Jack Tramiel

[Analog-X64]

Dies at Age 83

http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidthier/ ... at-age-83/

I wonder now if that Gold Sword will surface.

[Commie_User]

He escaped the Nazi camps and began his Commodore career mending typewriters. Fellow Poles have produced some of the most beautiful C64 productions I've ever seen or heard, which for me is epitaph indeed.

Amazing what he kickstarted.

[Chris Abbott]

RIP Jack.

I downloaded torrents of old magazines: all the PCGs, old C&VGs, Antic and Zzap. It turns out it's rather depressing, once you've got over all the "I remember that!" stuff, because it's full of crushed hopes and dreams, from small companies with quarter page ads advertising something with a detailed description of the software, companies you've never heard of advertising for machine-code programmers and paying "top royalties", and big companies making BIG mistakes ("we're confident that the Aquarius will be the future of computing"). And looking at the listings and thinking of how much time I used to spend typing them in, how life has speeded up, and how much spare time I must have used to have...

Also, how people can find any number of ways to delude themselves into a bad business plan which looks great at the time! (C16, I'm looking at you!).

Chris

[Chris Abbott]

Oh yeah, and all the shows I missed that I really would have remembered forever had I gone (PCG Show, 1984, I'm looking at you!).

[Vosla]

Another pioneer lost.
RIP, Jack!

[Commie_User]

I think Tramiel was one of those characters who changed the face of personal computing without most people really knowing who he was.

I think his biggest impact was in studio recording: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/nov10/a ... oducts.htm





And of course, without Uncle Jack we wouldn't even have boards like this.


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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLxy8TRuXhg

[Analog-X64]

Read this Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swordquest

Legend has it that the Sword which was never given away was hanging in Jack's living room wall.

[Commie_User]

It turns out it's rather depressing, once you've got over all the "I remember that!" stuff, because it's full of crushed hopes and dreams...

Not to mention stuff that looks, now, to have been a touch expensive for what it was.



http://www.scribd.com/doc/32692986/Ahoy ... 7-1987-Jan

25 year-old magazine pages boast of the all-time cheapest prices - 512K Amiga RAM for £237 for example. And if it wasn't for one place having a liquidation sale, 1541 clones would've cost many hundreds. Just a disk drive. (Mind, if you were going to use it, GEOS was nice and affordable.)

I remember Datasettes being fifty Pounds almost up to the end of the C64's life. I can understand the RAM price but things like the tape recorder prices were simply out of order. Mind, the prices of Tramiel's competitors really were worth a heart attack. (Or a kicking, depending on your temperament.)