I’m shamelessly ripping off the format of one of the best (albeit most shocking) blogs (NSFW) I’ve seen in a long time, but I don’t care. This is my ‘Yes!’ moment. I admit it, I’m a sad pathetic geek but there you go.
In case you’re wondering what the thing is, it’s a CDTV. The CDTV was one of the first major car-wrecks of computing that signalled the end of Commodore as we knew it. Designed to compete with the CDI (why?) and even beat it to market, the CDTV was an absolute commercial failure.
The CDTV was the brainchild of marketing consultants, who were drafted in to help Commodore gain the edge in the next generation computer war that was brewing. Multimedia was the ‘in-thing’ at the time. The CDTV was designed not as a computer, but as a kind of replacement for the VCR and CD player. It was revolutionary, and is the direct predecessor of the CD32.
It was also the first computer with a CD-Rom drive as standard (you at the back with the FM Towns, bugger off!). Its sleek, black exterior combined with the Hi-Fi unit styling made sure it wouldn’t look out of place in the living room. It could play CDs, CD+G and CDXL video, was compatible with Amiga games and applications, came with serial and parallel ports, along with a floppy drive, keyboard and mouse as an option. Oh, and it came with an Infra-red remote.
So to recap, using this baby, you could play music (CD, MOD etc.), view pictures and movies, play games, applications, link it up to a network (sernet and parnet) and it doesn’t look like a computer. All of this in 1991? What were Jobs and Gates up to in those days? My MythTV barely does that now (albeit more due to the little cherub crashing than anything else).
So how come it failed? Well, firstly the market wasn’t really ready and didn’t understand what multimedia is. More importantly, Commodore didn’t really understand what multimedia is. In fact, commodore fluffed things up so much they’re as rare as hens teeth now (although you still see them on ebay now and again).
Instead of using Commodore’s Kickstart 2.0, they opted for the ageing and outdated 1.3. Instead of giving it a whopping 2mb of RAM, they initially looked at 512k, and were convinced that 1mb should be enough. Instead of going for a powerful 68020 processor, or even a slightly less compatible but faster 68010, Commodore chose to stick with the 68000 – effectively bunging an Amiga 500 (which was already 4 years old and being superceded by the A500+ released the same year!) in a hifi case with a CD-Rom drive.
To make things more confusing, Commodore marketed the device at Amiga fanatics who already had a 500 and were waiting for the A570 add-on CD-Rom drive that would turn your existing A500 into something close enough to a CDTV! To further muddy the issue, Commodore marketed the device to the general public as a replacement for the VCR or CD player, demanding that stores placed it with Hi-Fi equipment instead of computers. Computer fans didn’t like it because it was pretty much unexpandable, and the general public found it too confusing to buy. At £499, it wasn’t cheap, especially with rumours of the Amiga 1200.
I still lusted after one, although I was holding out for the Amiga 1200, which I eventually got as a christmas present. So now, in 2006 I’ve finally got one, and I have to say the experience is as brilliant now as it would’ve been then.
There’s a dearth of information on the Internet about the CDTV. There’s the CDTV information center, There’s a forum for CD32 and CDTV users, and there’s some notes (including an easter egg) at the Workbench Nostalgia page.
It’s a shame really, as the console was years ahead of its time, despite being incredibly underpowered for what it was. Oh well, I’m off to play Wrath of the Demon…
