The Amstrad PCW series is a range of personal computers produced by British company Amstrad from 1985 to 1998, and also sold under licence in Europe as the "Joyce" by the German electronics company Schneider in the early years of the series' life. The PCW, short for Personal Computer Word-processor, was targeted at the word processing and home office markets. When it was launched, the cost of a PCW system was under 25% of the cost of almost all PC compatibles in the UK, and as a result the machine was very popular both in the UK and in Europe. The series sold 8 million units. The last two models, introduced in the mid-1990s, were commercial failures, because of falling prices, greater capabilities, and wider range of software for PC compatibles.
The series consists of PCW 8256 and PCW 8512 (introduced in 1985), PCW 9512 (introduced in 1987), PCW 9256 (introduced in 1991), PCW 10 and PcW16 (introduced in 1995).
In all models, the monitor's casing contains the CPU, RAM, floppy disk drives, and power supply for all of the systems' components. All models except the last included a printer in the price. Early models use 3-inch floppy disks, while those sold from 1991 onwards use 3½-inch floppies.
All models use a Z80 CPU, running at 4 MHz in earlier models and higher speeds in later models. Standard RAM is 256 KB or 512 KB, depending on the model.
All models except the last shipped with the Locoscript word processing program, the CP/M Plus operating system, Mallard BASIC, and Dr. Logo. The last model, PcW16, has a custom GUI operating system.
A wide range of other CP/M office software and several games became available, some commercially produced and some free. Although Amstrad marketed all but the last model as text based systems, graphical user interface peripherals and the supporting software also became available. The last GUI model is incompatible with software for previous PCW models.
Development and launch In 1984, Tandy Corporation executive Steve Leininger, designer of the TRS-80 Model I, admitted that "as an industry we haven't found any compelling reason to buy a computer for the home" other than for word processing. Amstrad's founder Alan Sugar realised that most computers in the United Kingdom were used for word processing at home, and allegedly sketched an outline design for a low cost replacement for typewriters during a flight to the Far East. This design has a single "box" containing all the components, including a portrait-oriented display, more convenient for displaying documents than the usual landscape orientation. However the portrait display was quickly eliminated because it would have been too expensive, and an included printer also became a separate unit. To reduce the cost of the printer, Amstrad commissioned an ASIC (custom circuit) from MEJ Electronics, which had developed the hardware for Amstrad's earlier CPC-464. Two other veterans of the CPC-464's creation played important roles, with Roland Perry managing the PCW project and Locomotive Software producing the Locoscript word processing program and other software. The CP/M operating system was added at the last minute. During development the PCW 8256 / 8512 project was code-named "Joyce" after Sugar's secretary.
For the launch the product name "Zircon" was jointly suggested by MEJ Electronics and Locomotive Software, as both companies had been spun off from Data Recall, which had produced a word processing system called "Diamond" in the 1970s. Sugar, preferring a more descriptive name, suggested "WPC" standing for "Word Processing Computer", but Perry pointed out that this invited jokes about Women Police Constables. Sugar reshuffled the initials and the product was launched as the "Personal Computer Word-processor", abbreviated to "PCW". The advertising campaign featured trucks unloading typewriters to form huge scrap heaps, with the slogan "It's more than a word processor for less than most typewriters". In Britain the system was initially sold exclusively through Dixons, whose chairman shared Sugar's dream that computers would cease to be exclusive products for the technologically adept and would become consumer products.
Impact In 1986, John Whitehead described the Amstrad PCW as "the bargain of the decade", and technology writer Gordon Laing said in 2007, "It represented fantastic value at a time when an IBM PC compatible or a Mac would cost a comparative fortune". At its British launch in September 1985, the basic PCW model was priced at £399 plus value added tax, including printer, word processor program, the CP/M operating system and associated utilities, and Mallard BASIC and Dr. Logo. Software vendors quickly made a wide range of additional applications available, including accounting, spreadsheet, and database programs, so that the system was able to support most of the requirements of a home or small business.
Shortly afterwards the Tandy 1000 was introduced in the UK with the MS-DOS operating system and a similar suite of business applications and became the only other IBM-compatible personal computer system available for less than £1,000 in Britain. At the time the cheapest complete systems from Apricot Computers cost under £2,000 and the cheapest IBM PC system cost £2,400. Although competitors' systems generally had more sophisticated features, including colour monitors, Whitehead thought the Amstrad PCW offered the best value for money.
In the US the PCW was launched at a price of $799, competing with Magnavox VideoWriter and Smith Corona PWP, two word-processing systems also including a screen, keyboard, and printer. Popular Science thought that the PCW could not compete as a general-purpose computer, because its use of non-standard 3-inch floppy disk drives and the old CP/M operating system would restrict the range of software available from expanding beyond the spreadsheet, typing tutor, and cheque book balancing programs already on sale. However, the magazine predicted that the PCW's large screen and easy-to-use word processing software would make it a formidable competitor to dedicated word processors in the home and business markets. The system was sold in the US via major stores, business equipment shops and electronics retailers.
The PCW redefined the idea of "best value" in computers by concentrating on reducing the price, which totally disrupted the personal computer market. The low price encouraged home users to trade up from older, simpler systems like the ZX Spectrum. According to Personal Computer World, the PCW "got the technophobes using computers". In the first two years over 700,000 PCWs were sold, gaining Amstrad 60% of the UK home computer market, and 20% of the European personal computer market, second only to IBM's 33.3% share. Having gained credibility as computer supplier, Amstrad launched IBM-compatible PCs, once again focussing on low prices, with its PC1512 surpassing the IBM PC on performance and beating even the Taiwanese clones on price. Amstrad became the dominant British personal computer company, buying all the designs, marketing rights and product stocks of Sinclair Research Ltd's computer division in April 1986, while Apricot later sold its manufacturing assets to Mitsubishi and became a software company.
The magazines 8000 Plus (later called PCW Plus) and PCW Today were published specifically for PCW users. In addition to the usual product reviews and technical advice, they featured other content such as articles by science fiction writer and software developer Dave Langford on his experiences of using the PCW.
By 1989, units had been sold. When the PCW line was retired in 1998, 8 million machines had been sold. The Daily Telegraph estimated in 2000 that 100,000 were still in use in the UK, and said that the reliability of the PCW's hardware and software and the range of independently produced add-on software for its word processing program were factors in its continued popularity. Laing said the PCW line's downfall was that "proper PCs became affordable". IBM, Compaq and other vendors of more expensive computers had reduced prices drastically to increase demand during the early 1990s recession. In 1993 the PCW still cost under £390 while a PC system with a printer and word processing software cost over £1,000, but after adjustment for inflation the retail price of a multimedia IBM-compatible PC in 1997 was about 11% more than that of a PCW 8256 in 1985, and many home PCs were cast-offs, sometimes costing as little as £50, from large organisations that had upgraded their systems. Also available at virtuallearning.org.uk
Models and features
PCW 8256 and 8512
The PCW 8256 was launched in September 1985 with 256 KB of RAM and one floppy disk drive. Launched a few months later, the PCW 8512 has 512 KB of RAM and two floppy disk drives. Both systems consist of three units: printer; keyboard; and monochrome CRT monitor whose casing includes the processor, memory, motherboard, one or two floppy disk drives, the power supply for all the units and the connectors for the printer and keyboard. The monitor displays green characters on a black background. It measures diagonally, and shows 32 lines of 90 characters each. The designers preferred this to the usual personal computer display of 25 80-character lines, as the larger size would be more convenient for displaying a whole letter. The monitor can also display graphics for the bundled graphics program and for games.
The floppy disk drives on these models are in the unusual 3-inch "compact floppy" format, which was selected as it has a simpler electrical interface than 3½-inch drives. In the range's early days supplies of 3-inch floppies occasionally ran out, but by 1988 the PCW's popularity encouraged suppliers to compete for this market. There are several techniques for transferring data from a PCW to an IBM-compatible PC, some of which also can transfer in the opposite direction, and service companies that will do the job for a fee. While all the 3-inch disks are double-sided, the PCW 8256's 3-inch drive and the PCW 8512's upper one were single-sided, while the 8512's lower one was double-sided and double-density. Hence there are two types of disk: Single-density, which could store 180 KB of data per side, equivalent to about 70 pages of text each; and double density, which can store twice as much per side. The double-density drive can read single-density disks, but it is inadvisable to write to them using this drive. Users of single-sided drives have to flip the disks over to use the full capacity.
The dot matrix printer has a sheet feed for short documents and a tractor feed for long reports on continuous stationery. It can print 90 characters per second at draft quality and 20 characters per second at higher quality, and can produce graphics. However it has only 9 printing pins and its higher quality does not match that of 24-pin printers. The dot matrix printer is not very robust as its chassis is made entirely of plastic. Users could buy a daisy-wheel printer or graph plotter from Amstrad. The daisy-wheel printer could not produce graphics.
The keyboard has 82 keys, some specific for word processing, especially with the bundled Locoscript software – for example to cut, copy, and paste. Non-English characters such as Greek can be typed by holding down the or key, along with the key if capitals were required. Other special key combinations activate caps lock, num lock, and reboot.