What the hell is an Archives PC? I own one, and even I have barely heard of it. I’ve never seen another.
Well, to cut to the chase somewhat – there isn’t one. Or, to be more accurate it’s something else with another name printed on it. The Archives PC is a re-branded Pied Piper Communicator 1. It was sold under the Archives PC label by an Australian company called Archives Computers around 1984.
Pretty much everything I have learned about Archives (Australia) is speculation right now, but I really want to get some initial notes published while I’m digging. I’m in the process of making a video about the computer itself, but I don’t know if I want to go off on a tangent about Australian IT companies of the 1980s in it.
They seem to have been formed in early 1982 to sell the Archives series of computers, early CP/M machines, from Archives Inc. (USA), formerly Realistic Controls Corporation, even using the same logo as the USA company and presumably a lot of their stock images in ads, such as one in Australian Personal Computer magazine in February 1982 when the Archives III model was current.
There was an Archives IV planned for release in 1983, and I speculate that the plan was to be ready to sell that when it arrived, after getting a bit of a foothold in the market. However, in March 1983 Archives Inc. (USA) announced it was shutting down.
This left an Australian company named Archives Computers with no future products, and possibly only the stock on hand, it being likely they only imported systems as needed. The turnover at that time would not have been large.
Meanwhile, in Canada
Semi-Tech Microsystems had announced the Pied Piper Communicator in late 1982, and began shipping it mid-1983 – shortly after the closure of Archives Inc. (USA). It was not reviewed particularly well. It was a “luggable” computer with a carrying handle which was a little bit of a novelty still and as it didn’t weigh several tons it was probably fine on that front if that was something that you actually wanted. Not many people did.
So it looks like, at the tail end of 1983 or early 1984, Archives Computers (Australia) seems to have purchased and slapped the Archives Inc. (USA) logo onto some Pied Piper Communicators. At least one of them, anyway. Sales were not great for the STM machine, it was underpowered for 1983 (an 8-bit Z80 computer with 64K of RAM and no hard drive), and so they likely got a good deal.
Whether this succeeded in keeping Archives Australia alive in any way is something I’m still digging into, but as far as I can tell, this is how we (or just me?) ended up with the Archives PC – a Canadian computer wearing the logo of a defunct US company, distributed in Australia.
Photos of my Archives PC
I’m currently fixing up my Archives PC, and will be posting things as I go in a thread on Yellow Plastic Club. There’ll be a video or two as well. If you have one of these, or know anything about either Archives company, I’d love to hear about it!
