In April 1981, the floor of the West Coast Computer Faire in San Francisco was crowded with hobbyist tinkerers, engineers and curious gawkers. However, against a backdrop of beige desktop boxes sat one contraption forcing onlookers to stop and stare. It was a portable computer.
Even though Time Magazine said it looked more like “a cross between a World War II field radio and a shrunken instrument panel of a DC-3” than a cutting-edge PC, it still made people gape.
This was the Osborne 1, billed proudly by creator Adam Osborne, as the world’s first portable computer. Granted, it was portable in the sense that it was the size of a small suitcase and the weight of a fully grown border collie. Also, the 24 1/2-pound box had no battery, which required a wall socket at every stop, but it still allowed reporters to submit their stories from their hotel room.
Some of the more serious visitors were unimpressed. The tiny five-inch screen seemed more like a toy than a serious display, and jokes about the word “portable” floated through the crowd. But when they saw the $1,795 price tag — and, more importantly, the thousands of dollars’ worth of software included — faces changed.
By the second day of the show, Osborne Computer Corporation’s booth was swamped with curious onlookers. InfoWorld reported that “By far the most frequently asked question” at the Faire became, “What do you think of the new Osborne computer?”.
Skepticism turned into delight as word spread that this luggable little beast cost only under two grand – a startling bargain in 1981 – and came bundled with almost $1,500 worth of software. Attendees who had initially scoffed at the Osborne’s clunky looks began nodding appreciatively at its value proposition. BYTE Magazine summed up the buzz, announcing that “(1) it will cost $1795, and (2) it’s portable.”
The Osborne 1 had stolen the show.
The portable office in a box
The computer’s utility was by design. It was built to be tough enough for travel, with an ABS plastic shell, and Osborne claimed it was the only computer that would fit under an airline seat. In reality, the contraption felt more like “luggable” than truly portable, but the pitch worked.
Flip open the front panel — actually, the detachable keyboard — and inside was the five-inch monochrome cathode-ray tube (known more popularly as the CRT) flanked by two 5 1/4-inch floppy drives. The keyboard snapped into place with the lid, so when closed, everything was self-contained.
The screen could display 52 characters per line by 24 lines of text. It was cramped, but you could connect an external monitor for a standard 80-column view. The floppies, single-sided and single-density, stored 90 KB each — enough for a few modest files or a small program.
But the real magic wasn’t the form factor. It was the software. Out of the box you got the CP/M 2.2 operating system, WordStar (the most popular word processor of its day), SuperCalc (spreadsheet), MailMerge and both Microsoft BASIC and CBASIC programming languages.
Later units even included dBase II, the leading database program. Osborne freely admitted the machine’s performance was “merely adequate” and “not the fastest,” but that wasn’t the point; it was a complete, ready-to-use office in a box.
The appeal of portability — however relative — was immediate for certain professions. Journalists were among the first to embrace it. James Fallows of The Atlantic swapped his typewriter for an Osborne, declaring he’d “sell his computer before he’d sell his children. But the kids better watch their step.” In 1982, reporter David Kline lugged one (plus a hefty battery pack) into the mountains of Afghanistan to cover the Soviet-Afghan conflict, using it to write and transmit dispatches from the field.
For reporters, the Osborne 1 was nothing short of a revolution – the newsroom had suddenly become wherever they were, be it a hotel room, a jungle or a battlefield. Lawyers hauled them into courtrooms to call up briefs and reference notes during trials, and accountants used SuperCalc to crunch numbers on-site for clients.
From zero to $100 million
Osborne, a British-born former technical writer and publisher, had bet everything on building an affordable, all-in-one computer. The gamble paid off spectacularly. The first units shipped in June 1981, and by September the company had its first $1 million sales month.
By early 1982, Osborne was shipping 10,000 units a month, with revenues hitting $73 million in the first year and $100 million the next. Analysts marveled at the steepness of the growth curve. John Bunell, who founded some of the most successful computer magazines, including PC Magazine, PC World and Macworld, joked there were “three major people in the industry: Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Adam Osborne, and not necessarily in that order.”
The Osborne 1’s success, though, sparked a wave of imitators. The Kaypro II, introduced in 1982, matched the price but offered a larger nine-inch screen and double-density drives. IBM-compatible portables like the Compaq Portable soon followed. TIME Magazine noted “at least a dozen” portable models at a 1982 conference.
The Osborne Effect
Competition was fierce, and by late 1982, Osborne was working on successors: the Osborne Executive and a smaller model called Vixen. In January 1983, Osborne hinted to the Wall Street Journal that these new, better machines were coming soon. Dealers and customers took the hint — and stopped ordering the Osborne 1. Why buy a model that would soon be old news?
The Executive shipped in April 1983 at $2,495, with a bigger seven-inch screen and some improvements, but it still ran CP/M. The IBM PC standard was taking over and unsold Osborne 1s stacked up in warehouses. Osborne slashed prices, but the damage was done.
By June, InfoWorld was detailing the company’s cash crisis. Hundreds were laid off, a New Jersey factory was closed, and the planned IPO was canceled. On September 13, 1983, Osborne Computer filed for bankruptcy. A photograph of Adam Osborne shielding his face with a briefcase as he left the building captured the bitter irony.
The “Osborne Effect” entered business lexicon as the danger of announcing new products too early. In truth, the collapse was a mix of that misstep, outdated technology, intense competition and overextended operations.
One insider later remarked that Osborne’s meteoric expansion was fueled by juggling orders and expenses on a razor-thin margin, and that the venture capital backers had made a mistake in sidelining Adam Osborne (replacing him as president in early 1983 with a food industry executive) just when visionary leadership was needed most.
Aftermath and epilogue
Under bankruptcy protection, the company launched the Osborne 4 Vixen in 1984. The model was a lighter, slightly larger-screen CP/M machine along with an IBM-compatible Encore. Neither succeeded. In 1986, Osborne Computer Corporation closed for good.
In a 1984 TV interview on The Computer Chronicles, a chastened Osborne noted that the personal computer industry had shifted to favor large, mass-producing companies, and wryly advised would-be entrepreneurs that “If you want to build a microcomputer, it’s probably not a good idea at this point.”
Adam Osborne’s 1984 memoir Hypergrowth recounted the meteoric rise and fall, blaming banks, management changes and the market’s shift, while downplaying the Osborne Effect.
He soon launched Paperback Software, aiming to sell business software under $50. The idea gained traction until Lotus Development sued over the “look and feel” of its VP-Planner spreadsheet in 1990. The courts sided with Lotus, effectively ending the venture.
Throughout the 1990s, Osborne dabbled in a few other projects – one involving importing computer components from India, another in the nascent field of artificial intelligence (a venture called Noetics that produced AI software).
Despite his invention, the once larger-than-life Osborne receded into the rear of computer history. Medical problems, in a series of strokes, delivered the final blow and the visionary passed away in 2003 at the age of 64.
Today, the Osborne 1 sits in museums and private collections, often still functional. Its legacy is underappreciated by many. First, it proved there was a huge appetite for portable computing, paving the way for laptops, tablets and mobile devices. Secondly, its aggressive software bundling influenced an industry now accustomed to pre-installed suites and apps. Third, it left the enduring cautionary tale of the Osborne Effect.
For a brief moment, this ungainly beige briefcase was the future of computing. It changed how people thought about where and how computers could be used, then vanished almost as quickly. The story is equal parts inspiration and warning; proof that in technology, innovation and obsolescence often travel together.
