Atari ST (1985)

Atari 1040ST

Launched June 1985

Launched in the summer of 1985, the Atari ST was a direct competitor to the Commodore Amiga. Cheaper than the Amiga but also based on a Motorola 68000 processor the ST was another key contender in the home computing market in the late 1980s.

The Atari ST was much simpler than the Amiga in graphics and sound terms, but it could support MIDI devices which lead to it being very popular with musicians. The user interface was DR's GEM system that also found its way onto Amstrad computers and some PC clones.

The history of the creation of the ST actually intertwined with that of the Amiga. Atari were an early investor in the Amiga's technology, but eventually that platform went to Commodore. But the rivalry was more intense because the Atari brand was owned by Jack Tramiel who had founded Commodore in the first place. Tramiel himself is an interesting character, aged 83 today, and a survivor of the Auschwitz concentration camp.

An elegant all-in-one design, the Atari ST sold well for several years, and in 1992 it was followed up by the more powerful Atari Falcon which was only on sale for a year before Atari pulled it to concentrate on the unsuccessful Atari Jaguar console. Atari disappeared from the market in 1996, a couple of years after Commodore declared bankruptcy.

However, as with Commodore, the Atari name refused to die and these days the descendant company concentrates on mobile and online gaming. And although the legacy of the ST is limited today, it did help to popularise gaming and the low cost helped many musicians produce their own music.

Image credit: Bill Betram via Wikimedia Commons

Commodore Amiga (1985)

Commodore Amiga 1000 (1985)

Launched July 2005

Launched 30 years ago this month, the Commodore Amiga was an early 32-bit computer that featured dedicated graphics and sound chipsets and is widely regarded as the first multimedia computer. It was also a highly expandable system running on an efficient operating system, and as such it was one of the key contenders in late 1980s and early 1990s home computing.

Starting off with the original Amiga 1000, the popular Amiga 500 followed on in 1987 and continued on through several models until Commodore's bankruptcy in 1996. Afterwards other Amiga models appeared from other manufacturers with different processors and upgraded operating systems, but these were strictly niche products for Amiga fans looking for an upgrade. The currently-available derivative is the AmigaONE X1000.

Easily outclassing everything else on the market, the Amiga launched at a time when the IBM PC was taking the lion's share of the market. Nonetheless, it was a successful product for its time and is fondly remembered by owners.

In a wider context, the Amiga showed the value of adding dedicated hardware for multimedia where before all processing would have to be done by the main CPU. Effectively the Amiga line was the first widely available system to feature a dedicated GPU, something that is commonplace today in smartphones and tablets.

As an aside, the Commodore name has been revived several times, and the company currently bearing the name is in the process of launching the Commodore PET smartphone, named after Commodore's influential 1970s computer line.

Image credit: Wikimedia Commons

Motorola PEBL U6, Q8 and RAZR V3x (2005)

Announced July 2005

Ten years ago this month, Motorola was still riding the wave of success created by the iconic RAZR handset. But they were finding it a struggle to find new products to capitalize on their surge in popularity, with several devices that had been announced.. and then cancelled. However, in July 2005 we saw a trio of products being shown off that Motorola hoped would change things.

Despite its popularity and radical design, the RAZR was simply a cosmetically different addition to the V500 range that Motorola had been making since 2003. The Motorola PEBL also used the V500's underlying technology, but this time it came in an elegantly curved case that looked like a pebble. Inside the keypad was a flat affair inspired by the RAZR. Overall, the PEBL was a pretty limited device with support for 2G only, it had a little 1.8" 176 x 220 pixel screen and a 0.3 megapixel camera. The PEBL couldn't play music, but it did have Bluetooth.

The PEBL had the same shortcomings as the RAZR, so was only a modest success. The Motorola "4LTR" phones (RAZR, PEBL, ROKR) are among the more collectible Motos and are readily available for a minimum outlay.

Motorola PEBL

The Motorola RAZR V3x had a confusing launch, at various points being called the Motorola V1150 and Motorola V3x (dropping the RAZR label). Despite some cosmetic similarities to the RAZR V3, the V3x was a very much more advanced handset with 3G, a music player, expandable memory and a two megapixel camera plus video calling capabilities.

As with all 3G phones from that era, the V3x was a lot bigger and heavier than its GSM competition. The V3x was a niche success with 3G-only carriers such as the Hutchison 3 network. As with the PEBL, the V3x is readily available for not much money.

Motorola RAZR V3x

The Motorola Q (later called the Motorola Q8) attempted to take a bite out of the BlackBerry market. It was a Windows smartphone with a rather familiar looking keypad, and although not a huge success it did spawn a couple of sequels with the Q9h in 2007 and Q11 in 2008.

It's hard to remember now, but BlackBerry was becoming a seemingly unstoppable force at the time, and rivals could not compete with the quality of their push email service. After all, why buy something that wasn't as good as a BlackBerry when you could just buy a BlackBerry.

The GSM version of the Q8 is very rare today, however the CDMA version is commonly available, but won't work outside the US.

Motorola Q8

Motorola FLIPOUT and Nokia X5-01 (2010)

Announced June 2010

These days, almost every smartphone looks the same. But five years ago this month both Nokia and Motorola were experimenting with square smartphones with physical keyboards.

Motorola's take on the idea was the Motorola FLIPOUT, an Android smartphone with a little 2.8" 320 x 240 pixel display and a QWERTY keyboard that rotated out. Measuring 67 x 67 mm, the FLIPOUT was almost perfectly square apart from the rounded edges. Although it was a fully-featured Android device with GPS, 3.5G and WiFi, the small screen must have been severely limiting, and physical keyboards have since gone the way of the Dodo on most smartphones.

The quirky FLIPOUT was a bit of a flop at the time, but if this esoteric design appeals to you then new ones can still be had for less than €200 with used ones in various conditions coming in at about €70 or less.

In the same month, Nokia announced the Nokia X5-01 slider phone which wasn't as square as the Motorola and featured a 2.4" screen with the same resolution as the FLIPOUT. Unlike the Motorola, the X5-01 was a Symbian device. Symbian was a operating system much more suited to smaller displays, and overall specifications were very similar to its rival except the X5-01 lacked WiFi but had a better camera.

Unusual Nokia devices are always collectible, but the rareness of the Nokia X5-01 makes it very hard to obtain.

In the end, smartphones with tiny screens fell out of favour and on-screen keyboards such as SwiftKey and Swype meant that most people didn't want an actual keyboard. But perhaps the time is right for manufacturers to experiment with different form factors again?

Nokia 6111 (2005)

Announced June 2005

Nokia is not really well-known for slider phones, but ten years ago the little Nokia 6111 proved to be a popular and attractive device that had many fans.

Weighing just 92 grams, the 6111 was a compact device with a 1.8" 128 x 160 pixel display, a 1 megapixel camera with a flash, an FM radio and Bluetooth. Although the 6111 supported MP3 ringtones, it couldn't be used as a media player.

There was some basic internet connectivity such as a WAP browser and email client, but this was a 2G-only device and nothing like the sort of smartphones we have today.

But perhaps the main selling point with the 6111 was the way it looked. The curved front and sides combined with the relatively thick 23mm casing made the phone look rather cute. In white or pink, the 6111 looked like a "girlie phone", but the black version looked more like a "boy's toy", which was quite a clever bit of design.

Back in the day, the Nokia 6111 was set to retail for €270 SIM-free before tax. Today, you can get a similar new handset for about one tenth of that price, or if you fancy the 6111 as a retro-classic then they are commonly available in good condition for around €30.

Apple iPhone 4 (2010)

Announced June 2010

Announced five years ago this month, the Apple iPhone 4 was a complete redesign which introduced several significant new features, but it was not without its problems.

Physically, the iPhone 4 looked rather different from the previous models. A rather uncompromising and somewhat brutalist design, the new version of the phone had a flat glass back and the edge of the device also served as the antenna, giving it a distinctive look.

Although the display size was still 3.5", the iPhone 4 has a relatively high resolution of 640 x 960 pixels, giving it a display density of over 300 pixels per inch. Apple called this a "Retina Display" because most people would not be able to make out the individual pixels. The iPhone 4 basically had a comparable pixel density to some printers, so Apple certainly had something with a bit of "wow factor here".

Apple have always lagged behind a bit when it comes to camera megapixel counts, and the iPhone 4 was their first device to feature a relatively modest five megapixel main camera, and it was also the first Apple device to have a front-facing camera for video calling. The processor was also faster than previous versions, and the iPhone 4 went some way to addressing the battery life problems of older models.

As is traditional, the iPhone 4 brought a new version of the operating system, in this case iOS 4. This finally brought multitasking to the iPhone, something that had been sorely missed in previous generations.

Despite all the improvements, the iPhone 4 is also remembered for problems with the novel antenna arrangement. If held in a certain way (bridging the WiFi and cellular antennae) then the phone signal would fade and cut out. Apple originally tried to play this down, but in the end it had to admit that there was a design flaw and it offered free "bumpers" to go on the outside of the phone, fixing the problem.

One other problem was that the white version of the iPhone 4 wasn't available at launch, and in fact it took nearly a year to come to market. Apple reportedly had technical problems with the plastics itself, and also the underlying camera hardware had to be altered because the sensor behaved differently in the white case.

The iPhone 4 set the basic physical format of the device for the next four years, in 2011 the iPhone 4s was a faster version, in 2012 the iPhone 5 stretched the display to 4" and was followed up by 2013's 64-bit iPhone 5s. It wasn't until 2014 and the iPhone 6 that we saw a significant redesign in the way the iPhone looked.

Very rare Nokia 7700 for sale on eBay for £1700

Last month a non-working example of the incredibly rare Nokia 7700 appeared on eBay in the UK and sold for £1020.

Only a tiny handful of these have ever come to market, but now there is another one that appears to be in immaculate condition and is fully working (although bear in mind that this is a prototype) with a starting bid of £1700.

Strictly one for collectors rather than somebody looking for a smartphone they can use every day, the Nokia 7700 is a highly unusual and rather beautiful device to look at. The product was cancelled before launch and only a small number of technology samplers were produced.

We'll be keeping an eye on this particular auction to see how it goes. But if you have one of these lying in a cupboard somewhere.. it is probably time to sell it!

UPDATE
This Nokia 7700 didn't seem to sell at this price, but another Nokia 7700 in working order sold for $1,140.06 (approximately £720). This particular model was located in Finland, so perhaps many collectors missed out on it. There does seem to have been quite a few of these coming up for sale recently, which is unusual.