“Jack Tramiel, founder of Commodore International and crucial figure in the early history of personal computing, passed away surrounded by his family on Sunday, his family confirms,” Dave Their reports for Forbes. “He was 83 years old.”
“Tramiel was born in Poland to a Jewish family in 1928,” Their reports. “During World War II, he and his family were sent to Auschwitz, after which he and his father were sent to a labor camp called Ahlem, near Hannover. Tramiel was rescued in April 1945 and emigrated to the United States in 1947.”
Their reports, “In America, Tramiel started a typewriter repair business. Staying in the forefront of technology, his typewriters morphed into calculators, and later computers. In 1982, Commodore International launched the Commodore 64, which went on to the best-selling personal computer of all time. In 1984, after being forced to leave the company he founded, Jack bought the crumbling Atari Inc.’s Consumer Division and formed Atari Corporation.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: A true pioneer. Rest in peace, Mr. Tramiel.
In addition to our Macs, we owned Commodore-64 units with which, among other things, we attempted to wear holes through our Jumpman floppy disks and later used Commodore Amigas for broadcast television character generation (CG).
LOAD “LONG LIVE JACK TRAMIEL” ,8,1
LOADING LONG LIVE JACK TRAMIEL
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I still have a fully working C-64. Loved that machine.
RIP Jack you were one of the pioneers!
My first computer was a German Atari ST, purchased in 1985. At the time it was considered a ‘poor man’s’ Mac, but in reality the sophisticated software the Germans developed for it made it in many ways better than a Mac. With a flatbed scanner and OCR software (yes, in the 1980s), that machine served me well as a workhorse for five years (until I bought my NeXT Workstation). Jack Tramiel graced the pages of Atari magazines for years, he was another Steve Jobs for a lot of us.
My first computer was an 8k bytes Commodore PET. It came in RAM sizes 4k, 8k, 16k. I chose 8k because I couldn’t image using up that much RAM. It was one of the very first all-in-one computers. See… http://oldcomputers.net/pet2001.html
Thank you, Jack, for making me the Mac geek I am today.
My first computer was an Amiga 500 with an Amiga branded color CRT. Loved that machine.
Stayed with Amiga until Irving Gould and Mehdi Ali destroyed Commodore. Moved to Macs after that.
Been a wild ride…
IIRC that he was also working on a so-called “Jackintosh” that was going to be the Mac killer. I don’t know whatever happened to that product but I was so torn between hoping for phenomenal success (because Tramiel was a forward-thinker) and spectacular failure (because I was a fan boy back then even).
RIP Jack. You were one of the crazy ones of the 60s and 70s.
I recall getting the poor man’s RPN calculator, a Commodore SR4921. I was in love with the HP line but the Comm was much more affordable then.
My first computer in 1978 was a Commodore PET with a real typewriter keyboard (not the calculator version), first in a 40-column screen model, and then after a trade-in, an 80-column screen. Paired with the IEEE dual-floppy stand-alone drive and an NEC Spinwriter, it was a very serviceable word processor. And when VisiCalc came out for it, I lost A LOT of sleep – the power of a spreadsheet was amazing.
I used to cruise all the computer stored in the Seattle area at that time and never saw a pet with a “real” keyboard. They all had the chiclet style keys. I had my heart set on an Apple II but couldn’t afford it so settled for TRS-80 for $499 in 1977 from the Radio Shack next door in Bellevue, WA. Played many games of Star Raiders on that machine.
I did meet Jack while selling computers with the Byte Shop though and he was one of the people we kept track of.
What a surprise and I hadn’t thought of him in years.
@CitizenX – look here: http://www.retrogamingcollector.com/Retro-Computers/CommodorePET8032.html
I do remember the full keyboard now. I also remember it opened like the hood of a car.
Fall 1979- Freshman year of college.
“All new students will be required to take a computer programming course (freshman level) as a University requirement. Handout at Fall preregistration”
That meant Apple II, TRS-80 and Commodore PET computers on cassette drives, kiddies. In those days no software was available for purchase the way it is today. SW clubs (MUGS later) met to exchange programs and tips. A completely different world brought by many,but spearheaded by a few like Steve Jobs, Woz and Jack Tramiel.
That course was my first exposure to Commodores and Apples. Bought a II and stayed the course to this day. Had a few Commodores as well. The Amiga was one bad hombre…
Steve and Jack are now gone, but will not be forgotten.
Atari ST series practically held a monopoly among the musicians in the 80s. It was the first and the only computer (ever) that had a built-in MIDI port, which very quickly sprang up a healthy selection of music sequencing software. From Dr T’s KCS (Keyboard-controlled Sequencer), to Steinberg’s Pro24 (later Cubase), to C-Lab’s Creator (and then Notator; the grand-daddy of Apple’s Logic), these were incredibly powerful tools for musicians with the MIDI instruments. In 1990 (22 years ago), I had used Notator to produce full score and parts for musicians for two major musical shows (“Sugar” and “Little Night Music”). I could complete orchestration for an entire musical number (5 – 7 mins of music) in one night, and bring the score and parts to the rehearsal in the morning. The result was practically error-free (I could hear the music I wrote, so no typos), and significantly more legible than hand-copied parts for musicians. And the old Atari Mega ST chugged away briskly and effortlessly.
Back home, there are still many musicians who have the old Atari ST and use it for sequencing MIDI tracks, 25 years later!
My first Computer was a Commodore 64.
Rest in peace.
I wonder how many other innovative, world changing individuals never survived the concentration camps. Enjoy your well deserved life in the hereafter Mr. Tramiel.
Saved up money as a kid to buy a Commodore Vic 20. It didn’t do much, but had a lot of fun learning basic. Jack and the Vic 20 will be missed.
Nothing But Respect for Jack Tramiel.
Sad to see him go. I wonder what he and Steve will be up to in heaven right about now? 🙂
As a young man in the 1970’s I repaired Commodore adding machines, amongst others. They were very well made and I usually just had to clean them to get them working again.
Please don’t whistle when you write the word “among.” It’s annoying.
You gotta problem?
1 surrounded by; in the company of: wild strawberries hidden among the roots of the trees | you’re among friends.
It’s a huge world kiddo.
Please tell me you were only joking. Please.
…yes, I was only joking…not intentionally trying to troll or toss in some flame-bait…sorry for the rude manners
The word “amongst” is allowable in British English grammar as is “whilst”… Two countries separated by a common language… Mind the gap. 😉
And yes, I was an American living in the London area for five years… Come to think of it, I still have trouble with the British pronunciation of “oregano” and “basil”. :p
But I digress… RIP, Jack. My old Amiga 500 and Amiga 1200 are in my Mom’s attic somewhere… Feel like playing Speedball now.
What’s with these companies forcing out their brilliant founders?
The marketing and sales bozo’s know more than the founders. Its been proven many, many times.
My first computer was a Commodore PET (1977). But always drooled for an Apple. But here is a little background about Commodore/Apple:
Jobs and Wozniak wanted to sell Apple to Commodore for $100K in cash and give Jobs and Wozniak $36K a year salaries.
However, Jack Tramiel thought it was ridiculous to acquire two guys working out of a garage. Instead, in October 1976, Commodore bought MOS Technology, which developed the 6502 processor and was the heart of the Apple II.
My first computer was a Commodore 128 with a 1571 disk drive. With the Commodore memory expansion unit I was able to boost the ram to 640k. With Geos 128, the machine was nearly a Macintosh, yet it could also run C-64 programs, and CPM programs. Wish I had never sold it.
In a lot of ways I miss Commodore. Commodore pushed the industry because they were willing to push the technological boundaries yet keep prices low.
Apple’s OSX is many ways reminds me of the Amiga operating system. Just much more refined. Here is hoping that Mountain Lion will correct the irritants in Lion and be the operating system that I first dimly imagined in the late 1980’s when I purchased my first Amiga 500.
RIP Jack Tramiel
Started with a C-64 too, hell I still have my AmigaDOS manual lol.
C64, A500, A1200, ‘dark ages’, macbook, iMac. I own and sometimes even re-read my RKM’s… (IFF fileformat is still a great reference design for me.)
RIP Jack. My first computer was a Commodore Vic-20. Later I got a Commodore 64. I started writing games and marketing them. Eventually, I licensed an adventure game and a stock market simulator game to a nationally known company. I should resurrect those games. Their ability to run in limited memory space and the graphics involved would be perfect for the iPhone or iPad.
I still have a functioning C-64 and 1571 floppy drive so I can run my old games.
Still have both Atari ST monitors ( Color/BW) An Ataril 1040 ( upped to 4MB ) Orginal ST Hard drive and a developers kit.
Bet most don’t remember David Smalls small adapter if you put in a set of Mac ROM chips. You had a Mac with the Atari ST!
A sad day like last fall hearing about Jobs passing…
My first computer was a C64 and then an Amiga, of which I still have one to this day. Never really liked Macs much at that time because I found them limiting after the flexible multitasking of the Amiga, not to mention well out of my price range. Even in the late 90’s when I was working in a campus computer store I wasn’t particularly fond of Macs, though the drool-worthy Powerbook Duo was something I was considering.
But then OS X came along and I haven’t looked back.
Regardless, sad news about Jack. RIP.
J\
Oh the C-64’s were awesome! I also had my Beta-Max video out going to the video-input on the monitor.. the picture quality coupled with Beta-goodness was beyond words, best colour too!
I sure do miss the programming!
10 CLS
20 Input A$ = ….
“My C-64 has a virus!!!”
“Turn it off, then turn it back on and the virus will be gone!”
🙂
My career as a programmer, which continues to this day, started on a C64 back in ’84.
I met Jack a number of times, he was a nice guy. My companies Comp-U-Save and Pulsar were at times Commodore’s largest dealer of C64, C128 and Amiga’s. It’s too bad he did not get the chance to really get the Amiga off the ground, it’s was a great machine. I used to booths at all the commodore and Apple shows to sell products. Both Jack and Steve Jobs would pop over and say hi. We had a strange way of selling. We had rubber chickens and crazy themes at each show we were at. I would insult all the people who would come to the booth to look or buy stuff.. I went under the name of “Dr. Oxide”. I miss those days in the beginning of personal computer.. We were all Geeks.
My first job in California was at Commodore. An engineer friend got me a refurb PET.
It was a fun time. Jack, RIP, job well done.