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The GRiD Compass; The First Laptop?

By: Thomas Pretty

The laptop today is a common site all over the world, not just in the home and office but on the train, the plane and practically anywhere. But where has this most common of devices come from? What can be considered genesis for the laptop?

Whilst a large amount of debate rages over what can be considered the first true laptop one of the most frequently highlighted products is the GRiD Compass. It was first released in the April of 1982 after an extensive design process.

The designer was a British man called Bill Moggridge who placed a great deal of emphasis upon design that focused on the user, subsequently interaction and ease of use were two of the key principles when the GRiD Compass was being designed. Moggridge finished his design in 1979 although it was not released into the public domain until three years later.

The design was the first to make use of the clamshell case that allowed the screen to be closed over the keyboard. The case was made out of robust magnesium alloy, a material that is still used in laptop manufacture today. The screen rather than a LCD screen used in the modern laptop had a CGA display that was a paltry 320 by 300 pixels. This display was rather limited and could not present images, such as films and television that the modern laptop is able to do.

The magnetic bubble memory that by today's standards was extremely small could manage 340 kilobytes. The 1200 bit per second modem was enough for the data transferal needs at the time and even though it is not particularly fast it is a hallmark of the modern laptop to have a modem built in to allow for internet and network connection. Additionally the GRiD Compass had the option of a connectible device that allowed for external hard drives as well as floppy discs.

The Compass laptop was revolutionary; so much so that it had its own form of operating system rather unimaginatively known as Grid-OS. Unfortunately for the Compass its ingress into the popular market was never realized. This was due to two reasons; firstly the OS system put many members of the public off although far more important was the high price of the laptop.

At the time the Compass would set consumers back eight thousand dollars, if inflation is taken into account this figure is closer to eighteen thousand dollars. Understandably this high price meant that the Compass laptop was never used wholesale. Predominantly it was US government agencies such as NASA and the Special Forces that used it.

The Compass along with other portable computers such as the Gavilan SC and the Sharp PC-5000 set the benchmark in terms of laptop features and design. Although experts argue whether it can be truly regarded as the first laptop computer, highlighting the work of the Dynabook project during the nineteen sixties the innovations and its compact size were at the avant garde of development.

The GRiD Company made a great deal of revenue from the patent rights of the Compass due to the fact that the technological developments were used in portable computing over the next twenty years. Conjecture still surrounds its viability as the first laptop, many highlighting the Osborne 1 as the first affordable and widely accessible mobile computer. Despite this, the impressive size and revolutionary design earns the GRiD Compass a place in the computing hall of fame.

Article Source: http://bytepowered.org/articles

Technology expert Thomas Pretty studies the origins of the laptop and how it has become an important device to the modern world.

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