Altair 8800 name Was: Re: Altair 680 Expansion Boards?

[drlegendre .]

"The Z80 had more players and more names than all the rest"

And yet it was essentially a bit-player in the days of the 'home computer'
revolution - at least in the US. CBM, Apple, Atari - the three big names in
home computers, all went with the 6502 family. And perhaps even more
importantly, so did Nintendo, in the NES. The main use of Z80 in US home
computing was in the absurdly small Timex / Sinclair ZX80 series - with
their awful cramped membrane keyboards and seriously limited sound & video.

The Z80 also showed up in the Osborne, Kaypro and TRS-80 models.. mostly
due to the fact that CP/M was written to it. Commodore also put one in the
C128, but by then, it was almost a dead letter.

On Thu, Dec 22, 2016 at 9:49 AM, allison <ajp166 at verizon.net> wrote:

> On 12/21/2016 07:06 PM, Sam O'nella wrote:
> > On Wed, Dec 21, 2016 at 5:54 PM, js at cimmeri.com <js at cimmeri.com> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> On 12/17/2016 1:23 PM, Stephen Pereira wrote:
> >>
> >>> I was (finally) lucky enough to acquire an Altair 680 back in
> November...
> >>>
> >> Is there any logic to the naming of these Altairs?   Wonder why it
> wasn't
> >> "Altair 8080" and "Altair 6800".   8800 and 680 don't follow the same
> >> pattern.
> >>
> >> ------
> >>
> >> Had MITS made other Altairs...
> >>
> >> Altair 8800 = 8080
> >>        8850 = 8085
> >>        8860 = 8086
> >>        8880 = 8088
> >>        8286 = 80286
> >>        8386 = 80386
> >>        680  = 6800
> >>        680  = 6809
> >>        680  = 68000
> >>
> >> ;-),
> >>
> >> - JS
> >> ----------------------------
> >>
> > lol, I would love to hear that too if anyone knows any stories behind the
> > naming. Used to hurt my head to remember that it was an 8800 not an 8080.
> > I know the fairly well published story about the name Altair but
> companies
> > and their model numbers are always odd.
> >
> My bets..
>
> I'd put $.09 on got the numbers wrong and went with it.
> then $0.01 on, it wasn't marketing.
> and $0.90 on, who cares.
>
> The 680 was from a market perspective a fail.  The successful 6800 was
> SWTP.
> The 6502 was dominated by Apple.
> The Z80 had more players and more names than all the rest.
>
> That of course is MY US centric view other countries had theirs too.
>
> Almost  all of the system naming of the day for the intel based systems
> and heirs
> (8080/8085/Z80/8088/8086) was irrational, illogical, and often just
> plain bad.
>
>
> Allison
>
>