W: Questions for interview with Dutch Philips ex-employee

Ascended (19685)

14-06-2020, 22:57

Hi all,

Via Wammes Witkop I got into contact with the guy from Philips who was the Philips contact of MSX Computer Magazine. He is retired now, but very much willing to talk to me about MSX. He was not specialized in MSX, but, as he explained, he was the "Software Manager" for Philips Netherlands, but in his free time also an MSX hobbyist.

So, what kind of things should we ask him? You're input is most welcome and will definitely be used. Although he warned us that we may know more about things than he does, he will do his best and we can better ask too much than not enough

So, shoot please

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Par wolf_

Ambassador_ (10135)

14-06-2020, 23:43

1) Who made the design/concept of Designer/Designer+/VideoGraphics? Was that just A.Koene on his own and with his own ideas, or did A.Koene get a list of functions and GUI-conventions to implement from higher hand?

2) Barely any company tried to uplift the bare standards regarding RAM, built-in audio, video chips etc. Did Philips have any intentions to push up the specs of their later models, e.g. to models with 256 of 512 kb RAM out of the box, and perhaps an internal harddisk (kind of like the 8260, but that was a protoype iirc). Philips surely couldn't have been blind to the specifications of other systems while the MSX still had an old architecture.

3) In the end, did the 8280 turn out to be what Philips wanted it to be, regarding its video capabilities, in context of the market where other systems had similar video possibilities?

4) Did you ever get feedback from customers who were actually using Ease on a structural basis? If so, what kind of feedback did you get, and how would you estimate Ease's popularity?

Par TheKid

Paragon (1238)

15-06-2020, 08:30

1) How big was the staff at philips concerned with MSX?
2) Was there a dedicated factory where they made msx? All in one place, or all over several factories? Or not in the Netherlands at all?
3) Does he know anything about production/sales numbers? So, how many msx-es where made/sold.
4) Does he know companies that used MSX in their production proces. I know schools used msx in their teachings, but how about companies/government maybe?
5) Maybe off-topic, but the NMS series continued on PC. Was that succesfull and how long did they continue making those PC's ?

Par enribar

Paragon (1224)

15-06-2020, 09:30

991) Rumors said that Philips was planning an MSX2 + machine, were these rumors true? Why was the project abandoned?
992) What was the target market for the HCS 280? (consumer retail, videotext server, etc.)

Par Latok

msx guru (3960)

15-06-2020, 11:03

Foremost, I would let the guy talk himself. About things he remembers and his feelings towards that period of time. If I would be interviewed, all these hardcore questions would scare me quite a bit

Par T.R.

Resident (45)

15-06-2020, 11:57

As an MSX hobbyist himself, is there anything he wished Philips had done but didn't do? And what was it like when Philips dropped MSX? Was this internally a controversial choice?

Par Pac

Scribe (7108)

20-06-2020, 21:14

1. Most MSX computers by Philips were made in Japan. Apart from setting their own specifications for the European market, was the aesthetic design the only work done by Philips on those MSX models?

2. Some "Made in Japan" models show clear references to the manufacturers in mainboard printing such as NEC and mainly Sanyo, the rest are unknown but still made in Japan. Were there any other Japanese manufacturer involved and not shown for some reason?

3. Why NEC, a company that never focussed on MSX and with no MSX hardware known? Had NEC plans to join the MSX standard at that time maybe?

Par TheKid

Paragon (1238)

30-06-2020, 07:36

Just wondering what the status is. Manuel, did you ask these questions yet? Or are you collecting more questions?

Par Manuel

Ascended (19685)

30-06-2020, 22:55

Not yet. Please be patient. We'll still have to plan a good time to meet and we're also trying to pull in more people from Philips. So far, we only have been able to contact people from the Dutch sales organization of Philips.

We also know now that there was no specific MSX sales staff. It was part of the Audio/Video "group".

Par mohai

Paragon (1031)

30-06-2020, 23:28

What was the intention of the CD-ROM interface?
Was Philips planning to make a multimedia center based in MSX, some kind of CD-I predecessor?

Par mohai

Paragon (1031)

30-07-2020, 10:43

Hello. Any news about the interview?