As recently as 29 November 1995 the Wall Street Journal
reported that the company was having financial difficulties
and that one of its major suppliers of CPUs, Intel, was
about to make a large cash loan, so as to prevent loss of a
major customer. Packard Bell is a privately held company and
the WSJ also reported that NEC has been rumored to have
bought a large minority block of shares to help the company
stay in business.
Its computers are sold in major retail outlets in the USA and
are available as a bundled package: desktop or tower 486
CPU, single 3.5 inch floppy disk drive, CD-ROM, sound
card, 14 inch colour monitor, and 4-8MB of RAM.
1995 end-of-year prices in Computer Currents magazine (a
California Bay Area bi-monthly giveaway publication) are
US$1500 (approx. 1000 pounds) for a 486 desktop, with 8MB
RAM, 420MB hard disk drive, single 3.5 inch floppy drive, 14
inch colour monitor, 2-speed CD-ROM, and 16-bit sound card.
Headquarters: Sacramento, California, USA.
(1996-01-02)
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