Uploaded December 2010 | Updated September 2026, 11 minutes ago
1998 commercial for Radio Shack emphasizes how buying a computer for your children can help them make "multimedia mathematics reports", become better students and presumably get better grades.
The ad cuts to an in-store Compaq Learning Center where you can purchase a Compaq Learning Series mini-tower for $999 (*Monitor not included). The sub-$1000 PC was just breaking into the market, and the market would never be the same. Direct mail-order (like Gateway 2000) were offering complete systems including monitors for $999 already.
The ad prominently features the internet buttons on the Compaq keyboard, presumably these made made getting on the internet easier than ever before.
This ad does still call the Compaqs "home computers" a throwback term to the beginning of the PC in the 1970s. Radio Shack was a big player in computers then with their own TRS designs and perhaps wanted to hold onto those days a bit longer. The rest of the industry had switched to the "Personal Computer" or "PC" term which actually had debuted in the late 1970s when companies like Apple realized that small business was becoming their largest market and not the home.
This ad does not feature an Intel chime at the end, other manufacturers had already adopted this and few PC commercials (outside of Apple's) are like this today.
This ad aired during the 1998 season premiere of The Simpsons.
1998 commercial for Radio Shack emphasizes how buying a computer for your children can help them make "multimedia mathematics reports", become better students and presumably get better grades.
The ad cuts to an in-store Compaq Learning Center where you can purchase a Compaq Learning Series mini-tower for $999 (*Monitor not included). The sub-$1000 PC was just breaking into the market, and the market would never be the same. Direct mail-order (like Gateway 2000) were offering complete systems including monitors for $999 already.
The ad prominently features the internet buttons on the Compaq keyboard, presumably these made made getting on the internet easier than ever before.
This ad does still call the Compaqs "home computers" a throwback term to the beginning of the PC in the 1970s. Radio Shack was a big player in computers then with their own TRS designs and perhaps wanted to hold onto those days a bit longer. The rest of the industry had switched to the "Personal Computer" or "PC" term which actually had debuted in the late 1970s when companies like Apple realized that small business was becoming their largest market and not the home.
This ad does not feature an Intel chime at the end, other manufacturers had already adopted this and few PC commercials (outside of Apple's) are like this today.
This ad aired during the 1998 season premiere of The Simpsons.
