website/content/museum/amstrad-pc-1640.md

title, categories, types, origins, years, cpus, params

title	categories	types	origins	years	cpus	params
Amstrad PC 1640	Computers	Professional Computer	United Kingdom	1986	Intel 8086	name image company company_name specs tabs forum_thread links related oc_id source PC 1640 /media/museum/photos/amstrad_pc1640.jpg /companies/amstrad Amstrad label value NAME PC 1640 label value MANUFACTURER Amstrad label value TYPE Professional Computer label value ORIGIN United Kingdom label value YEAR 1986 label value CPU Intel 8086 label value SPEED 8 mHz label value RAM 640 KB label value VRAM 256 KB ? label value ROM 64 KB label value TEXT MODES 40 x 25 / 80 x 25 label value GRAPHIC MODES All EGA graphic modes (maximum : 640 x 350)\ Hercules mode for monochrome versions (maximum 720 by 350) label value COLORS 16 among 64 label value SOUND Beeper label value I/O PORTS Four 8-bit ISA slots (one being reserved of the internal HD controller), Centronics, RS232c, Mouse port (proprietary) label value BUILT IN MEDIA one or two 5.25'' disk-drives, 20 or 30 MB HDD label value OS MS DOS 3.2 label value POWER SUPPLY PSU built-in label value PERIPHERALS Most of the standard IBM/PC cards links 39 title url text Intel GEM page http://www.seasip.demon.co.uk/Gem/index.html a page dedicated to the GEM graphical user interface /museum/amstrad-pc-1512 /museum/amstrad-ppc-512-640 /museum/ibm-pc-at /museum/ibm-pc-model-5150 /museum/ibm-pc-portable-model-5155 /museum/ibm-pc-xt-286 /museum/ibm-pc-xt-model-5160 /museum/ibm-ps-1 /museum/micronique-hector-xt 19 url date https://web.archive.org/web/20230520105232/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=19 2023-05-20

The Amstrad PC 1640 was the successor to the Amstrad PC 1512. It had the same characteristics as its predecessor except for added memory (640 KB instead of 512 KB) and the EGA graphics standard.

It also had great success, but to a lesser extent than the PC 1512. As the PC 1512, the Amstrad PC 1640 came with the GEM graphical user interface, from Digital Research, an alternative to Windows.

The PC-1640 was marketed under the name PC-6400 in the USA. It was also sold in Germany and maybe some other European countries under the name Schneider.

Three different kinds of monitors where supported, monochrome (-> Hercules), low-res (max 640 x 200) and hi-res (max 640 x 350). The hi-res monitor had a fan for the power supply as opposed to the other monitors which where fan-less. With the low-res monitor you could choose between a full CGA compatible mode (required for many CGA games) and an EGA mode (used for 640 x 200 x 16 eg. for GEM or 320 x 200 x 16 for several games).

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Contributors: André Janz

Charles Da Silva adds:
The 1640 was first introduced in the US and after a few months in Europe (which infuriated the British media, some of them having already been harsh critics on the 1512 : fan problems - forgetting that since the PSU was in the monitor, it was not needed - not 'fully' compatible as it was then thought. All of this proved to come from IBM itself, which made Alan Sugar really angry).
You can find all this info in 'Alan Sugar' from late D. Thomas.

Ex Cathedra's memories:
I did a large amount of development on these machines in the late 80s. They were surprisingly good, with only a few bugs and incompatibilities with the IBM PC standard. Bearing in mind the price differential, we had no problems living with these.
The RTC and BIOS settings were preserved by 4xAA batteries under the monitor - a configuration I wish we still had today! There was a minor (patchable) bug in the BIOS which caused a div/0 error at midnight each night if you'd left it running a long compilation...