Amiga History Year By Year
1982
3 doctors from Florida had about 7 million US dollars to invest on something.
After thinking about what to invest, they decided to open a computer company.
They convinced Jay Miner (who worked at Atari at the time) and Dave Morse (who
worked in Tonka Toys as vice president of sales) to join in and assist them in
building a computer. They also got Carl Sassenrath and RJ Mical to help then on
the project. They were looking for a good name for the new machine, a friendly
name, which would attract potential customers. While looking in the thesaurus,
the Amiga was the first synonym they saw, and they soon decided to call the new
machine, Amiga. 7 million US dollars weren't enough for such an extensive
project. The Amiga team needed some more cash and they also needed to have other
products so that the name Amiga could be recognized. The Amiga team bought the
rights for some products, and developed other, but one of the most popular
pre-Amiga products was the JoyBoard. The JoyBoard was a controller device, like
a joystick or a mouse, which you used by either sitting on it or standing on it.
Several games were designed for it, like Ski and others, but the more popular
one was Zen Meditation. In Zen Meditation, you had to sit on the JoyBoard and
remain completely still. When things got tight on the development of the Amiga,
the Amiga team used Zen Meditation to relax. They still worked on the Amiga and
picked the processor for the Amiga, the Motorola 68000.
1983
In 1983, the financial strains on the Amiga team rose, as the prices on hardware
increased. They wanted the Amiga to be a successful game machine and that really
started to happened as suggested price for the Amiga was 400$, but when to
prices rose to more then 600$, the Amiga team needed more then a game machine to
survive. They started plans to design better hardware for the Amiga, so it could
be introduced as a computer, not as a game machine. The Amiga team started
designing the controllers, custom chips, keyboard, ports and disk drives.
1984
In early 1984, Consumer Electronics Show (C.E.S) exposition took place in
Chicago, USA. The C.E.S show was one of the biggest computer shows in the world
at the time, and many companies placed the demos of their latest products in
C.E.S. Commodore introduced its Plus 4 home computer, and the Amiga team showed
their prototype. The Amiga team was looking for someone to invest in them or to
buy them, because the project was too expensive. They rented a small gray room
in the exhibition, and the Amiga prototype was only shown to select customers.
The Amiga prototype was only completed several hours before the show started,
and the team worked about 20 hours a day (not including sleeping, eating and
drinking). When the people came in, all they could see was a pile of logic
circuits, wires and chips (no case). People saw the display, and the
presentation that the Amiga prototype ran (the famous "Boing" demo - a bouncing
ball, with red and white rectangles as its color), and kept looking under the
table, looking for a real computer (or supercomputer) that generates the
presentation.
Jack Tramiel, who was the president and founder of Commodore, got into a dispute
with Commodore's main shareholder, Irving Gould. Gould made him leave Commodore
after 25 years as Commodore's president, and employed a guy named Marshal Smith
instead. Smith had no knowledge in computers and thus no knowledge in managing a
computer company, and Commodore never returned to the days when Tramiel was
president, and Commodore's share in the Personal Computer business was more then
32%. Anyway, after Tramiel left Commodore, he purchased Atari, Commodore's main
rival in the home computer business. Tramiel was hoping to get his revenge on
Commodore by building in Atari a superior computer. The Atari development team
designed the Atari ST, but Tramiel knew that the Amiga could be a much better
investment since its much better then the Atari ST. Seeing that the Amiga team
was running out of money (since the three doctors wanted out of the deal) he
lent Amiga 500,000$ US, while they're negotiating. Tramiel took business very
seriously (he learnt business in the far east and was quoted more then once
saying "business is war"), and when it was apparent that Amiga wont be able to
pay Atari back, he offered to buy Amiga for 0.98$ US a share. Amiga thought it
was unacceptable and every time they tried to bargain, Atari lowered their bid.
Amiga was looking for someone else to buy them, because 0.98$ US per share,
isn't enough to cover 2 years and millions of dollars of development. Three days
before the 500,000$ US loan deadline, Commodore came and started negotiating.
Commodore offered 4$ US per share, but Dave Morse insisted on 4.25$ US per
share, for all the employees that worked on the Amiga. Commodore immediately
gave Amiga 27 million dollars for development, and the Amiga team, overwhelmed
by the amount of money invested in them, went and bought Sun workstations for
the software developers and started working to develop the Amiga for Commodore.
1985
In July 23rd, 1985, Commodore and Amiga introduced in Lincoln center in New York
City, the first Amiga machine, the Amiga 1000.
In September, the Amiga 1000 already shipped to its first customers.
If you want to check the technical specifications of the Amiga 1000, click the
Amiga Models button on your left side toolbar.
The operating system for the Amiga, the Amiga OS, was created by a British
software house, called Metacomco. Metacomco created programming languages for
the Atari ST and the Sinclair QL, and Commodore hired them to create a back-up
operating system for the Amiga, in a matter of weeks. Luckily for Metacomco,
they already built an operating system for the Motorola MC68000 processor, so
all they had to do was to modify it for the Amiga system. This also turned out
as a complicated job, but they finished building it, and the original operating
system software maker, from Los Gatos couldn't complete it in time.
1986
In 1986, work commenced on a new Amiga model. The new Amiga was developed in two
of Commodore's R&D centers, one in Los Gatos (USA) and one in Braunshweig
(Germany). The Braunshweig R&D center is still in use today by Amiga Inc.
Commodore also wanted the new Amiga to have IBM compatibility, so both R&D
centers started developing a software and a hardware emulator.
1987
In 1987, Commodore launched the Amiga 2000, the successor of the Amiga 1000. It
still used a Motorola MC68000 processor, and it was the basis for future models:
A1500, A2000HD, A2500/20, A2500/30, A2000HDA/100, A1500 plus and A2000 plus.
The Amiga 500 was introduced later in 1987. It had the Keyboard and the CPU in
the same box (like the Commodore 64, VIC 20, Commodore 128, etc), and had a new
operating system, the Amiga OS 1.2. The Amiga 500, is the most popular Amiga
computer in the Amiga history.
Both new Amiga computers used a new graphics chipset, the EHB (Extra Half
Bright).
1988/9
Nothing much happened in 1988 and 1989. Production continued on the Amiga models,
and Atari filed a lawsuit against Commodore for building Amiga products (?).
1990
Commodore finished developing the first fully 32-bit computer. The Amiga 3000
with the 32-bit Motorola MC68030 processor was introduced by Commodore and
started shipping. The Amiga 3000 had a new chipset, the ECS, and the new
Kickstart 2.0. Commodore also introduced a tower version, the Amiga 3000T, and a
UNIX version, the Amiga 3000UX. The Amiga 3000 could also use a VGA monitor,
only by installing a flicker-fixer.
Commodore introduced later that year, the Amiga 500+. This was a European
version, with the new ECS chipset instead of the EHB chipset, more memory, and a
newer operating system.
1991
Commodore introduced the first computer system that used a CD-ROM, the CDTV in
1991. The CDTV never became a big hit for several reasons. Although Commodore
put the Amiga OS as the operating system for the CDTV, Commodore didn't put the
Amiga logo on the CDTV case, and so the Amiga users could not identify it as an
Amiga computer. There was also a lack of software for the CDTV. The CD versions
of many games were not much better then the floppy disk version. The CDTV was
also more expensive then the Amiga 500 and so eventually, Commodore introduced
an upgrade for the CDTV that makes it an Amiga 500.
1992
In March 1992, Commodore introduced the Amiga 600. It used the same processor
that the Amiga 500 used, and had the same keyboard-case. It also had an IDE
controller rather then a SCSI one, and a PCMCIA slot. Later in 1992, Commodore
launched the Amiga 600HD, a hard drive version.
In the September 1992 World of Commodore (W.O.C) show in Pasadena, California,
Commodore introduced a new graphics chipset.
The AGA (Advanced Graphics Architecture) was able to support up to 16.7 million
colors. In the same show Commodore officially introduced the first high-end
computer to use the new chipset. The Amiga 4000 had the new Motorola MC68040
processor and other features. In the same show, Commodore introduced the new
AmigaDOS™ version 3.0 and the new development package for the Amiga, the
AmigaVision Professional.
In Christmas 1992, Commodore introduced a new low end Amiga computer, the Amiga
1200. The Amiga 1200 used the AGA chipset, and it also had 2 MB of RAM.
1993
In 1993, Commodore released its last machine. The new game console, the CD32,
used the Amiga OS, and was the first 32-bit game console. The CD32 was a lot
like what the Sony Playstation is today. It used a double speed CD-ROM, 2 MB of
RAM and the AGA chipset. The CD32 had an option of running games in Full Motion
Video (F.M.V) mode. This feature was pretty innovative, but Commodore didn't
receive much support for it by software and game developers, and a very small
number of games used the F.M.V option. The CD32 didn't stop Commodore form
losing money, and Commodore was now underway for bankruptcy.
1994
Commodore was in deep financial difficulties in the past years. In its final
months, Commodore sold Amiga computers like crazy, and demand increased. A lot
of retail stores say that in the last months before the end of Commodore, they
couldn't keep up with demand! However all the sales didn't matter at this point,
since Commodore had such a financial damage that they couldn't recuperate.
Commodore was still developing and manufacturing Amiga computers until the
middle of April 1994. Commodore was developing the AAA chipset, which could give
you resolutions of up to 1280x1024 with millions of colors and 16-bit CD quality
audio. During the last days of Commodore existence, Commodore lay off hundreds,
perhaps even thousands of employees and workers, and many of Commodore factories
and development centers closed. Finally in April 29th, 1994 Commodore
International filed for liquidation in the Bahamas Supreme Court (4:10 PM).
1995
1995 was full of rumors about bids for Commodore and Amiga. CEI (one of the
bidders) signed an agreement with IBM to have them manufacture Commodore's
products if CEI wins Commodore. Commodore UK seemed to have the highest bid, but
when the day of the auction arrived on April 20th, 1995, only two companies
placed their bids, Dell (USA) and ESCOM AG (Germany). CEI joined with Dell, so
that Dell would get Commodore and their facilities, and CEI, will get the
development of the Amiga. ESCOM placed a 5 million dollar bid, in addition for
the 1.3 million dollars that they spent on buying the Commodore logo and
trademark from Commodore Germany. The creditor's Committee accepted the bid made
by ESCOM, but then Dell made a bid for 15 million US dollars, with some
conditions. The Creditor's Committee wanted to accept Dell's offer, but ESCOM
protested against that, since their bid was already accepted. ESCOM eventually
raised their bid to 12 million dollars, so that Dell's bid wouldn't be so much
higher then their bid. Commodore was now sold to ESCOM AG, including all their
property, which includes Amiga. Commodore UK eventually wasn't in the auction,
since their backer apparently backed out, but they reached an agreement to get a
license from ESCOM for developing and manufacturing Amiga products, or the more
apparent solution of ESCOM buying Commodore UK. ESCOM had sales of approximately
2 billion dollars in 1994.
ESCOM held a conference where they disclosed their intentions and programs for
the Amiga's future. They said that they would create a new division, called
Amiga Technologies, that will work on developing the Amiga computer into the
future. ESCOM said that they expect that they will bring the Amiga computers
back to the production lines in September 1995. They also announced their
intentions to start manufacturing new products, and announced the production of
a new Amiga 4000 with the Motorola MC68060 processor and a new tower case. In
October ESCOM will start manufacturing Amiga 1200 computers. ESCOM also signed
an agreement with Scala, that according to the agreement, you will get with
every new Amiga a Scala MM300 program for multimedia authoring.
In July Amiga announced a new Amiga logo. FrogDesign designed the logo.
1996
ESCOM AG signed an agreement with a company called VISCorp (Visual Information
Service Corp.), a company that specializes in building interactive TV set-top
boxes, to let VISCorp the permission to distribute Amiga technologies in the
VISCorp set-top boxes products. The license applies to the Amiga operating
system and compatible hardware and peripherals.
ESCOM AG introduces a new Amiga product. The Amiga Surfer Pack, is virtually an
Amiga 1200, just fitted with a 260-MB hard disk drive, 2 MB of RAM, 14,400 BPS
modem and a package of Internet software.
The software titles in the package are:
o AmIRC
o AmFTP
o AS225 Release 2
o Magic User Interface v 3.2 (MUI)
o Mindwalker Web browser
o Voodoo Multimedia Mailer
Atari, the long time competitor of Commodore over the home computing market, was
bought by JTS Corp. a maker of computer hard disk drive.
In the 1996 CeBit show, the second largest computer show in the world, ESCOM AG
introduced two new Amiga prototypes - the Amiga Surfer pack and the Amiga
Walker.
The Amiga Walker is like the A1200+, but it uses the Motorola MC68030/40 MHz, an
FPU socket and other innovations, including a PCI slot, a x4 CD-ROM, a tower
case and Amiga OS 3.2.
In April, VISCorp announced that it sent ESCOM a bid to purchase Amiga from
ESCOM. The bid was accepted, but eventually, the purchase didn't take place, and
in July 1996 ESCOM AG filed for bankruptcy.
1997
Gateway 2000, a US PC giant, purchased Amiga Technologies GmbH in March 1997.
Gateway 2000 renamed Amiga Technologies to Amiga International (and later to
Amiga Incorporated), and the new Gateway 2000 subsidiary will work to build new
products. Amiga International will retain its current president Petro
Tyschtschenko.
In the rest of 1997, not much happened. Gateway 2000 and Amiga International
licensed the Amiga technology and operating system to a few other vendors and
several new user groups were formed for the Amiga. New software from small
development teams was added to the Amiga small stock of software.
1998
in May 1998, Gateway 2000, after a year since they bought Amiga, announced
future plans for the Amiga platform. Gateway 2000 renamed Amiga International to
Amiga Incorporated, and hired a large number of developers to Amiga
Incorporated. Amiga Inc. opened a new web site at http://www.amiga.com, and
placed the former head of the Destination Digital Media line of products as
president of Amiga Incorporated. Gateway 2000 also announced that the Amiga Inc.
subsidiary would work only to develop the next generation operating systems for
the Amiga, the Amiga OS 4.0 and the Amiga OS 5.0. Amiga will not develop new
machines, but it will license the operating systems to vendors and hopefully
Gateway 2000 will also join and build Amiga computers.