YUCoM Artifacts -- 1980 --

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The MCM Power, 1980

The MCM Power was the last computer manufactured by MCM before the company's demise in 1982. The computer was designed to "bridge the gap between the small business systems and the large, complex computers that are beyond the reach of most businesses" [MCM, 1980] It was sold in configurations ranging from a complete, stand-alone, small business computer to a distributed processor network sharing a common data base.

The front cover of the MCM Power system promotional brochure, 1980.

The Commodore VIC-20 Microcomputer, 1981

Commodore International Ltd was founded in 1958 by the Polish-born Jack Tramiel as a small typewriter sales and repair shop located in downtown Toronto, Canada. Over the years, Commodore become a major player in the home and business microcomputer market. The debut of the VIC-20 microcomputer came in September 1980 during an exhibit in the Seibu Department Store, downtown Tokyo. By the spring of 1981, the Commodore VIC-20 could be purchased in large department stores across North America. The VIC-20s sales reached the one million mark in early 1983. The VIC-20 model shown was manufactured in Ontario, Canada.

Commodore SuperPET microcomputer, 1981

Commodore SuperPET SP9000 was designed by the Computer Systems Group of the University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, and fully developed into a working prototype by BMB CompuScience of Milton, Ontario. Also known as the Micro-Mainframe, the SuperPET was a unique "co-processor computer" (with the MOS 6502 and Motorola 6809 microprocessors). In addition to the standard software for the Commodore CBM 8000 series machines, the SuperPET ran Waterloo microSystems Language Processors Package of micro-oriented language interpreters. The production and sales of the SuperPET began in 1981 under the license from BMB CompuScience.

Commodore Tribune, Volume XVI, Number 10,000, Commodore Business Machines, May 20, 1981

Commodore SuperPET promotional brochure.

The Dynalogic Hyperion, 1982

The work on Dynalogic's portable desktop micrococomputer--the Hyperion-begun in 1981. The Hyperion was unveiled at the 1982 spring Comdex computer show in Atlantic City as the ``most powerful, portable, business computer in the world'' compatible with the IBM PC. The first Hyperions were manufactured in January of 1983 and the sales continued throughout 1983 and 1984 in Canada and the U.S.

The Hyperion, 1982(?)

Design drawing of the Dynalogic Hyperion case (by David Kelly?). The design follows the design style of the Apple III and the Apple Lisa computers.

Hyperion, The Most Powerful, Portable, Business Computer in the World, Dynalogic Info-Tech, 1982(?)

The Hyperion promotional brochure.

NABU Network PC

The NABU Network designed by an Ottawa-based company called NABU Manufacturing was one of the first large-scale networks involving home computers and one of the most innovative ventures in the Canadian computer and communications industries of the early 1980s.

The network was designed to offer its users a variety of software and services from computer games to word processing, home accounting, and messaging. Users of the NABU network could `surf' the NABU net using a specially designed but general purpose home computer--the NABU Network PC--connected to a cable-TV or satelite-TV system.

The NABU Network was launched at Ottawa Cablevision in 1982; it was also installed by a cable-TV company in Suwa, Japan.

The front cover of the Exceltronix Fall 82/83 Catalogue

Exceltronix was founded by Eugen Hutka in 1979. From a retail store specializing in electronic components, Exceltronix had expanded in the early 1980s into a group of companies (Exceltronix, Multiflex, Toronto Computing Center, Versa-Digital Technology, Digi Media) covering research and development, manufacturing, retailing, and mail order. Originally located in downtown Toronto, Exceltronix was in the center of computer hobbyist movement supplying would be computerists with computer components, computer kits, and fully assembled systems.

The front cover of the Matrox Electronic Systems 1986(?)

Matrox Electronic Systems was founded by Lorne Trottier and Branko Matic in Montreal in 1976. The first product launched by Matrox was a specialized video-display device called Video RAM that interfaced with a computer to display computer generated alphanumeric data. It was a novel device on the worldwide market. In 1977 Matrox entered the video graphics card market with its ALT-256**2 Graphics Board for S-100 microcomputers and the MTX GRAPH software package for the Matrox ALT-256 graphics display. Since then, Matrox's state-of-the-art software and hardware products have established the company as an industry leader in the fields of graphics, video editing, image processing, and new business media.

Multibest single board computer, 1987(?)

Multibest Industrial and Manufacturing, Inc. of Toronto was a company specializing in the design and manufacturing of PC motherboards (such as the Intel 80286-based MB2865 SCAT or the Intel 80486DX/SX-based MB4861DX/SX) and single board computers (such as the MBCTL-02).