On the Edge: the Spectacular Rise and Fall of Commodore Hardcover – September 14, 2005

Although I was personally involved (and mentioned in the book), even as insider I didn't know the whole story of Commodore. I think Brian did a fantastic job of telling this story, so often left out of the personal computer histories that are, as one might imagine, only told by the winners. It's easy to get the story of Steve Wozniak building the Apple I in a garage, and he did some brilliant things.. but consider, when Chuck Peddle started building a computer, he didn't start with chips, he started with "sand".

Brian's coverage of my era at Commodore (the last 11.5 years) was spot on, and he did a good job of tracking down the people involved. And illustrating that things like this, Engineering, are creative endeavors; as such, the specific people involve matter, and matter big.

While clearly of interest to Commodore and Amiga fans, I think this is essential reading for anyone interested in the whole story of the dawn of the personal computer revolution.

The final few pages get a little poetic; the real end was a rather protracted mess. The "logical" end was essentially when Brian describes it, the layoffs shortly before the "after hours" bankruptcy declaration on April 30, 1994... I made a video about that (Google "Deathbed Vigil", tragically not available through Amazon) which was my attempt to tell the story of why it ended, and maybe who we were in Engineering in those days. 13 years later, I'm glad that's out there, but I think the story of our successes are the ones I'd like to remember... the best reason to look back is to help you look forward with a better eye.

I'm almost in tears reading this book in all its 561 pages of Commodore-Amiga glory. Now if only there was another one like it covering Radio Shack, all would be well! It's truly stunning the way the paths of Amiga, Apple, Atari, Commodore, IBM, Digital Research, Microsoft, MOS Technology, Motorola and yes, Radio Shack, intertwined in this rich stew of opportunism, arrogance, incompetence and employee stealing. Go ahead, read this one along with Andy Hertzfeld's "Revolution in The Valley" and reflect for a moment on the amount of revisionist mythmaking machinery that has grown up around the House that Cringely Built. Unlike many other books, Bagnall doesn't skimp on the technical details here either - the story of MOS Technology and the 6502 is almost deserving of its own book!

-Dallas Hodgson, Deluxe Paint (AGA series) co-developer

The book could be compressed by 50% without loosing any detail and the events are sometimes reported in confusing way and timing.

However the story is fascinating and can please both engineer and businessman. Guys working at Commodore leaded a revolution ( technological and social ) at that time.

It is funny how a technological company can be lead successfully by men like Jack Tramiel who probably could not understand a capacitor from a can.

Nice read.

AS one of the people personally involved at Commodore and "the birth of The Microcomputer Industry" I was very impressed at the level of detail that Brian Bagnall has been able to get into this book and with also with his level of accuracy. As a Commodore insider I naturally found the book a fascinating read but also believe it is interesting to anyone who would like to know more about the birth of the microcomputer industry. It gets certain revisionist thinking on the role of the early micro pioneers into a good perspective. To anyone who had an early Commodore Computer (and 20 million had a Commodore 64) it will also give some interesting insights into some of the features that went into those early micros and why. It is also an interesting human business history of what can go right and wrong in a fast moving company.

Brian Bagnall has packed incredible detailed information in this book which spans the history of Commodore from the early days of transitioning from calculators to microcomputers to the glory days of the Commodore 64 and all the way into 1994 when the company went bust. It's almost too much for those of us interested in the early, often forgotten days, before the IBM PC.

Commodore, during the Chuck Peddle era, was a force that brought many people into personal computing. Speaking of Peddle, it's clear that the author got extensive interviews with the man who created the 6502 processor AND created the Commodore PET microcomputer. I found the stories about just how they made those early chips, doing a physical layout of the whole thing, to be fascinating. I had a chance to hear a talk by Chuck Peddle in which he told some of the same stories that are in this book, about how loads of the early chips simply did not work. In 1975, a 30% chip yield (the number that actually worked) was considered good. When Peddle was with MOS Technology, he and his attractive wife Shirley presided over a barrel of chips at the Wescon show in San Francisco (actually in a hotel suite, where people were directed from the show). Having a barrel of chips made it look like they could produce them in quantity. The dirty little secret was that only the ones at the top of the barrel actually worked!

The year 1977 was a turning point for personal computing, with three important microcomputers appearing on the market (Apple II, TRS-80, and Commodore PET), giving computer enthusiasts a choice beside building their own from a kit. This book reveals that John Roach from Radio Shack took a look at a prototype PET and Commodore honchos hoped he might buy it, but the legendary Jack Trameil was obsessed with getting a big order for calculators from Roach, and Radio Shack developed their own product, the TRS-80.

For another look at this period, see my book Priming the Pump: How TRS-80 Enthusiasts Helped Spark the PC Revolution. Tandy Corporation, parent of Radio Shack, introduced the TRS-80 Model I in August of 1977, just after the PET, and the TRS-80 family of microcomputers had a great run, with follow-on Model III and Model 4, but these, like the Commodore products, faded away into computer history. Radio Shack, of course, did not go out of business, but they did stop making computers when it became apparent that the market had changed. Radio Shack was, to some extent, a victim of its "shlock image" (as the cover of InfoWorld once declared). Once the business world saw the power of small computers, there was a stampede to adopt the technology. But they wanted to do business with a serious partner, not with companies whose main customers had been hobbyists and geeks. Commodore, like Tandy, had an image problem.

The author did a lot of interviews with people who worked at Commodore, but he did not talk to Jack Trameil, who no doubt might see a few things differently. The book was almost too long, with lots of details about projects and products that never saw the light of day. It does not concentrate on any one person or era, but takes you through the whole history. I'm not sure I can agree with the book's subtitle, "The Spectacular Rise and Fall of Commodore." The early years of microcomputing saw many companies rise and fall. There's no doubt that Commodore was an important player, but their importance declined along with their most impressive product, the Commodore 64. The fact that they went out of business is not remarkable; once the IBM PC and its clones took over the marketplace, there wasn't much future for any company that did not follow their lead.

I enjoyed the stories about Jack Tramiel and his "Jack Attacks" and the incredible tale of the "PET Jet," the executive airplane so beloved of favored employees until one day when it went down in flames, with those aboard barely escaping with their lives. These kind of interesting stories about the people, their habits of sleeping at the office and lack of hygiene, and the their single-minded dedication to their work are what make this book good reading.

This book is a geat contribution to computer history, and there's a need for more books about the early era of microcomputing, which many people today know nothing about. Did IBM invent personal computing? Of course not! You have to look to the roots in the Altair, in the Homebrew Computer Club and in the Radio Shack stores back in 1977, where people who knew nothing about computers could walk into the store and see a real computer on a table and could type a few lines of BASIC and fill the screen with their name. Sounds corny, but lots of people got hooked, paid $600 and took home a TRS-80 and learned to program (including my husband David Welsh, who authored the Lazy Writer word processor which we sold worldwide back in the late 70s and early 80s). The same tale can be told about buying a VIC-20 or an Apple or a Commodore 64 and finding a whole new world of computing. That's the story David and I tell in our book; see more stories at microcomputerpioneers.com. I challenge anyone with ties to that era to preserve their stories and write their own book.