Amstrad

f you've never come across the name 'Amstrad' before, then the odds are you've had your head in the sand the past few years. No disrespect intended, but Amstrad's low-cost, racked audio systems do have a certain notoriety for being almost as commonplace as flying ducks making their way up the flocked wallpaper behind the imitation Chippendale sideboard. 'NQOCD' ('Not Quite Our Class, Dearie'), as one of my NHS colleagues put it. Fortunately, the CPC464 is a good bit more tasteful than all that and marks the latest and calculated marketing ploy of Alan Sugar, Amstrad's whizz-kid chairman: namely, a cheap well-turned out micro that borrows the best ideas from all around the micro field and comes packaged as a ready-to-run system.