The Story of the TI99/4A, The Successful Failure - Tech Retrospective

The TI99/4A was Texas Instruments second attempt at taking over the home computer market. Released in 1981, the TI99/4A has a mixed reputation with retro computer collectors. On one hand it was an innovative computer with the first consumer 16 bit CPU (the TMS9900) that was a starting point for many lifelong computer nerds, on the other hand it was an over priced paperweight with a poor software library and a abysmal revised model. Which camp are you in?

Get Social:

[cbmeeks]

I'm not sure I agree with some of your comments about the TI-99/4A. The TI has a VERY active community and there is new hardware and software being released for it often. There are literally hundreds and hundreds of games (great, good and bad) for it that are NOT educational. But if educational games are your thing then the TI has them in spades. Sure, Apple and Commodore had MORE games but the TI has a lot as well.

[CharlieJohnson]

I shared one with my friend who had the chrome and black middle, with modem and cassette .
I started my love of computers with this modle. So many memories.

[RCfromtheNYC]

The 99/4A was the very first compuetr I ever used in 1983. In retrospect, the black & brushed chrome look is a sexy as a computer could get in the 80's!

[chad]

The commentary on *Bill Cosby* is completely mistaken. I don’t know if you were alive in the early 80’s, but *Bill Cosby* was the biggest name in entertainment at that time. He came off his hugely successful *Bill Cosby Himself* film and into the highest rated TV show. Yes his reputation is tarnished now, but that was decades later. There was no better celebrity in the early to mid 80’s to hire as a spokesperson than *Bill Cosby.*

[AgentZarkov_]

I just discovered this and the $49 price is exactly why my dad bought this back then lol. My favorite memory on this system was Parsec, Hunt the Wumpus and Jungle Hunt.

[Archpope]

Hunt the Wumpus was an absolute classic!

[CarsonG]

I just bought a beige one of these today for a cool $4. Saw it sitting on a table at a church sale, and thought it'd be neat to play around with. You really weren't kidding about the coffee warmer part!

[PeBoVision]

I think I paid $199 locally for my 4A in 1982. When the line was cancelled on the eve of the 99/8, I moved over to the Atari 800XL. It had an enormous library, a slower processor that provided much faster system performance, and an interesting take on sprites. But there was just something about the 4A that I always missed.

10 years ago I rekindled the flame, and discovered a remarkable enthusiast community and a wealth of new hardware and software that finally demonstrate the system's considerable capabilities, despite its by-design failings.


After 40 years it has become a very desirable nostalgia system. (The limited in-house library makes acquiring a complete set very possible, with just enough hard-to-find items to make it a fun hobby (Still looking for "Gestion Privée").

In retrospect TI shot themselves in the foot by rushing a product that was gerry-rigged from available components, and instituting a draconian 3rd party licensing model. They believed they could go it alone, and alone they went. But QI models notwithsatnding, they left us a REALLY cool toy to play with. Among the best collector systems in that regard (as long as you have a big desk).

[manlan]

Somewhere between 84-86, the elementary school I attended had like one, maybe two TI-99/4A for the whole school, so one would come to each classroom a few days of the year. I don't remember being given much direction on using it. They had a few of those education titles and maybe one game on cartridges, and the teacher would send us one by one to use the computer for a 15-20 minute allotment of time during the day or two it was in our classroom. I'd go over and play with whatever program I wanted till the timer said my time was up.

Either shortly before, or shortly after we moved away from that school system in 86-87, my dad acquired a TI-99/4A. We had no software for it, no expansion slots, no hard drive, just the 16K of RAM. We used the TV as a monitor. I copied a program or two out of a book, and played around a little bit with TI BASIC on my own. Learned enough to create a program to practice/drill elementary arithmetic and have the computer tell you if you got the randomly generated math problem correct or not. But since we had no way to save stuff, I wasn't motivated to go much further than that. However, it was nice to already have a basic understanding of loops, conditional commands, and random number generators before I had an actual programming class in college.

[RadioCaledon]

Yep still have one in my storage room with the expansion cabinet and a few expansion cards. Plus a crap ton of cartridges. Mother in law worked for TI. One day (hopefully soon ) it will come out of storage for restoration.

[tronentertainment]

Used my TI until 1990, and also amassed 90 cartridges - mostly games. Still have it tucked away.

[metalheadmalta]

Apologies for the delay... but giving -10k score for software???? Granted, assembly was locked away, but the cartridges on offer were far from disastrus. You mentioned only Parsec... but there are a ton of other gems in the catalogue worth mentioning. Practically all the Scott Adams asventures, the MBX series, with Bigfoot leading the way, the stupendous TI Invaders (definitely the BEST invaders ever), Blasto, Star Trek, all the games by Atari, Pacman, Donkey Kong, Burgertime...

The Extended Basic cartridge was a godsend, and so many games were written...

And also, Europe is totally full of the Beige TI.... that also received an enhance production tooling system and quality control...

[packfan]

The TI 99/4A was my first computer and I loved it. I was in middle school and the book that was included with the computer on learning the Basic Programming Language put me way ahead of my peers cause the Basic language was being taught in all my math classes. By the time I was a freshman in my high school algebra class, my programming skills were advanced compared to my peers and was actually put into accelerated math because of that programming skill. I moved on the Commodore 64 which was fine, but I had to add a cartridge module to increase the basic language level to a more advanced level.

[MrSmriley]

I had it and loved it! Its Basic was slow, but ok for a first computer. As a kid I used to write Basic games with pen and paper while we were away on vacation then type them in when we returned home, which was very rewarding. And the cartridge games were awesome, loved Parsec and Alpiner!

[TheAtomicTexan]

Just finding this after digging through storage I found an old cartridge. This was my first computer in 83. I loved it at the time. It's partly what drove my love of computers.
I feel old now... almost 50 years old now.. where did the time go?

[Troy]

TI99/4A was my first computer and I bought it for $59 at Venture. I loved that computer. I was in college and it put me on track to being a future network admin. It did have some second party game cartridges. I had Donkey Kong for it and it looked great on that computer.

[gregoryknight]

I'm not so sure I agree with everything in this review. The TI 99/4A was my first computer and we bought it at JC Penney's for $299. That substantial investment in 198 terms for my single mother helped paved the way for my interest in computers and programming. Tunnels of Doom and Parsec were awesome games beyond compare to any other games of the day. Played them for hours.

With that computer I learned TI Basic and TI Extended basic and programmed games for my brother and I and other friends with TI's -- a horse racing game, Wall Street simulation game, etc...

The VIC 20 was too limited (in my teenage opinion at the time and playing on my best friend's VIC 20) as was the Commodore VIC 64 (my friend upgraded to that as soon as it was available).

Just as in video gaming you were either an Atari 2600 fan or Intellivision, in intro home computer market as a teen you were either a TI 99/4A fan or Commodore. The TRS 80 was a school only model because it was just too expensive for most kids in my neighborhood to have their parents buy.

This was a great stroll down memory lane for an old fart like me, but it hardly captures the crux of the importance of the TI 99/4a. Nor does it capture the advantages of the TI 99/4A over the Commodore VIC 20 or Commodore VIC 64 and the interplay between those systems.

For what it's worth, most of my Atari 2600 friends were also TI 99/4A geeks. My Intellivision video gaming friends were typically the Commodore VIC 20/64 geeks.

[MrHurricaneFloyd]

I grew up dirt poor and my first computer was a Ti994A that I picked up in a thrift store for $10 back in 1990.

[yeahralfi]

Great video which deserves much more views. Thanks !,

[lurkerrekrul]

Back in the 80s, I only had an Atari 2600 and knew nothing about computers. To me, they were mysterious, expensive machines that I would never be able to own. I hadn't even seen that many screenshots of games in the video game magazines. Then one December I saw a Toy 'R' Us commercial advertising the TI99/4A for $50, and I realized I might actually be able to get one for Christmas, so I started asking for it. After a visit to a local store where they had some other other machines on display, I started asking for a Commodore 64 instead. At the time, I had no idea that it was MUCH more expensive. 

Anyway, my parents got it for me, although for the first year, I only had a cassette drive, which was agonizingly slow. Not knowing much about computers, I thought that's what they all used. I didn't get a floppy drive until the following year. Looking back, I'm pretty happy that I didn't get the TI. The C64 had much more software available for it, and most peripherals just plugged right in.

In more recent years, I've acquired two of the beige model TI99/4As. I tested one years ago and it worked fine, although I didn't have any software for it. I forget if I tested the other one or not. My only real experience with TI software has been running games in an emulator. Cartridge games work fine, but it seems that absolutely EVERYTHING on disk, whether commercial software, or homebrew stuff, needs some expansion cartridge plugged in, in order to work. Half the time, I can't get the homebrew software to work at all.