Henry Edward Roberts MITS Altair 8800

Summary

The electrical engineer Henry Edward Roberts is the founder and president of Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS), Albuquerque, USA. He builds the Altair 8800 and offers it as a kit in 1974 in the magazine Popular Electronics. At the beginning it costs 395 US dollars, the fully assembled computer costs 495 US dollars (according to today’s purchasing power around 1500 €).

The CPU is clocked to 2 MHz, the system has 256 bytes of memory by default and can be extended to 64 KiB. The input is made via toggle switches on the front panel, output via LEDs. Despite these limitations, the computer will be a great success, also with the flexible S-100 bus, which allows many peripheral devices to be connected.

Production ends in 1977. Roberts sells MITS, acquires a ranch in Georgia and becomes a farmer. After receiving the Doctor of Medicine (MD) in 1986, he practises as a doctor in the countryside until he dies in 2010 — shortly before, Bill Gates visits him in the hospital.

Detailed description

Electrical engineer Henry Edward Roberts founded and led Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS) in Albuquerque, USA. In the early 1970s, he began designing calculators. In 1971, he contacted hobby electronics magazine Popular Electronics to present the kit for his MITS-816 desktop calculator. It initially sold well, but falling calculator prices from 1974 prompted him to plan a computer. Intel’s 8080 CPU cost 360 US dollars, too much for a personal computer, so Roberts negotiated with Intel, which eventually sold him cosmetically damaged CPUs for 75 US dollars.

The result is the Altair 8800 and the kit is officially released on 19 December 1974. Again he writes to Popular Electronics, which report on the kit in the January 1975 issue. However, the cover of the magazine shows a prototype, since the functional computer never arrives at the publisher. Advertisements in Popular Electronics, Radio-Electronics and other magazines offer the kit initially to 395 US dollars, the completely assembled computer costs 495 US dollars (according to today’s purchasing power around 1500 €). The CPU is clocked to 2 MHz, the system has 256 bytes of memory by default and can be extended to 64 KiB. The input is made via toggle switches on the front panel, output via LEDs. Despite these limitations, the computer will be a great success, also with the flexible S-100 bus, which allows many peripheral devices to be connected.

According to Robert’s calculations, he has to sell 200 kits in the first year to cover his costs, instead there are 200 orders on the first day, which quickly increase to thousands.

The Altair 8800 marks the beginning of home computing. Microsoft developed Altair BASIC, and Bill Gates went on to become a billionaire. A year after its release, in October 1975, Popular Electronics carried a small advertisement for the IMSAI 8080, the first clone. It already had a keyboard and floppy disk controller. More and more kits surpassed the Altair, but instead of developing his computer further, Roberts attacked the competition and tried to persuade computer shops to sell only the Altair. The strategy failed, and production ended in 1977. IMS Associates, Inc. also became insolvent in 1979.

Roberts sells MITS, acquires a ranch in Georgia and becomes a farmer. After receiving the Doctor of Medicine (MD) in 1986, he practises as a doctor in the countryside until his death in 2010. Bill Gates visited him in hospital shortly beforehand.

Sources and further links

• Popular Electronics