Marketed as a computer/printer combo. But the bad part of it all was that the Adam’s power supply generated electromagnetic pulses that could erase its own data tapes. Yeah, that was the Adam experience. So I can see how maybe that would turn off buyers.
Despite causing more data loss than user productivity, it demonstrated Coleco’s ambitious leap from toys to technology.
I bet that is a great keyboard though. Nice satisfying solid clicks.
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This is the machine that killed Coleco. It’s a Colecovision plus keyboard, printer, and proprietary tape drive, for $700, which is about $2,350 in 2026 dollar value. It wasn’t really made with serious business use in mind so the keyboard is as cheap as they could get away with, not like IBM Model F.
I was around during these times, but my family was pretty poor so I never had the cool stuff, and I wasn’t aware of all the history of it. My rich friends had Ataris and Commodores. But I never saw a Coleco in my area. By looking at the keyboard in the pics, I wrongly assumed it was higher quality. So fun to learn. Thanks!
We were “blue-collar” but Dad worked with computers and CAD in his manufacturing job. He brought home a C64 one day in the mid-'80s. My dentist’s office had an Atari 2600 that I hooked up myself while the receptionist was asking around for help with it.
Colecovision was expensive because they were charging a premium for the undisputed best home conversions of arcade games, which is funny because Coleco was also making bad conversions for their competitors… like Donkey Kong by Nintendo, ported to Atari by Coleco, and distributed by Sega. 😆
Such a fun and great time to be a kid. I remember when a kid I was friends with, missed a day of school. I stopped by his house after school to find out why. Turns out he had just gotten a game system and he was playing the Pac-Man knock off called “Chomp,” while being “sick.”
It was a Friday, and I put my book bag down by the door, and immediately called my mom (on a corded phone that was attached to the wall in the kitchen) and said, “I’m spending the night with Kevin tonite, bye!”
And we played that fucking thing all weekend. I think there was Chomp, Pitfall Harry, and some Space Invaders knock off.
His mom and dad bought us pizza and soda and let us have at it. We slept in sleeping bags right there on the floor in front of the TV. And it was freaking heaven! I was 12 years old. Great memories! So fun. So carefree. Hard not to miss those days!
I actually had one of these, the school I went to gave me one after I found it in a closet and fixed it and got it running.
My asshole step dad threw it away because he decided I was enjoying it too much.
Oh wow, that sucks that it was thrown out! It’d be fun to mess around on today
