Osborne 1

Front view of the Osborne 1

The **Osborne 1** is the first commercially successful portable microcomputer, having been released on April 3, 1981 by Osborne Computer Corporation. It weighs 10.7 kg (24.5 lb), it costs 1,795$ (1,460.93£, 1,609.94€) and runs the CP/M 2.2 operating system. It's powered by a wall socket and even though it's required to be plugged in for use, it's still classed as a portable device since it can be hand-carried when packed. The computer shipped with a large bundle of software that almost costed the price of the computer itself, a practice adopted by other CP/M computer vendors. Competitors quickly appeared, such as the Kaypro II.

Originally made by Adam Osborne and Lee Felsentein and first announced in April 3rd, 1981, Adam Osborne decided that he wanted to change the pricing of computers. The design of the Osborne 1 was heavily based off of the Xerox NoteTaker, which was a prototype developed at Xerox PARC in 1976 by Alan Kay.

The Osborne 1 was described as "a cross between a World War ll field radio and a shrunken instrument panel of a DC-3", and Felsenstein later admitted that carrying two of the Osborne 1 at a trade show "nearly pulled my arms out of their sockets". The Osborne 1 containts a mere tiny 5-inch (13 cm) display screen, use of single-sided, single-density floppy disk drives which store 90K per disk, and considerable weight. Adam Osborne decided to use single-sided disk drives out of concern about double-sided drives suffering head damage from rough handling, while a single-density disk controller was used to keep costs down.

In September 1981, Osborne Computer Company had its first $1 million sales month. Sales were hurt by the company's premature announcement of superior successor machines such as the Osborne Executive, a phenomenon later called the Osborne effect. From 1982 to 1985, the company published *The Portable Companion*, a magazine for Osborne users.[14]

## Early Production

The company initially had ten different prototypes produced, as described by Felenstein's email:

> "I can confirm that this is one of the first ten prototype units built, known as the "metal case" units. I don't think they had serial numbers. The cases were made by Galgon Industries in Hayward, California but their quote for production was prohibitive, so work immediately commenced on the plastic cases. The circuit board was ready in January 1981 and these were built shortly thereafter. They were used in the first ads ("the guy on the left doesn't stand a chance") in which the veins on the hand of the guy on the right bulge as he struggles with the 30-pound weight of his transformer-powered luggable. These were the units we took to the West Coast Computer Faire and the National Computer Conference in early 1981."
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## The Osborne Computer Company Bankruptcy

After the release of the Osborne 1, The Osborne Computer Company went and released the more advanced Osborne Vixen in 1983, which was smaller than the Osborn 1 and featured a permanently attached keyboard that doubles as a stand. Due to the low numbers of the Osborne Vixen, The Osborne Compputer Company filed for bankruptcy in Sepctember of 1983. Later, the Osborne-4 (Vixen) was released in 1985, but failed to sell many numbers.