Timex/Sinclair Sales Drop

Sales of the Timex 1000 (ne Sinclair ZX81), once the most popular home computer, have plunged. Orders for its new 1500 and 2000 models are far less than projected. Timex, which pioneered the super-cheap home computer and led in the pricing battles, sold 550,000 units in its first five months. Sinclair had sold 500,000 ZX81s before turning distribution over to Timex. So far, well over a million units have been manufactured.

The 1000 has sold for as low as $27.95, and typically sells for about $45. The Commodore VIC-20, TI-99/4A, and Atari 400, which sell for only $30 to $40 more, offer color, more memory, better keyboards, and more features. As a result, they’ve hurt sales of the 1000, and many retailers have abandoned the unit. Even the Timex 1500, which generally sells for about $80, does not stack up well against these units. And the model 2000 is facing stiff competition from the somewhat higher-priced Commodore 64, which has better keyboards, graphics, and sound.

Timex has therefore begun selling its systems to mail order companies and to companies that will package the unit with encyclopedias and textbooks. Also, the units are being offered by banks and real-estate developers as give-aways in sales promotion programs.

In England, Sinclair has unveiled a continuous-loop tape drive interface for its Spectrum color computer. It has an 85K capacity and an average access time of 3.5 seconds, and sells for $76, plus $7.50 for a tape cartridge. The unit is expected to be introduced in the U.S. for the Timex 2000 systems. The drive requires a $50 interface unit (only $30 when purchased with drive). The unit that is needed, which fits under the computer, also provides an RS-232 port and local-area network connection device.