What do you expect for $50?

And at the end of it's life, the local Base Exchange was selling them for $50 along with a $99 rebate voucher. The offer didn't last for long, though my brother scrabbled enough cash to buy 5 of them, got the rebate checks and wound up making money on the deal. But then he had 5 99/4As that he couldn't even give away.

It was a bit of a crap-fest handicapped by bizarre corporate strategies from TI and a "baroque" internal architecture. But it was DURT CHEAP compared to "real" computers like PCs/clones, Apple ][s or CP/M devices.

(Not arguing with the fact that in 1983 when TI pulled out of the market, it was clear it was ready to move to a computer farm upstate. But none of us knew any better in '79 when the 99/4 was originally released. And besides, BILL COSBY was the spokes-person, so it COULDN'T be a bad machine!)