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Influence of the IBM PC on the personal computer market

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This is a list of personal computers which are not at all or only slightly IBM PC compatible but came on the market around the time of the launch of the Intel 8086 processor, the first mainstream 16 bit microprocessor[1]. shortly after followed by the 68000 microprocessor from Motorola.

The existence of these cheap 16-bit general purpose microprocessors deeply changed the personal/home computer market, that before was dominated by systems using the 8-bit 6502 or Z80 microprocessors.

The IBM-PC was one of the first to adopt a 16-bit microprocessor, the i8088 [2][3] and it completely changed the computing landscape. Many other companies made "business personal computers" with a completely different architecture, some still using 8-bit microprocessors. The ones that used i8086 processors often used MS-DOS. But even these systems were not simple copies of the IBM PC (clones). Even after the launch of the IBM PC. Manufacturers such as Digital, HP, Sanyo, Tandy, Texas Instruments, Tulip Computers, Wang Laboratories and Xerox introduced personal computers that were — although x86 and MS-DOS-based — not at all or only slightly hardware-compatible with the IBM PC.

The thinking in the industry at the time, (around the time the IBM-PC was launched) was that a limited compatibility, as existed in the CP/M marked, by using BIOS interrupt calls, was sufficient. This meant that even trivial hardware like the keyboard interface was not standardized. The IBM-PC's coming dominance over the PC market, however, meant that many important software packages, (such as the spreadsheet program Lotus 1-2-3, and Microsofts own Microsoft Flight simulator 1.0) and somewhat later especially games, directly accessed the IBM-PC's hardware, bypassing the BIOS. This meant that in practice this compatibility level was not sufficient enough for most customers. So the systems that were not 100% IBM-PC compatible also quickly became just as obsolete as the other systems listed here, and almost all were replaced by true IBM PC compatible systems (clones). One of the first of these was the Compaq Portable made by Compaq.

Almost the only personal computer systems that remained on the marked were those systems that were classified as home computers, and the systems that were made by Apple Inc..

The following lists shows the what kind of competition the IBM-PC architecture had before and shortly after its launch.

Pre-IBM-PC personal business computer systems

These systems came on the market before the IBM PC (August 1981).

Post-IBM-PC personal business computer systems

This is a list of non IBM PC compatible computers that came on the market shortly after the IBM-PC.

See also

References

  1. ^ The Z8000 was on the market earlier, but never really caught on due to lack of software and some bugs. The TMS9900 was technically also a 16-bit CPU, but due to its architecture did not have a speed advantage
  2. ^ IBM decided to use this CPU after first considering the Motorola 68000 and the Intel i8086, because these other two were considered to be "too powerful" for their need [1]
  3. ^ about the i8088
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n This means that MS-DOS is ported to this machine, and is using BIOS calls to interface with the hardware, but the architecture of the hardware is completely different. So IBM-PC software that directly writes to (for example) the video screen (which almost all software did) won't work. The differences with the IBM-PC architecture could be huge. Especially the memory mapping and the video display hardware, but even simple things like the way the keyboard was interfaced to the system could be completely different. See also IBM PC compatible#Compatibility issues.
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