Okay, I know I’m dating myself for blogging this, but I don’t care..

  Back in the early PC days, the Amiga grabbed a lot of attention. It was the dream machine at the time. I remember one day casually walking by a computer store on Main street in Alhambra, oh I don’t know mid ’80s. I saw an Amiga on the window, displaying the classic animation of a bouncing red/white checkered ball. I was quick to ditch my friends and went in to check it out. I still remember that I thought it was the coolest computer I’d ever seen. I was blown away!

I had been reading about the Amiga in Byte magazine. I was a kid with a $200 Commodore 64, green with envy at all the rich kids at school who owned IBM, Atari & most of all Apple II. So it wasn’t like my parents were going to get it for me. Don’t remember the price, just that it was ridiculously expensive. Technically, the Amiga was best in the market at that point, but it was mismanaged and eventually flamed out– just a footnote in computing history and another of many duds left on the wayside by IBM & Apple.

Anyhow, Arstechnica features an on-going series of articles on the history of The Amiga. Very intriguing geeky read, highly recommended from yours truly!

  1. genesis
  2. birth of Amiga
  3. 1st prototype
  4. enter Commodore

Here’s a funny excerpt:

Amiga, Inc. didn’t have a lot of money left over for shipping its prototype to the show, and the engineers were understandably nervous about putting such a delicate device through the rigors of commercial package transport. Instead, RJ Mical and Dale Luck purchased an extra airline seat between the two of them and wrapped the fledgling Amiga in pillows for extra security. According to airline regulations, the extra “passenger” required a name on the ticket, so the Lorraine became “Joe Pillow,” and the engineers drew a happy face on the front pillowcase and added a tie! They even tried to get an extra meal for Joe, but the flight attendants refused to feed the already-stuffed passenger.