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            TALES OF KIM-1
      ON THE EDGE - CHAPTER 1.5
               Part II


    The KIM-1 debuted during Wescon in
Chuck Peddle's hotel suite, along with
the 6502 and other development
systems. Users received the small
computer enthusiastically. Al
Charpentier recalls, "They sold a lot
of those. It was sort of the first
fully packaged microcomputer that you
could take out of the box, throw a
power supply on, and do something
with. It was hell, but it educated
people on the processor."

    Engineer Robert Yannes recalls
KIM-1 engineer John May showing the
machine at his college. "I had a lot
of familiarity with the KIM-1," says
Yannes. "The guy who designed it was
actually a friend of Al Charpentier's,
and he was a Villanova graduate too.
He had brought it to Villanova
University when it first came out and
I had gone to that presentation. They
had KIM-1's at Villanova too, so I
ended up playing with them."

    "The KIM-1 had one characteristic
that everybody always commented on,"
says Peddle. "It was a packaged,
complete, plug-it-in-and-start-
using-it product. You could sit down
and learn to program using my
manuals."


EARLY COMPETITION

    In December 1975, the coveted
inside front cover of BYTE magazine
contained a two-page advertisement for
'the world's lowest cost computer
system'. Though it contained a 6502
microprocessor, it was not the KIM-1.
It was the Jolt computer, sold by
Microcomputer Associates either as a
kit for $249 or fully assembled and
tested for $348.

    Jolt, named after Rod Holt who
helped develop the TIM and KIM-1 code,
was technically similar to the TIM
computer. Although Jolt competed with
the KIM-1, Peddle did not object.
"Manny just said, 'We want to do this
board of our own', and I said
'great'", explains Peddle. "I was
looking for anything that would help
customers design with the [6502]
product. We gave these guys the
license." Nonetheless, Jolt did not
have lasting popularity with the
hobbyist market. Jolt's most notable
achievement lies in its use as the
platform for the Atari 2600 VCS
prototype system.

    The Jolt advertisement in Byte did
much to influence MOS Technology. A
few months later, in the April 1976
issue of BYTE Magazine, a new product
announcement appeared for the KIM-1
titled, "What's New, KIM-o-sabee"
There was also an advertisement from
MOS Technology itself. The low-key ad,
stating the features in KIM-1 in point
form, included a clip-out order form
for a $245 KIM-1 microcomputer system.
Anyone who understood computers
recognized the potential immediately.

    The advertisement in BYTE caught
the attention of the hobbyist market.
A month later, BYTE ran a feature
article titled, 'A Date with KIM'.
Byte contributor Richard Simpson
gushed about the low price and quality
of the feature-packed KIM-1. He
accurately identified it as the ideal
system for anyone who did not want to
assemble a kit. The KIM-1 subsequently
became a favorite of BYTE and other
popular homebrew publications, such as
Dr. Dobbs Journal, Kilobaud, and
Interface Age. Articles and projects
appeared in these magazines well into
1979.

    MOS Technology released the KIM-1
in 1975, the same year as the Altair
8800 computer. The Altair has come to
be known as the first computer system
in North America to herald the new
microcomputer revolution.

    The differences between the KIM-1
and the Altair computer illustrate a
split in design philosophy within the
computer world. The KIM-1 was a
single-board computer, with all
components mounted on a single
printed-circuit board. It had room for
expansion, but there were no slots to
insert adapter cards. This design
philosophy reduced production costs
and thus gave the KIM-1 a major
pricing advantage over the Altair.
Commodore computers would follow this
tradition of containing everything on
a single board, with specialized user
ports for peripherals.

    The Altair 8800 used an Intel 8080
chip, which retailed for $360, but Ed
Roberts was able to negotiate the
price down to $75 each in bulk. Still,
he needed to sell his computers for
$439 in kit form, and $621 assembled
to make a profit. MOS Technology was
able to profitably sell KIM-1 systems
for $245.

    Though it was not a true personal
computer, MOS Technology soon
discovered the KIM-1 had a large
market. "That was one of the things
that took MOS by surprise," recalls
Bob Yannes. "Throughout the early days
of computers, one of the most
successful computers introduced in
that timeframe was the KIM-1.

    "They had developed the KIM-1 as a
sort of sales tool for the 6502
processor. They would say, 'Here's a
development system for you, you can
design your own computer system and
develop your software on the KIM-1 and
help understand the hardware
architecture and so forth.' And people
would use them and say, 'Why do we
want to design our own computer We
have one right here and it's only
$245, which is cheaper than we can
build it for.' They would just buy
KIM-1's and bury them in their
products."

    Hobbyists began enthusiastically
calling and writing for the kit.
Though the goal had been to drum up
interest in the 6502 chip, it soon
became apparent that microcomputers
would also be a valuable source of
revenue for the company. According to
Kilobaud magazine, MOS Technology sold
over seven thousand KIM-1 computers by
June 1977. At $245 each, revenue was
in the millions, which helped MOS pull
through a tough financial period.
"They sold a lot," says Charpentier.
"By God, they sold thousands of them -
ten thousand or something like that.
It was a big number of processors back
then."

    There was an obvious demand for
computers. The appeal of the KIM-1 was
not lost on Chuck Peddle. "It was a
complete package, and there are a lot
of people who bought it just for that
reason and learned something, and then
said 'Okay, that's all I can do.' But
we were seeing those people and
talking to them and getting feedback."


THE SEEDS OF THE SOFTWARE INDUSTRY

    While the early microcomputer
industry focused on hardware, very few
people focused on software, with the
notable exception of Bill Gates. As a
result, there was a conspicuous
absence of quality microcomputer
software. Byte magazine noted this in
December 1975, describing the
situation as a "software vacuum".

    But when it came to software, the
KIM-1 had an advantage over other
microcomputers. The single board
design resulted in a homogenous
population of computers, which
guaranteed programs would work from
one system to the next. The simple
operating system put all KIM-1 users
on equal footing, so programmers knew
their programs would run on all
standard KIM-1 computers. Distributing
the programs was also easy due to the
standard tape-interface. Soon,
programmers began copying and
distributing their code on low cost
audio tapes.

    MOS Technology sold one of the
earliest KIM-1 software packages at a
time when no one knew what might
appeal to users. One obvious
application was number crunching.

    The 6502, like all chips at the
time, could not perform many
mathematical functions - it could add
and subtract numbers; all other
operations were iterations of these
two functions and had to be coded by
the developer. MOS Technology
developed a program called KIMATH,
which effectively transformed the
KIM-1 into a full-function calculator.

    KIMATH also added the capability
to handle decimal numbers with high
precision. As usual, the MOS
Technology documentation included with
the software was outstanding, complete
with a manual and assembler source
code.

    Another early favorite of
development was music. Since the KIM-1
did not contain a native sound device,
users connected a small piezoelectric
speaker to a few pins on the IO port.
Other hackers found a way to play
music by recording beeps to the
cassette tape. Once they recorded the
music, they ejected the tape and
played it back in an audio cassette
player.

    The seventies was the age of
hardware hacking (hacking is used here
in its original positive sense -
describing experimentation in the pure
spirit of inquiry), and hardware
projects proved popular among KIM-1
users. One gifted 12-year-old hacker,
Tod Loofbourrow, created a 70 pound,
six foot tall robot using the KIM-1.
Hayden Publishing approached
Loofbourrow to write a book about his
robot, which he subsequently wrote on
yellow-lined paper. He titled his
book, How to Build a Computer
Controlled Robot, and it went on to
become a successful publication.
(Loofbourrow used the revenues from
his book to found a Fortune 500
company called Foundation
Technologies.)

    The calculator-like KIM display
would seem to be a poor candidate for
playing games, but games were among
the most popular programs for the
KIM-1. Most game adaptations were
simple pen and paper mind-challenges,
which ranged from the well known
(Tic-Tac- Toe, Hangman, Mastermind,
Maze) to the obscure (Hunt the Wumpus,
NIM, Shooting Stars).

    Programmers had to design their
games for the minimal KIM-1 display
which meant that they often had to
rely on the imagination of the player.
In Maze, the player could only see the
walls directly surrounding the small
blinking avatar. Hunt the Wumpus
required the player to use a pencil
and paper for working out a strategy.
With such concessions, most mind games
were easily adapted. Gambling and card
games were also especially well suited
to the limited display.

    Programmers learning their craft
created Blackjack, Craps, Bandit (Slot
Machines), and a horseracing game.
Surprisingly, programmers even tried
action games. These primitive games
went by such names as Duel, Farmer
Brown, Ping-Pong, and Asteroid. Duel
was notable as being one of the
earliest two-player games on a
microcomputer. It was a simple but fun
reflex game where each player watched
the display and tried to hit their
button first when a character
appeared.

    No one attempted to sell any of
this early software. Programmers
shared their games, copied them to
tape, and widely distributed them to
whoever wanted a copy. They saw games
as a way to learn about programming
while creating something fun. Most of
these early games lived on in more
advanced computers years later.

    One of the earliest KIM-1 users
enjoying these primitive games was
Chris Crawford. Crawford delighted in
the choices these games allowed and
eventually programmed his first
computer game using a KIM-1. Years
later, Crawford developed famous games
for Atari and became influential in
game design theory.

    Another early programmer who would
gain recognition in the industry was
Jim Butterfield. For Butterfield,
using a KIM-1 was an adventure in
exploration. His goal was to uncover
the hidden secrets of the KIM-1 and
pass that knowledge on to other users.

    Jim has the rare ability to
understand complex subjects and
describe them in simple terms. One of
the biggest barriers to learning about
microcomputers in those days was the
problem of communicating knowledge
since the average hacker seemed to be
speaking a different language.
Butterfield allowed those on the
outside to enter the world of
programming in comfort.

    At gatherings with other KIM-1
users in his native city of Toronto,
Butterfield presented his new finds to
an attentive audience seeking to
unlock the mysteries of the computer.
One of his most popular programs was a
game.

    The Apollo moon missions had
always been closely associated with
computers and the vivid pictures were
still in Jim's mind in the
mid-seventies. This inspired him to
write Lunar Lander, a simulation of
landing on the moon. The game started
with the user at the controls of a
lunar module 4500 feet above the
moon's surface, and slowly descending.
Players used the number keys to
control the throttle. To add a sense
of urgency, there were only 500 units
of fuel to expend. If a player set the
throttle too high, the rocket soon
used all its fuel and crashed into the
surface.

        [Continued in Part III]