RadioShack introduces the TRS-80 personal computer - August 3rd, 1977

On this day in 1977, electronics retailer RadioShack unveiled the TRS-80, one of the first personal computers marketed to the average consumer.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This Day in History Class is a production of I
Heart Radio. Hello and Welcome to This Day in History Class,
a show that believes there's no time like the present
to learn about the past. I'm Gabe Lousier, and in

(00:23):
this episode, we're taking a trip back to the early
days of the personal computer, a time when hardly anyone
knew how to use one, but just about everyone was
itching to try. The day was August three, seven, electronics

(00:48):
retailer Radio Shack unveiled the t R S eight, one
of the first personal computers marketed to the average consumer.
This early all in one PC was the result of
a joint effort between Radio Shack and its parent company,
the Tandy Corporation. The computer's name t R S A

(01:09):
D was a nod to that lineage, with the T
standing for Tandy and the R S for Radio Shack.
As for the E D, that was a reference to
the Machines micro processor, the mighty Zilog Z E D.
Radio Shack showed off its new cutting edge product at
a press conference at the Warwick Hotel in New York City.

(01:30):
Beginning the following month, customers would be able to purchase
the base model for four hundred dollars, or they could
spring for the Deluxe package, which included a twelve inch
monitor and cassette recorder, for six hundred dollars. That's the
equivalent of just under three grand today. Despite that steep
asking price, most people opted for the fancier model, which

(01:53):
makes sense since it was the only one that came
with a screen. It was also the only way to
get a cassette tape containing such killer apps as Blackjack
and Backgammon. No matter which option a customer chose, the
t R S E D didn't come with a hard
drive and only had four kilobytes of RAM. For reference,

(02:14):
an iPhone thirteen comes with either four or six gigabytes
of RAM. It's specs may not be impressive today, but
in the early days of the micro computer industry, the
t R S eight was a big deal. It wound
up making a ton of money for Radio Shack, and
the company would go on to introduce more than a
dozen different models at the device over the next six years.

(02:38):
Designing and marketing a personal computer was outside the comfort
zone of the Tandy Corporation, which had actually started as
a leather goods company. However, Radio Shack executive Don French
was convinced that expanding into the PC market would be
a smart move for the company. He thought so not
only because he was a computer hobby himself, but because

(03:01):
he knew how badly radio Shack needed a hot new product.
One of the store's biggest sellers of the last few
years had been CB radios, but in seven sales had
begun to lose steam. French believed that a consumer friendly
PC could make up for that lost revenue, but Tandy
executives weren't so sure. They questioned whether something is bulky

(03:25):
and complex as a personal computer could sell well at
a radio Shack, especially since most of their products were
far cheaper and easier to use. Despite these reservations, Tandy
approved the project, and development on the TRS a D
officially began. Don French provided some initial concepts for the machine,

(03:46):
but most of the actual design work was done by
Steve Lininger, an electrical engineer and computer programmer. At first,
the company had wanted to play it safe by just
releasing a computer hobbyist kit essential, a do it yourself
package of circuit boards and other components that could be
assembled into a rudimentary computer. It was still an open

(04:08):
question whether the average American consumer would even be interested
in a personal computer. Selling the device as a kit
would allow the company to tap into a more established
market those who already had the technical expertise and interest
in building their own computer. It was Steve Lininger who
convinced the company to set it sites a little higher.

(04:30):
He argued that there weren't many pre builts all in
one PCs out there, so if Radio Shack invested in
a product like that, they'd basically have the market all
to themselves. Lininger got approval for this more ambitious approach,
and the fruit of his labor hit store shelves in
September of nineteen seventy seven. Although initially projected to sell

(04:52):
no more than a thousand units in its first month,
the TRS e d wound up selling ten times that amount.
The hefty price tag wasn't as much of a deterrent
to Radio Shack customers as had been expected, and the
country's growing curiosity about this new state of the art
technology helped drive sales just as Don French had predicted.

(05:14):
In fact, within a year of the TRS eighties launch,
more than a hundred thousand units had been sold, accounting
for fifty percent of all PC sales in nine seventy eight.
As for the other fifty percent of that market share,
most of it came from the TRS eighties two main competitors,

(05:34):
the Apple two and the Commodore PET two thousand one.
Both of those models also came fully assembled and ready
to use out of the box, but in terms of
computing power, they outperformed the t R S eight on
almost every level. Of course, Radio Shack had something going
for it that the other two brands didn't. Retail space

(05:56):
in nineteen seventy seven, Radio Shack had more and five
thousand locations across the United States, many of which were
conveniently located inside shopping malls. That made the t R
S e ight the natural choice for many consumers, as
it was the computer sold at a store they already frequented.
It's worth noting, though, that among geeks of the era,

(06:19):
the TRS e ight wasn't held in high regard. It's
black and white display and chunky, plastic gray case simply
couldn't compete with the high end feel of the Apple too,
with its color graphics and curvy beige case. Radio Shacks
PC was a machine for the masses, but many computer
connoisseurs wouldn't be caught dead with it. In fact, they

(06:42):
even had a not so loving nickname for the t
R S A D. They called it the Trash e D.
How cruel still trash or not, The tr S E
D was America's computer of choice for the first few
years of the industry. By one that in stry was
worth about a billion dollars, and while Apple and IBM

(07:04):
claimed a big slice of that pie, Tandy slice was
even bigger. That year, Time magazine reported on the company's success,
writing quote, a newer version of the t R S
A D has become the largest selling computer of all time,
and Tandy now commands of the small computer market. However,

(07:26):
as you've probably guessed, those good times didn't last. The
tech market proved a little too fast paced for Tandy
to keep up with, and the competitors that had kept
at bay for several years eventually claimed its share of
the market. It's now forty years later and Tandy, the
t R S A D and Radio Shack are all

(07:48):
things of the past. The effect they had on human
society is still with us, though. After all, the t
R S A D was the brand that helped make
computing approachable and intuitive for the averag each person. In
that sense, it helped pave the way for the world
we live in today, where almost everyone now has a
personal computer in the palm of their hand. So while

(08:10):
computer geeks may have dismissed it as trash back in
the day, in terms of cultural impact, it was a
real treasure. I'm Gay Bluesier and hopefully you now know
a little more about history today than you did yesterday.
You can learn even more about history by following us
on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram at t d i HC Show.

(08:36):
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this Day at I heart media dot com. Thanks to
Chandler Mays for producing the show, and thank you for listening.
I'll see you back here again tomorrow for another day
in History class