 


				COLECO

			(By) John J. Anderson

		  ( Creative Computing, March/1984)

	
	From the glossy pages of Time magazine, the photo
depicted an arresting tableau. There was Coleco president Arnold
Greenberg, surrounded by a bevy of cloying Cabbage Patch dolls
and sitting next to an Adam (sic) computer. It was a terrific
shot.

	However, as you used to read in the pages of Highlights
for Children, something was wrong with this picture. But what?
Arnold was smiling warmly, the Cabbage Patch kids were beaming
through their pudgy cheeks, and everything looked pretty darned
rosy. Then it dawned on me.

	The Coleco Adam wasn't smiling. In point of fact, the
little fella looked particularly glum. the story, in a sentence,
of Coleco in 1983 was that Arnold couldn't get Adam even to say
"cheese."

	Things have been pretty tough for Adam since he left the
Coleco Garden of Eden for the cold hard world. You could argue
that God himself was pretty big on hype in the Old Testament,
but when it came to delivering the goods, He cam through. His
shipping schedule was six days, no backorders. Granted, the
documentation is still coming in.

	Not so for Coleco. Their Adam seems to have fallen from
the Garden without even getting a bite out of Apple or a kiss
from Eve. In the wake of its fall from grace is a trail of
broken promises, unfulfilled expectations, andextremely skittish
stockholders.

	From the start, it seemed too good to be believed. But
then, most miracles are. An 80K computer with mass storage, a
bui9lt-in word processor, and a letter-quality printer for $525.
Most agnostically-inclined pundits remained skeptical that
Coleco could deliver on those promises.

	And boy, were those promises made. Coleco spared no
shovel in piling on the hype for its little miracle. At summer
CES, you could harly approach the Col;eco booth. The whole
extravaganza was worthy of Walt Disney. If, in fact, you did get
close to them, you noted that the Adams were on display behind
cases of tinted glass. They were to be seen through a glass,
darkly.

	The glass helped soften tooling marks on the prototype
Adam shells. If you used your powers of observation, it became
clear that each unit was hand-made. In addition they sported
dummy tape drives. Something was afoot.

	In fairness to Coleco, they did not invent the common
practice of debuting products before they actually exist. In
microcomputers, to do otherwise would be to break with a
veritable tradition. However, in the case of the Adam, there
wasn't very much inside the case of the Adam -- save a souped-up
ColecoVision game system, running a rather buggy prototype word
processor.

COLECOVISION SUCCESS

	The ColecoVision is a popular game system for good
reason, Its graphics and sound are above average, and some very
good games are available for it. As Atari derailed itself and
looked on, the ColecoVision became the number on selling premium
game system.

	The idea of making the ColecoVision into a full-fledged
computer was planned by Coleco from its inception. Coleco began
work on the project quite shortly after the games unit was
introduced. And Coleco knoew that as a maker of vacuum-moulded
baby pools, it would be up against a credibility problem in the
arena of microcomputers. So it se its sights accordingly.

	Amid the current brouhaha, it is easy to lose sight of
the fact that, in theory, Adam remains a very strong contender.
If it were to come to full fruition, the Adam could still be a
hot item. Based on the Z80 that anchors the ColecoVision, the
Adam has more standard features than any other machine in its
class, and in many cases even out of its class. It is an
integrated system, and has two MPUs in the main console, one in
the keyboard, and one in the printer.

	All these components together constitute the Adam
Computer System. Each can function independently of or in tandem
with the other processing units. This makes multitasking
possible and elevates the system to the ranks of other "smart"
machines.

	ADAM

	The Adam sports 80K of RAM, expandable to 144K. Word
processing is resident in ROM and is designed to work directly
with the Smartwriter daisywheel printer supplied with the
system. Of course, Adam also has a ROM cartridge slot, and plays
all ColecoVision games. If you already have a ColecoVision, you
can buy an add-on system to make it into a full-fledged Adam.

	No computer system is truly complete without some sort
of mass storage device, and Adam has one. They call it a
"digital data pack," and though it looks like a conventional
audio cassette, it uses cassette technology different from that
employed in any other microcomputer. Each specially engineered
cassette is capable of story 500K (sic) and works between eight
and sixteen times faster than conventional cassette storage for
the Atari, TRS-80, or Commodore.

	Each Adam copmes with one built-in data pack drive, and
room for inboard installation of another.

	The 75-key keyboard is perhaps the most impressive
component of the Adam computer. It looks very much like the
detached keyboard of the IBM PC -- right down to the coiled
telephone wire coming out the back. In some ways, it is actually
superior to the PC keyboard. It is laid out Selectric style and
includes dedicated word processing keys, along with truly
directional cursor movement keys. It also features six
programmable "smart keys," which perform flexible functions
within specific programs.

	the Basic computer language is also provided with the
Adam package. It is not ROM-resident, but loads from digital
data pack (sic).The Adam version of Basic is compatible with
Applesoft Basic, that means that Applesoft tutorials, books, and
programs will work with the Adam. (It does not mean that
Apple-specific Basic programs, using specific addresses, or any
Apple machine language programs, can run on the Adam, they can't)

	Adam includes four expansion slots and an 80-column
expansion option, as well as a CP/M option. Usint eh same
expansion box as its dedicated gamester cousin, the Adam can
play all Atari VCS games.

	Thje graphics capabilities of the Adam match the
specifications of the ColecoVision as well. Thjis means 256 x
192 pixel resolution, the ability to generate up to 32
simultaneous prites, and 16K RAM dedicated to screen display
alone.

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

	Wow, huh? Sounds pretty good -- we couldn't waiot to get
one. That was six months ago, and we are still waiting to get
one. And our enthusiasm is on the wane.

	In August 1983, Greenberg claimed Coleco would ship half
a million Adams by Christmas. Then the deadlines started
slipping by. He said they would begin shipping September 1, then
September 15, then Octer 1, then October 15. The leaves fell.
November came. Pinkerton did not return. And the Adanm did not
ship.
     
	Adam missed Christmas, except for a dribble of units
here and there. On December 1, Coleco announced that it was
confident that it had solved production problems and would turn
out 125,000 to 140,000 systems in 1983. Evidence indicates that
even that projection was overly optimistic.

	Of those units that did ship, the rumored return rate
was absolutely alarming. The Coleco helpline number has been
ringing off the hook. Of one shipment of six machines, a Child
World manager stated that, as of the week before Christmas, five
had come back. He guess that the sixth hadn't been opened yet
and would be coming back December 26th.

	Even when it works, the Adam has problems. Its video
signal is somewhat smeared, even when connected to a high
quality monitor. Its tape drive technology is in its infancy and
display some serious glitches. Its printer is noisy, slow, and
doesn't look to have an exceptional mean time between failures.

	As a relut of Coleco"problems with the Adam, company
stock dropped from a high of 65 in June of 1983 to 13-3/8 in the
third quarter of 1983. Introduction of the IBM PCjr cannot have
helped, but Coleco's real problems stemmed from within, Third
quarter earnings dropped to 14 cents a share, and aggressive TV
and print ad campaigns were dropped for sheer dearth of the
product they hyped.

	And if there is one thing at which Coleco is superb, it
is hype. Investigation has shown that Coleco annual reports have
painted a rosy picture since 1973 -- and been exaggerated 60 per
cent of the time. Price Waterhouse, Coleco's accountant in 1977,
would give the company only a qualified opinion in that year's
financial statement, and resigned the account the following
year. In some quarters the brothers Arnold and Leonard Greenberg
are known as the "Sunshine Boys."

		Whether the Adam has terminallyh flashed in the
pan is disputed by many in the industry. Some feel that the bid
has already been lost, while others hold out hope that the
machine may still materialize and find a market.

	Meanwhile, the price has gone up. The suggested price
for the full system is now $725, and for the ColecoVision add-on
version, $450. News of this hike has surely made Commodore very
happy.




(The above was taken from the March 1984 issue of Creative
Computing, pages 65-66. It was written by John J. Anderson. The
story was headlined with the COLECO logo and ran with a picture
of Arnold Greenberg, president of Coleco. The picture cutline
says Greenberg and his brother Leonard who was Chairman of the
COLECO board, "brought the old line Connecticut Leather Company
into the age of electronics. It was renamed Coleco Industries in
1961." The article also carried a small newspaper or magazine ad
run by a New York area retailer in December,1983. It shows a
drawing of the Adam, "now in stock" and offers "Free! Cabbage
Patch Doll with purchase.")
                                       

            (It is offered for historical interest only.)


