Now let’s go back a bit and take a look at the history and features of the Compaq Luggable. In March 1983, the first IBM compatible portable computer, called the Compaq Portable, was released by the Compaq company.
Back then, having a portable device was a luxury. Compaq Luggable was offered for sale at a high price after its release. (Approximately $4995) It achieved significant commercial success, selling 53,000 computers in one year.
The technical details of the commercially successful computer are also quite impressive.
If we look at the technical specifications of the computer; It had a 4.7 MHz 8088 CPU, 128KB RAM, and 2 320K 5-1/4 floppy drives (A year later, the improved Compaq Plus was produced, while the Compaq Plus had a 10 MB hard drive).
You could also connect these computers directly to the TV via analog cable. This was a very important technical feature for its period.
Compaq “Luggable” was especially preferred by companies. Being both connected to televisions and being portable made it easy to make presentations.
Nowadays, we can handle almost all our work from these computers, regardless of laptop or desktop, but when we examined the conditions of the 80s, companies preferred Luggable to make presentations or work in different environments.
Moreover, its design was better than other computers. Of course, there is a purpose in designing it this way. The overall design purpose of this computer was to be portable and to create presentations that could be projected onto a large screen.
It took time to achieve success. Half of the keyboard keys were not working during the production phase of the Compaq Luggable.
In today’s conditions, when we consider laptops, there are still brands with chronic keyboard problems. In the 80s, the Compaq brand faced this problem.
Its keyboard, the F1-F10 keys are on the left, the CTRL key was also quite different compared to normal keyboards. During the first test of the computer, it was determined that half of the keys did not work, and then they adjusted the keystrokes with capacitance change.
It was also suitable for use by programmers. Programming could be done in BASIC and C++ software languages, but it was not preferred much.
Well, if you are wondering “which software languages were used” with these computers, the answer is ready. Compaq used BASIC, the standard programming language for Microsoft.
BASIC was slower to process than today’s coding programs, but was a surprisingly good programming language for education or small projects. For more serious projects, Borland allowed it to be coded in C++.
Of course, just because software can be created doesn’t mean Luggable is useful for software computing. In general, the Compaq Luggable was not a computer designed for software.
Let’s get the gamers of the past here. Nostalgic games could be played on this computer.
Recently, the concept of gaming computers has been introduced. Brands have started to create player systems in the last 10-15 years, thanks to the development of games, their evolution into 3D and more realistic games. These systems have very technological and powerful components.
When we examine the games of the 80s, Luggable was able to play the popular games of its period. Games like Blockout, Pacman, Digger, Paratrooper and Zork were played with Luggable.
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