3 ms·

Sony's First Computer – The SMC-70 from 1982 [video]

69 points by ksymph 14d ago

Wren_ops 11d ago
[dead]
rbanffy 11d ago
Pretty sweet and interesting 8-bit machine. I'd love to find one near me, but they are nearly unobtanium. I really love the keycaps.
- detourdog 11d ago
  I have one of these from an interactive exhibit. The exhibit predated my time at the company. I think it was a common form factor based around the s-100 bus.
  - rbanffy 11d ago
    If you can, please 3D scan everything. The original units are incredibly rare and need to be properly documented.
    - detourdog 11d ago
      I also have the documentation and cut sheets. How incredible rare? I’m getting ready to shed all the mass produced computers I have. Didn’t realize this was a gem. I admit I never saw another one. Where are you located? http://users.glitchwrks.com/~ahm/smc70/ http://users.glitchwrks.com/~ahm/smc70/
      - markgm 7d ago
        If you do wind up getting rid of it, please reach out on ZZXIO, I'm trying to document as much as I can about the system.
pokerpatioteam 11d ago
The expansion design was surprisingly advanced for 1982. Why didn’t Sony become a major PC manufacturer after this?
- MBCook 11d ago
  I saw another video a few months ago that talked about Japan’s attempt to enter the US market. I think it might have been Asianometry. I think it talked more about MSX. By the time it came to the states it was already competing with other better established things like Commodore. And then once the IBM PC became the big thing they really didn’t have anything special to offer. It was just another set of machines that, well built well, weren’t really any different. Racism and protectionism probably played into it some, given the time period. But mostly their offerings weren’t as unique here. So many computers weren’t practical in Asia since they didn’t support any of the local character sets so at home they weren’t competing that much with those. So in the end none of the brands really succeeded. They became a huge place to manufacture PCs for a long time, but it was almost always under someone else’s name.
  - throwaway85825 11d ago
    Building a microcomputer was pretty easy. Getting everyone to write software for it was very hard. Everyone tried to build an incompatible rent seeking fiefdom. Most of them failed. Then the relentless price competition of the clones finished them all off.
    - deleted 11d ago
      [deleted]
- Lio 11d ago
  At a guess I'd say that the spec wasn't quite competitive enough at the price it was pitched. Consider that the C64 was also launched in 1982 for a much cheaper price and was available in non-NTSC regions too, so would have had a bigger software library available to it. Many people can put up with less convenience with peripherals if you're paying an order of magnitude less up front. Even the software on cassette and 5.25" disk would have been so much cheaper to distribute than the newly launched 3.5" disks (which were much better).
dddw 11d ago
Love this guys vids, superinteresting.
peter_d_sherman 11d ago
This has to be one of the most clever old/vintage computer things I've seen for awhile... Basically, instead of a rigid hardware bus (fixed metal traces on a PCB motherboard), it uses a soft, flexible multi-pin cable with multiple connectors -- as its bus! Brilliant! Yes, these would be frequency-limited because they couldn't be designed with the same precision as the buses on the circuit boards today, but for older computers running in the lower Mhz regime, this would not have been a problem. And yes, you could argue that the S-100 bus had cable versions of it, and SCSI was a bus extension, and both of these would be valid arguments, but I've never thought of using a soft multi-pin cable as an actual low-Mhz early computer bus -- until watching this video. Anyway, great video!
xoxxala 11d ago
Here's an in-depth write-up of the hardware, software, manuals, variants, release prices and other info: https://zzxio.com/about-us/sony-smc-70/ https://zzxio.com/about-us/sony-smc-70/
- pjmlp 11d ago
  This is really cool, thanks for sharing.
nogajun 11d ago
That brings back memories. After releasing the SMC-70, Sony released a model called the SMC-777. In Japan, commercials featuring Seiko Matsuda were frequently broadcast, and it sold reasonably well. However, because it struggled to grow in the consumer PC market, I recall that they entered the MSX market.
hexapus 11d ago
I love this thing so much. It has such great cyberpunk vibes with those chunky expansion modules. I can imagine a pixel-art video game where you update your in-game computer's capabilities by acquiring and plugging in these blocks into your ever-expanding system bus. It's so freakin' cool
timonoko 10d ago
Exactly same colours and looks as Olivetti Teleprinter 1969. Amazing, almost creepy.
- timonoko 10d ago
  This is from the time when Made in Japan meant cheap copy of things. Sony stole this Dark-Brown-Green + Grey color scheme from Olivetti. It was on all prof equipment like Tv-cameras and Beta-recorders.

69 points by ksymph 14d ago

[dead]

Pretty sweet and interesting 8-bit machine. I'd love to find one near me, but they are nearly unobtanium. I really love the keycaps.

detourdog 11d ago
I have one of these from an interactive exhibit. The exhibit predated my time at the company. I think it was a common form factor based around the s-100 bus.
- rbanffy 11d ago
  If you can, please 3D scan everything. The original units are incredibly rare and need to be properly documented.
  - detourdog 11d ago
    I also have the documentation and cut sheets. How incredible rare? I’m getting ready to shed all the mass produced computers I have. Didn’t realize this was a gem. I admit I never saw another one. Where are you located? http://users.glitchwrks.com/~ahm/smc70/ http://users.glitchwrks.com/~ahm/smc70/
    - markgm 7d ago
      If you do wind up getting rid of it, please reach out on ZZXIO, I'm trying to document as much as I can about the system.

pokerpatioteam 11d ago

The expansion design was surprisingly advanced for 1982. Why didn’t Sony become a major PC manufacturer after this?

MBCook 11d ago
I saw another video a few months ago that talked about Japan’s attempt to enter the US market. I think it might have been Asianometry. I think it talked more about MSX. By the time it came to the states it was already competing with other better established things like Commodore. And then once the IBM PC became the big thing they really didn’t have anything special to offer. It was just another set of machines that, well built well, weren’t really any different. Racism and protectionism probably played into it some, given the time period. But mostly their offerings weren’t as unique here. So many computers weren’t practical in Asia since they didn’t support any of the local character sets so at home they weren’t competing that much with those. So in the end none of the brands really succeeded. They became a huge place to manufacture PCs for a long time, but it was almost always under someone else’s name.
- throwaway85825 11d ago
  Building a microcomputer was pretty easy. Getting everyone to write software for it was very hard. Everyone tried to build an incompatible rent seeking fiefdom. Most of them failed. Then the relentless price competition of the clones finished them all off.
  - deleted 11d ago
    [deleted]
Lio 11d ago
At a guess I'd say that the spec wasn't quite competitive enough at the price it was pitched. Consider that the C64 was also launched in 1982 for a much cheaper price and was available in non-NTSC regions too, so would have had a bigger software library available to it. Many people can put up with less convenience with peripherals if you're paying an order of magnitude less up front. Even the software on cassette and 5.25" disk would have been so much cheaper to distribute than the newly launched 3.5" disks (which were much better).

dddw 11d ago

Love this guys vids, superinteresting.

peter_d_sherman 11d ago

This has to be one of the most clever old/vintage computer things I've seen for awhile... Basically, instead of a rigid hardware bus (fixed metal traces on a PCB motherboard), it uses a soft, flexible multi-pin cable with multiple connectors -- as its bus! Brilliant! Yes, these would be frequency-limited because they couldn't be designed with the same precision as the buses on the circuit boards today, but for older computers running in the lower Mhz regime, this would not have been a problem. And yes, you could argue that the S-100 bus had cable versions of it, and SCSI was a bus extension, and both of these would be valid arguments, but I've never thought of using a soft multi-pin cable as an actual low-Mhz early computer bus -- until watching this video. Anyway, great video!

xoxxala 11d ago

Here's an in-depth write-up of the hardware, software, manuals, variants, release prices and other info: https://zzxio.com/about-us/sony-smc-70/ https://zzxio.com/about-us/sony-smc-70/

pjmlp 11d ago
This is really cool, thanks for sharing.

nogajun 11d ago

That brings back memories. After releasing the SMC-70, Sony released a model called the SMC-777. In Japan, commercials featuring Seiko Matsuda were frequently broadcast, and it sold reasonably well. However, because it struggled to grow in the consumer PC market, I recall that they entered the MSX market.

hexapus 11d ago

I love this thing so much. It has such great cyberpunk vibes with those chunky expansion modules. I can imagine a pixel-art video game where you update your in-game computer's capabilities by acquiring and plugging in these blocks into your ever-expanding system bus. It's so freakin' cool

timonoko 10d ago

Exactly same colours and looks as Olivetti Teleprinter 1969. Amazing, almost creepy.

timonoko 10d ago
This is from the time when Made in Japan meant cheap copy of things. Sony stole this Dark-Brown-Green + Grey color scheme from Olivetti. It was on all prof equipment like Tv-cameras and Beta-recorders.