unisys Icon. It was in all the schools in Ontario.

Edited December 8, 2014 by BillyHW

[+Cafeman]

To me, in central PA in the early 80's ....

 

Atari 5200 - this was a popular system in my eyes! I saw advertisements for it, it was in every store, and several friends owned it. After the internet hit, I was surprised at how many opinions of "nobody liked it ,nobody bought it" I encountered. Just sayin'. I'll never forget my poor friend who owned 5200 Q*bert with a b&w TV and he couldn't tell what colors to change the cubes to!

 

anyway ...

 

Odyssey2 - I read about it in Electronic Games magazine but never saw one, never knew anyone who owned it. But now I work with some folks my age who did own one and have fond memories of it.

Apple II - these were at my high school and then at college. They seemed extremely limited to me - only good for their "paint" program. Probably because my HS/college didn't have good software for the Apple II.

Atari 7800 and XEGS - I did see them at K-mart stores but never knew anyone to own one. Forget about them until the internet hit. Bought them in the 2000's.

"speccy" - Retro Gamer magazine educated me about speccy. Never even heard of it until the 2000's.

[Omega-TI]

 

TI-99/4A a loser? But Bill Cosby said it was the one!

 

Yes, the TI is the ONE. It's the quintessential example of an 'orphan computer'. Many computer systems just became obsolete over the years as people moved on to newer and better things. Texas Instruments however dropped kicked it's customers when they totally ABANDONED the computer market and left us all hanging. Even with third-party support, much of the excitement was extinguished in a lot of users.

[Omega-TI]

To me, in central PA in the early 80's ....

 

Odyssey2 - I read about it in Electronic Games magazine but never saw one,

 

 

Oh yeah, the OTHER loser, I have one of those too!

[Tickled_Pink]

And a few more I just realised:

 

MSX & MSX2

Atari 7800

Philips Videopac (Magnavox Odyssey 2)

Dragon 32

Colecovision

Sinclair ZX80

 

 

For me, the most common systems were the Atari 800XL, Atari ST, Amiga, the ZX81 and Spectrum. In all that time I came across just one guy with an Amstrad CPC and just a couple of people with C64s.

[Seob]

Here in the Netherlands, i did see a lot of

msx computers

C64

Amiga

Atari st

C128

Pc's

Zx spectrum

We had a Schneider cpc464, only knew one other person with the same computer. But in Germany and UK (amstrad) it sold a lot more.

Never saw a ti99, but it did sell in the Netherlands.

 

Consoles

Atari 2600

Philips Videopac (a lot)

Nes

Mastersystem

Snes

Megadrive

 

Never knew the

Colocovision,

Intellivision

Vectrex

Excisted back in the day, but that mas more due to the fact i was a homecomputer / pc guy.

Edited December 8, 2014 by Seob

[+save2600]

Between my own collecting habits that started at a very early age and friends, I'd say I've seen or run across most of the popular computer and game systems domestically available back in the day. A few I don't recall ever seeing anywhere include:

 

any of the 16/32 bit Atari's (but I guess my brothers friend had an ST and in the early 90's, I discovered an Amiga store that used one as their cash register)

Intellivision II

Apple ][gs

Atari 5200 and XEGS (only in one or two stores)

Laseractive (a high end audio store had one)

Amiga CD32 (had to mail order one)

Microvision (ran across one at a thrift store years later)

Any of the Spectrum machines, but a friend had the Timex Sinclair 1000

APF TV Fun

Astrocade

Odyssey 1

Coleco Telstar

Atari Video Music

Supergrafx

Vectrex (only ever saw at Sears)

[am1933]

I saw most machines at one time or another, I used to have a nice little place called the "Micro Shop" which occupied two seperate units near to where I lived as a teenager, that place used to keep all kinds of wierd and wonderful stuff. It was the one and only time I ever saw a SAM Coupe for sale straight off the shelf.

[adamchevy]

Never saw a vectrex until I owned one.

[VectorGamer]

I knew of nobody that owned an Atari 5200 or Vectrex. I saw them at stores but never in anyone's house.

[+Ripdubski]

Too many I didnt see to list. However, of those I didn't see but wanted to are:

Atari Falcon

NeXT

[Rex Dart]

It'd be much easier to list the systems I did see back in the day:

 

Apple II

Macintosh

PC Clone

Atari XEGS

NES

SNES

Genesis/Megadrive

Game Boy

Game Gear

Turbo Express

Playstation/Saturn/N64 blah blah blah, by this point everything's pretty readily accessible

 

A kid down the street had a VCS, but wouldn't dig it out for me to see because "it's crap".

[high voltage]

Like the title says. Looking at the Amiga thread made me realise just how different the European and US markets were during the 8-bit and 16-bit eras. So, just what systems did you never see in someone's home back in the day?

 

I personally never saw any of the following. There are some of these I've still yet to come across.

 

Apple II of any kind (yes, really - didn't come across these until early 90's when I went on a clerical course. They were using Apple IIe machines in the adult learning centre).

PC - didn't see one in someone's home till about '92.

Oric-1

Oric Atmos

Enterprise 128

Jupiter Ace

Camputers Lynx

Atari 400 - a friend started out with one but he'd moved on to the XL by the time we met.

Atari XEGS

Atari Lynx

Atari TT

Atari Falcon

SEGA Game Gear

Sinclair QL

Commodore PET - although my first job was converting PET software to PC.

NES

SNES

I've seen the Jupiter Ace at the Alternative Micro Show in London, the User Group had a competition going to run 'BASIC' programs from other computers and competing with the Jupiter Ace language, 'FORTH', which they claimed was 10 times faster than 'BASIC'.

I have also seen a Memotech at the SAMS, lying around half broken. Very sad.

[Lost Dragon]

Growing up, i never knew of anyone who owned the following:

Vectrex, ColecoVision, Intelliivision, any of the MSX range, Sam Coupe, Sinclair QL, Apple II etc.

Plus we openly mocked the Acorn Electron owner and the Commodore C16 owner.

No-one we knew was daft enough to fork out for a CDTV or CD-i either, let alone the C64GS or Amstrad GX4000.

[high voltage]

I saw a CDTV at Computer Care South in Reading, sitting there very lonely.

[JamesD]

Computers:
I never saw any European machines since they rarely made it to the US.
The only machines people I knew locally in my high school days were the TRS-80s, Apple II+, VIC20 and ADAM.
I never even got to see the ADAM because it was returned after the SmartBASIC tape got erased.
I saw Atari's, Franklin's and an NEC at various computer stores but the Atari dealer wasn't even local.

In college I worked with PCs, Apple IIe's and the first Mac.
I used every Amiga at some point because my partner was a dealer.
I knew people with C128s and Atari STs.

You can pretty much leave every other 8 or 16 bit machine off the list.

Video game consoles:
I knew people with the Atari VCS, Colecovision and NES
Nothing else until the PS2

[adamchevy]

Watched a video on YouTube about the bally astrocade today. I never saw or knew one existed until today. I might need to pick one of those up because they look and sound amazing!

[BassGuitari]

Watched a video on YouTube about the bally astrocade today. I never saw or knew one existed until today. I might need to pick one of those up because they look and sound amazing!

Where have you been?

 

If you want an Astrocade, be prepared to shell out. Also, they're notoriously failure-prone; they can die for no reason (related note: shipping is very dangerous for Astrocades, try to test/pick up in person if possible).

[BassGuitari]

The systems I never saw were things like the 3DO, Jaguar, CD-i, NeoGeo, and Master System. I shouldn't say "never" because the 3DO and Jaguar had some retail presence, and I knew one kid who had a 3DO (or at least claimed to; it was an exotic system and owning one would have made you pretty big shit among us mere Genesis- and SNES-owning morals). And the neighbor kid had a Master System (it was the first time I'd ever seen or heard of it since it had almost no retail presence...all Nintendo here). But for all intents and purposes, those systems didn't exist in my area. They only existed in magazines, along with the PCFX, CD32, and Pippin.

Sega CD, 32X, and Virtual Boy were amply available, but nobody I knew (or knew of) had them. I remember we made fun of the VB even back then, although I'm kicking myself for not buying one some time later when KayBee was liquidating them for $10. I think I bought a Star Wars Action Fleet A-Wing or something instead.

Oh, and NeoGeo Pocket Color. Again, I knew one guy who had one, and it was the first time I'd ever heard of it. I forget where he said he got it, but it wasn't local.