Coleco Adam
Encyclopedia
Home computer
Home computers were a class of microcomputers entering the market in 1977, and becoming increasingly common during the 1980s. They were marketed to consumers as affordable and accessible computers that, for the first time, were intended for the use of a single nontechnical user...
, an attempt in the early 1980s by American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
toy manufacturer Coleco
Coleco
Coleco is an American company founded in 1932 by Maurice Greenberg as "Connecticut Leather Company". It became a highly successful toy company in the 1980s, known for its mass-produced version of Cabbage Patch Kids dolls and its video game consoles, the Coleco Telstar and...
to follow on the success of its ColecoVision
ColecoVision
The ColecoVision is Coleco Industries' second generation home video game console which was released in August 1982. The ColecoVision offered arcade-quality graphics and gaming style, and the means to expand the system's basic hardware...
game console. The Adam was not very successful, partly because of early production problems.
Introduction
Coleco announced the Adam in June 1983 at the Summer Consumer Electronics ShowConsumer Electronics Show
The International Consumer Electronics Show is a major technology-related trade show held each January in the Las Vegas Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. Not open to the public, the Consumer Electronics Association-sponsored show typically hosts previews of products and new...
(CES) and executives predicted sales of 500,000 by Christmas 1983. From the time of the computer's introduction to the time of its shipment, the price increased, from USD $525 to $725.
The Adam is famous for an incident connected with its showing at the June, 1983 CES. To showcase the machine, Coleco decided to demonstrate a port of its ColecoVision conversion of Donkey Kong on the system. Nintendo
Nintendo
is a multinational corporation located in Kyoto, Japan. Founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi, it produced handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as a cab company and a love hotel....
was in the midst of negotiating a deal with Atari
Atari
Atari is a corporate and brand name owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by Atari Interactive, a wholly owned subsidiary of the French publisher Atari, SA . The original Atari, Inc. was founded in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney. It was a pioneer in...
to license its Famicom
Nintendo Entertainment System
The Nintendo Entertainment System is an 8-bit video game console that was released by Nintendo in North America during 1985, in Europe during 1986 and Australia in 1987...
for distribution outside of Japan, and the final signing would have been done at CES. Atari had exclusive rights to Donkey Kong for home computers (as Coleco had for game consoles), and when Atari saw that Coleco was showing Donkey Kong on a computer, its proposed deal with Nintendo was delayed. Coleco had to agree not to sell the Adam version of Donkey Kong. Ultimately, it had no bearing on the Atari/Nintendo deal, as Atari's CEO Ray Kassar
Ray Kassar
Raymond E. Kassar was president, and later CEO, of Atari Inc. from 1978 to 1983. He had previously been vice-president of Burlington Industries, a textile company....
was fired the next month and the proposal went nowhere, with Nintendo deciding to market its system on its own.
Technical details
In its favor, the Adam had a large software library from the start. It was derived from and compatible with the ColecoVision's software and accessories, and, in addition, the popular CP/MCP/M
CP/M was a mass-market operating system created for Intel 8080/85 based microcomputers by Gary Kildall of Digital Research, Inc...
operating system
Operating system
An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...
was available as an option. Its price gave a complete system: an 80 kB
Kilobyte
The kilobyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. Although the prefix kilo- means 1000, the term kilobyte and symbol KB have historically been used to refer to either 1024 bytes or 1000 bytes, dependent upon context, in the fields of computer science and information...
RAM computer, tape drive, letter-quality printer
Computer printer
In computing, a printer is a peripheral which produces a text or graphics of documents stored in electronic form, usually on physical print media such as paper or transparencies. Many printers are primarily used as local peripherals, and are attached by a printer cable or, in most new printers, a...
, and software including the Buck Rogers: Planet of Zoom video game. The IBM PCjr
IBM PCjr
The IBM PCjr was IBM's first attempt to enter the home computer market. The PCjr, IBM model number 4860, retained the IBM PC's 8088 CPU and BIOS interface for compatibility, but various design and implementation decisions led the PCjr to be a commercial failure.- Features :Announced November 1,...
sold for $669 but included no peripherals, and although the popular Commodore 64
Commodore 64
The Commodore 64 is an 8-bit home computer introduced by Commodore International in January 1982.Volume production started in the spring of 1982, with machines being released on to the market in August at a price of US$595...
sold for around $200, its price was not much lower after the purchase of a printer, tape or disk drive, and software.
Like many home computer
Home computer
Home computers were a class of microcomputers entering the market in 1977, and becoming increasingly common during the 1980s. They were marketed to consumers as affordable and accessible computers that, for the first time, were intended for the use of a single nontechnical user...
s of its day, the Adam was intended to use a television set for its display. The SmartWriter electronic typewriter loaded when the system was turned on. In this mode, the system operated just like a typewriter, printing letters as soon as the user typed them. Pressing the Escape/WP key put SmartWriter into word processor mode, which functioned similarly to a modern word processor.
A less expensive version of the Adam plugged into a ColecoVision, which delivered on one of ColecoVision's launch commitments that owners would one day be able to upgrade their game system to a fully featured computer system.
Problems
The Adam was not without weaknesses:- The Adam generates a surge of electromagnetic energy on startup, which can erase the contents of any removable media left in or near the drive. Making this problem worse, some of the Coleco manuals instructed the user to put the tape in the drive before turning the computer on; presumably these were printed before the issue was known.
- Initial shipments to customers included a high rate of defective tape drives, some say up to 50%. Ejecting a tape while it was moving would usually destroy the drive as there was no eject lock-out mechanism and the tape (based on a standard Compact CassetteCompact CassetteThe Compact Cassette, often referred to as audio cassette, cassette tape, cassette, or simply tape, is a magnetic tape sound recording format. It was designed originally for dictation, but improvements in fidelity led the Compact Cassette to supplant the Stereo 8-track cartridge and reel-to-reel...
) moved at an extremely high speed. - Since Coleco made the unusual decision of using the printer to supply power to the entire Adam system, if the printer's electronics failed or the printer was missing, none of the system worked.
- Unlike other home computers at the time, the Adam did not have its BASIC interpreter permanently stored in ROMRead-only memoryRead-only memory is a class of storage medium used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be modified, or can be modified only slowly or with difficulty, so it is mainly used to distribute firmware .In its strictest sense, ROM refers only...
. Instead, it featured a built-in electronic typewriter and word processor, SmartWriter, as well as the Elementary Operating System (EOS) OS kernel and the 8kB OS-7 ColecoVisionColecoVisionThe ColecoVision is Coleco Industries' second generation home video game console which was released in August 1982. The ColecoVision offered arcade-quality graphics and gaming style, and the means to expand the system's basic hardware...
operating system. The SmartBASIC interpreter was delivered on a proprietary format Digital Data Pack tape cassette. - Once put into Word Processor mode, SmartWriter could not get back into the typewriter mode without the system being rebooted.
- The Adam's Digital Data Pack drives, although faster and of higher capacity than the audio cassette drives used for competing computers, were less reliable and still not as fast as a floppy disk drive. Coleco eventually shipped a 160K 5¼ inch disk drive for it.
Reception
The Adam received some good reviews based on the quality of its keyboard and printer, and offered competitive sound and graphics. Its BASIC interpreter, called SmartBASIC, was largely compatible with Applesoft BASICApplesoft BASIC
Applesoft BASIC was a dialect of Microsoft BASIC supplied with the Apple II series of computers. It superseded Integer BASIC and was the BASIC in ROM in all Apple II series computers after the original Apple II model. It was also referred to as FP because of the command used to invoke it instead...
, which meant that many type-in programs from computer books and magazines would work with the Adam with little or no modification.
However, sales were weak, especially after the technical issues became obvious. Coleco lost $35 million in the fourth quarter of 1984 as returns flooded in. Officially, Coleco blamed "manuals which did not offer the first-time user adequate assistance." Coleco reintroduced Adam with a new instruction manual, lower price, and a $500 college scholarship along with each unit for use by a young child (to be paid when the child reached college). Less than 100,000 units ultimately sold. The Adam was discontinued in 1985, less than two years after its introduction.
Legacy
The Adam weakened Coleco by absorbing much of the money it had made from Cabbage Patch KidsCabbage Patch Kids
Cabbage Patch Kids is a line of dolls created by American art student Xavier Roberts in 1978. It was originally called "Little People". The original dolls were all cloth and sold at local craft shows, then later at Babyland General Hospital in Cleveland, Georgia...
; the company filed for bankruptcy
Bankruptcy
Bankruptcy is a legal status of an insolvent person or an organisation, that is, one that cannot repay the debts owed to creditors. In most jurisdictions bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the debtor....
in 1988.
A group of Adam enthusiasts gather every year at the annual AdamCon. The 22nd AdamCon was held June 18–20, 2010 in Montreal, Canada. The 23rd AdamCon (AdamCon23) will be held in Grand Rapids, MI from July 14th thru July 17th 2011.
Specifications
- CPU: Zilog Z80Zilog Z80The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog and sold from July 1976 onwards. It was widely used both in desktop and embedded computer designs as well as for military purposes...
@ 3.58 MHz - Support processors: three Motorola 6801Motorola 6800The 6800 was an 8-bit microprocessor designed and first manufactured by Motorola in 1974. The MC6800 microprocessor was part of the M6800 Microcomputer System that also included serial and parallel interface ICs, RAM, ROM and other support chips...
s @ 1 MHz (memory & I/O, tape, and keyboard control) - Memory: 80 kB RAM, 16 kB video RAM; 32 kB ROM
- Expansion: 3 internal slots, 1 cartridge slot, and a 62.5 kbit/s half-duplexDuplex (telecommunications)A duplex communication system is a system composed of two connected parties or devices that can communicate with one another in both directions. The term multiplexing is used when describing communication between more than two parties or devices....
serial bus called AdamNet. The stand-alone also has an external expansion port of the same type as the ColecoVision expansion port, on the right hand side. - Secondary storage: Digital Data Pack tape cassette, 256 kB
- Graphics: Texas InstrumentsTexas InstrumentsTexas Instruments Inc. , widely known as TI, is an American company based in Dallas, Texas, United States, which develops and commercializes semiconductor and computer technology...
TMS9928A (a close relative of the TMS9918Texas Instruments TMS9918thumb|VDP TMS9918Athumb|VDP TMS9918Athumb|VDP TMS9928AThe TMS9918 is a Video Display Controller manufactured by Texas Instruments.-General information:...
in the TI-99/4ATexas Instruments TI-99/4AThe Texas Instruments TI-99/4A was an early home computer, released in June 1981, originally at a price of USD $525. It was an enhanced version of the less-successful—and quite rare—TI-99/4 model, which was released in late 1979 at a price of $1,150...
)- 256 × 192 resolution
- 32 spriteSprite (computer graphics)In computer graphics, a sprite is a two-dimensional image or animation that is integrated into a larger scene...
s
- Sound: Texas Instruments SN76489AN
- 3 voices
- white noiseWhite noiseWhite noise is a random signal with a flat power spectral density. In other words, the signal contains equal power within a fixed bandwidth at any center frequency...
External links
- Coleco Adam Technical Reference Manual (Coleco Industries, Inc., 1984)
- Coleco ADAM Schematics (in PDF format; restored and unrestored)
- Video Game Nostalgia's Adam page
- Expandable Computer News Archive
- ADAM article at The Dot Eaters, an extensive history of Coleco and the ADAM
- www.old-computers.com Coleco Adam's page
- Adamcon home page
- Oldcomputers.net's Adam page has some nice photos of components
- Video of Coleco ADAM