Popular Computing Weekly magazine ordered one on the day they were announced (probably while they were at the press office). Although they didn't get one of the first 80-odd (the hand delivered ones?), they did get an "FB" ROMmed device.
I've just picked up a bunch of old PCW mags which document from launch to arrival (I don't actually have the official report of the launch unfortunately); if anyone is interested in the articles, I can scan them & put them on a website. I guess what I'm most surprised to have forgotten (although, in my defence, on January 12th 1984 I was in fact only 10 years old), is just how MUCH excitement the QL announcement created - and just how much disappointment the long long delays caused. You have to wonder if - had Sinclair waited 3 months (and hence lost out on announcing the world's first sub-£1000 (let alone sub-£500) 32-bit computer) - whether the QL would have had the same massive excitement and, being a fully working machine by now, have REALLY set the world on fire, instead of being comparatively restricted to those of us who saw a bloody clever thing when we saw it... (in fairness... it was my Dad who spotted its potential, I'd have probably been happy with anything that called itself a computer...) Cheers, Ade. > -----Original Message----- > From: ql-users-boun...@lists.q-v-d.com > [mailto:ql-users-boun...@lists.q-v-d.com] On Behalf Of Urs Koenig (QL) > Sent: 12 January 2013 17:32 > To: ql-us...@q-v-d.com > Subject: Re: [Ql-Users] Today. > > Gerhard Plavec wrote: > > As I remember, after that, QL was not available for a long time... > > Do you know - just for fun - when the first QLs were puchased to > > "normal people" and when the first Apple Macintosh were ? > Yes, first customers had to wait a long time for their QLs to arrive. > Reference http://www.qlvsjaguar.homepage.bluewin.ch/QLchronology.html: > "End of April 1984 the first batch of 89 QL's were shipped to > customers by car (SST)." > During May and June 1984 the backlog was reduced and towards > autumn enough working QLs were available resulting in High > Street stores stocking the QL. > > IIRC the original Apple Macintosh (128K) was available the > day after its launch! > Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_128K)writes: > "The sales of the Macintosh were strong from its initial > release and reached 70,000 units on May 3, 1984." > > Grüsse aus Luzern, Urs > > _______________________________________________ > QL-Users Mailing List > http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm > _______________________________________________ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
