LGR - Epson Apex 100 PC from 1989

Brings back memories and if that machine was used it would have needed a retrobright treatment, courtesy of the 8bit guy.

OzRetrocomp

8:20 ecks dee

LGR

Absolutely! Beige on top of beige with more beige.

LGR

I'm still impressed by the keyboard garage, hehe. An A1000 would be a great machine to own someday.

The good old days LGR.

James Taylor

Absolutely neat looking. I was never close to IBM clones in1989 but the nice touches like front dip switches and that keyboard connector is awesome. (I was still a die-hard Amigan... well, I'll always be an Amiga fan). Of course I was impressed as heck that an A1000 had a "keyboard garage" :) So I guess I'm easily impressed. :) Great video!

LGR

Nope! Just green.

Steve Lovelace

Is the text in monochrome mode any sharper?

LGR

I've got one of those as well! Gotta fix that up and show it sometime :)

LGR

It certainly had to add a couple bucks to the price somewhere along the line!

LGR

Well I'll be... it does support it! Thanks for that, I will update the video to mention this in the next edit.

The 8-Bit Guy

That's a neat system. I don't suppose you tried the Plantronics mode on Planet X3? (unfortunately, the disk you have probably doesn't include support since it was one of the first releases) That CGA card looks like one of the type that just might have Plantronics mode. As for the green mode.. I had a Commodore 1084s monitor that had the green mode button. I seem to remember the manual saying it would be easier on the eyes for people looking at text all day. Whether there was any scientific proof to that, who knows..

Glen Rea

1989 was the year I got my first PC, an Amstrad PC1512 with a mono CGA monitor and single 360k drive, 8MHz 8086. That was a great machine!

John Piscopo

Man you're right the dual cream colored floppy drives are so boss!

Alyxx the Rat

Sexy thing.

Kris Asick

As soon as you mentioned the price point, as I already knew the year from the video title, I thought, "Wait... that's not possible... unless the specs are way out of date..." and yep, pretty much on par with 86/87 machines. Clearly blew all the budget on that keyboard connection! :P

Bryndal Dwyre

It does prove though that just because a pc is built with older, slower parts, doesn't mean they have to be of poor quality. Epson might have designed it to be inferior to it's main lineup but they didn't scrimp on the quality of the unit.

BastetFurry

Thats what always amuses me, the US was prebuild-by-large-corp land while here in Germany everywhere i looked i always saw PCs from little shops made from parts from different vendors, maybe the odd Colani and later machines from ESCOM or Vobis, but even these always looked like some computer freak assembled them in their basement and just placed a Vobis sticker on them.

Uncleawesome

LGR and Coffee in the morning, me like! :) This is a good looking pc, and that keyboard connector with the door surprised me.

LGR

Thank you! And seriously though, I was expecting bottom of the barrel design and cheapness. A happy surprise indeed.

Ian Spence

Great video! Sure is amazing how much care went into a product they intended to be inferior.

LGR

Yeah, screw sleep!

LGR

Thank you! This really would've been a rather pleasant introduction to the world of PCs back then, considering some of the alternatives in the price range.

LGR

I actually think it looks similar to the Tandy CM-11, visually. Will be adding a line making the comparison in the next edit 👍

Jason Wellband

I agree - the keyboard door and plug are way cool! I am not sure how much Youtube can reproduce the weird video artifacting you're seeing, but it looks like my childhood. I grew up on Tandy monitors until I went VGA with a Packard Bell.

Great video as always. I remeber getting one of these when I was young. Great little pc.

Myles MAN

Late night LGR posts, I’m down with that!