Commodore PET 2001
A Commodore PET 2001
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| Manufacturer | Commodore International |
|---|---|
| Type | Personal computer |
| Release date | October 1977 |
| Discontinued | 1982 |
| Operating system | Commodore BASIC 1.0 ~ 4.0 |
| CPU | MOS Technology 6502 @ 1 MHz |
| Memory | 4 — 96 kB |
| Storage | cassette tape, 5.25" floppy, 8" floppy, hard disk |
| Display | 40×25 or 80×25 text |
| Graphics | monochrome character graphics |
| Sound | none or beeper |
| Successor | Commodore CBM-II |
The Commodore PET (Personal Electronic Transactor) is a line of home/personal computers produced starting in 1977 by Commodore International. A top-seller in the Canadian and United States educational markets, it was Commodore's first full-featured computer, and formed the basis for their entire 8-bit product line, including the Commodore 64. The first model, which was named the PET 2001, was the third personal computer ever made available to retail consumers, after the Apple II and TRS-80.
In the 1970s Commodore was one of many electronics companies selling calculators designed around Dallas-based Texas Instruments (TI) chips. However, in 1975 TI increased the price of these components to the point where the chip set cost more than an entire TI calculator, and the industry that had built up around it was frozen out of the market.
Commodore responded to this by searching for a chip set they could purchase outright. They quickly found MOS Technology, which was in the process of bringing its 6502 microprocessor design to market, and with which came Chuck Peddle's KIM-1 design, a small computer kit based on the 6502. At Commodore, Peddle convinced Jack Tramiel that calculators were a dead-end. In September 1976 Peddle got a demonstration of Jobs and Wozniak's Apple II prototype, when Jobs was offering to sell it to Commodore, but Commodore considered Jobs' offer too expensive.
Tramiel demanded that Peddle, Bill Seiler, and John Feagans create a computer in time for the June 1977 Consumer Electronics Show, and gave them six months to do it. Tramiel's son, Leonard, helped design the PETSCII graphic characters and acted as quality control.
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