1993 RadioShack Tandy Sensation Computer Demonstration & Sales Tutorial

Watch all the latest features on the "New" 1993 Tandy Sensation Multi-Media Computer! This is a demonstration & sales training video for Radio Shack store managers & salesman.
RadioShack knows that a salesman who is educated about their computers = higher sales volume for the store.
To see more videos, TV commercials, and an archive of vintage Radio Shack Catalogs visit www.RadioShackCatalogs.com.
There you can view the complete RADIO SHACK CATALOG ARCHIVE, and see...
■ 1939-2002 RadioShack Full-Line Products Catalogs
■ 2003-2011 RadioShack Electronic Parts & Accessories Reference Guides
■ 1977-1992 Tandy Computer & Computer Related Catalogs (including the TRS-80 computer line)
■ 1950-2012 RadioShack Sale Catalogs/flyers (domestic & foreign)
■ 1970-2011 RadioShack TV commercials (videos)
■ 1925-2006 RadioShack Electronic Parts & Accessories Advertisements
■ Vintage Photos of Radio Shack Stores & Hi-Fidelity Show Rooms
■ Tandy Computer "Whiz Kids" Comic Books
■ RadioShack Historical Data
■ RadioShack Memorabilia
Authorization to the use of RadioShack related content has been expressly granted to RadioShackCatalogs.com to maintain historical records of RadioShack Corporation.
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This KZbin channel and www.RadioShackCatalogs.com are dedicated to America's technology store... RadioShack.
Radio Shack has been in business since 1921 (over 90 years) as a leading national retailer of innovative technology products and services, including personal, mobile, home technology, and power supply products.
For 65 of those years, they have produced outstanding electronics and technology catalogs with a wide range of products and services from leading national brands to exclusive private brands.
These catalogs contained a mix of hi-fidelity stereos, amplifiers, radios, phonographs, speakers, TVs, CBs, communication equipment, desktop & laptop computers, electronic components, antennas, electronic test equipment, educational kits, electronic toys, gadgets, hand tools, batteries, and much more.
Products from the RadioShack catalog were purchased by professionals, hobbyists, and everyday consumers.

[@N3rdyg33kzor]

First computer I ever had the pleasure of using as kid. Still have the complete set with monitor, keyboard, mouse, system, and even the mouse pad and software. The system's had a few upgrades over the years. We tossed in a 75mhz 486 DX2 Intel overdrive chip in as well as a Sound Blaster 16 and a new CD drive. The old 107mb hdd bit the dust a long time ago and now we have a 400mb drive in the system.

[@tzieser]

Same here! I played many, many games on that machine ... (X-Wing, Rebel Assault, Dark Forces, Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe, The Dig....ahhh good times). I remember one time as a kid I deleted the C:\bin folder to make some space for more games and it corrupted the entire OS (win 3.5). Dad had to pay like $350.00 to get it reformatted lol.

[@Lachlant1984]

What sound card did it include out of the box?

[@MrRuckusRCrc]

@@Lachlant1984 3 years ago, little late on the reply. But it was an Adlib Gold soundcard out of the box, 4 bit I believe because it could not playback doom/wolf3D sound correctly. We ended up tossing in an ISA SB Pro into our Tandy Sensation. Onboard 2400bps modem was also horribly slow. Try loading Prodigy Online on 2400bps. I wasnt sure I was going anywhere. We threw in a Zoltrix 28.8 after a while which worked perfectly fine and much faster. Seagate 107MB was also upgraded after a while. Sold that drive to a guy who said he was going to run a BBS on it. The onboard Western Digital 512KB videocard is what made us upgrade the whole PC. It could not run 11th Hour which required a 1MB or greater Videocard. But we upgraded just about everything else on it before we went to a new machine. It was used pretty much everyday.

[@richardpowell1772]

I miss Radio Shack.

[@jackilynpyzocha662]

It's online.

[@poorringo]

I was 14 and this was my first EVER PC and the thing felt like some super future technology. Back then I'd never seen a computer use a CD. Heck, people were still listening to cassette back then. So this was also my first ever CD player. We would watch the DEMOS all the time, to see the CD man jump into the CD player, and the telephone answering system was freaking awesome. I never did get connected to the net with it. This was the early 90s and I live in a rural area, so calling a long distance number was out of the question. I didn't get online in my house until Web TV in 98, and then the Gateway Astro in 00.

[@Raptor50aus]

Had the best time as a 15 yo working at Tandy Australia in 1983 :)

[@katie2893]

This was my family's first computer and I remember the jingle and the intro so well. Also the shot at DAN QUAYLE at 7:44 haha.

[@HaloElite76]

LMFAO!! He asked, "How can I get a text message over a telephone?" @10:49

[@Rhewin]

That compressed audio brings back so many memories of computer demos back in the 90s

[@TheGodoychannel]

This was my first PC. My first computer was a Commodore 64, but this was leaps and bounds ahead of that machine. Thanks for sharing.

[@Joe-od7ho]

No, it wasn't bro.

[@kevintrontl1089]

This was my first computer. Bought it when I started working for the Post Office. Tech support was the best. They taught me how to upgrade my computer over the phone. I've been building most of my computers since or at least upgrading them.

[@GGBP14]

I remember watching this in the Radio Shack I worked in. Blast from the past. It was so filled with bloatware it had like 20mb of free space on the hd

[@silasdurane3073]

My second computer at the age of 11. This computer was the best thing ever at the time. Absolutely loved the machine. Learned how to program Basic on it. How to dislike winblows. And how to conquer Space and Kings Quest. The good 'ol days. :) How far we have come. Anyone remember Lower Lights BBS? ;)

[@GilDavis]

I really liked this computer. I got to buy one for $100 when they were still current. UPS decided to drop it out of a truck. Two pairs of vice grips, a bench vice and a hammer to straighten the case, went to Hard Drives International to pick up a new hard drive (160 Mb) and some time. Got it working great. At least great for the early 90s. After owning it for a couple of years, I bought a TV card for it and somehow plugged something in backward. Corrupted the bios and even according to tech support, there was no way to reset it. Would argue that today, but at the time I knew no better. Parted it out and threw away the case. And yes, I bought the tv card from... Radio Shack. Oh well, technology still isn't perfect.

[@Joe-od7ho]

None of that happened, bro. Nice fan-fiction.

[@markshade8398]

These days tons of people are removing the bios chip (even soldered in ones) and then the system is good to go! They can even make a chip from a hard chip and loading a bios onto it manually. What a difference in repair options today vs back then.

[@rubyvolt]

I bought a 3100 and then a 3200 a few months later and had to turn them into Sensations over the next few years. I still have them and they both work. They wouldn't even sell me the Sensation stuff to put on my machines. Well, I have it now. Mine are grandparents but they have and run the same Sensation stuff. One even has a modem that could do the answering machine on a land line.

[@videooblivion]

My Amiga friends and I were mildly impressed. 😂

[@gstcomputing65]

I was working at RadioShack when this was top of the line. I remember our district manager made all of us meet him at the division office. He decided to hold a "pop quiz" about the Sensation to see what we knew. His first question was, "what processor does the Sensation have?" I thought I would over-achieve and say 80486. He said we were all wrong. The correct answer (according to him) was "a 25-MHz Intel 80486 SX". We all got all huge lecture. At least a dozen of us, including me, quit within a few weeks.

[@bitwize]

That's par for the course at a retail outlet, you have to recite the ad copy as written.

[@ChatGPT1111]

It is interesting to stumble on this in 2022 when they show the old Kennedy "Ask Not" Speech almost 30 years before. Now its been another 30 years since this video was made, just nuts if you think about it!

[@zroger73]

Oh. Wow. I haven't heard or seen that demo in nearly 30 years since I worked at Radio Shack and heard it playing all day long. :)

[@Gr8thxAlot]

I was saving up for this computer in high school, wanting to upgrade from our Tandy 1000RL. The Sensation! became obsolete before I could save enough money. I ended up buying a Compaq Presario with over the double the power by waiting about 18 months. I spent a small fortune (all of my money) on computers back then as kid.

[@chasemcc]

I loved this thing as a kid back in the day. I still remember the distinct sound the single-speed CD Rom made when it was spinning up. The CD drive was a big deal back then. It took a bit of effort to open and close it. I can't believe it's been 28 years since 1993. I actually believed the government had a secret department where they kept the X-files lol.

[@TrunkMonkey0389]

This was my first computer. Played quest for glory 1 and Sherlock Holmes the case of the serrated scalpel on this. Best times.

[@bcyrx]

"how do i get a text message over the telephone' oh god that's amazing as i watch this on a phone.

[@umageddon]

you are clearly superior. grats!

[@aaron71]

I still have this PC!

[@captcorajus]

Ha, ha, I remember having to watch this video!

[@xxo8746]

I'm sold

[@lslurpeek]

I can’t wait to watch a video on the iPad 29 years from now

[@My-Say]

My first computer was called SKV. I have no idea who made it, but the computer came with Win 3.1, DOS 6.0 & 7 books, a 212 MB HD, & had A 25 MHz processor. It came out around the same time of this and I really wanted one. I paid just over 2k for it, used it for about 8 years, then gave it to my nephew to use, but wanted it back if he ever got rid of it. Well, he had no idea what ever happened to it... I would love to have that old computer back, just to show it in a display as my first system. I have grown since then to be a professional software developer.

[@Pinwormx]

Woah! I remember this. I still couldn’t sell one to save my life.

[@paulmilnes6553]

WHY??? We sold the heck out of them!

[@NewsmakersTech]

The Tandy Sensation is a super underrated system. it's only real downside was the somewhat lackluster speed of the CPU for a high end multimedia system.

[@crnkmnky]

Until we got Sensation for Christmas in 1992, my computer experiences were all on Apple II GS and Macintosh II ci. I had no idea most schoolchildren were using monochrome DOS systems, if they got to touch a PC at all. I believe the hype, this was a PC like no other! I only wish I'd spent more time with the seven Knowledge apps, instead of fiddling with the fried modem or accidentally wiping the hard drive.

[@Joe-od7ho]

None of that happened, bro. Nice fan-fiction.

[@crnkmnky]

@@Joe-od7ho Are you a bot or something? 🥱

[@ThommyofThenn]

6:30 oh joy a microwave "cookbook." I would love to see what they include. A recipe for microwaving a hot pocket?

[@cups3]

Gosh memories

[@tonye4176]

Right around when they started to struggle

[@NathanChisholm041]

WOW the future is now!!

[@dykodesigns]

Not a bad specced computer for 1991/1992 standards. But it got the low end of the 486 range. I guess they could not put a 33 mHz 486 DX in there for that price. Othernthen that it was quite well packed with features.

[@syxx573]

I totally wished it was 33 back then instead of 25. Seems like nothing today, but back then it was a big difference.

[@Lachlant1984]

What's with the odd audio editing during some of those "phone centre" utterances?

[@jpcfit]

My first computer, and the salesman threw in a free game, "The 7th Guest." It couldn't have gotten any better. I loved that computer, and the game was fantastic!

[@JimLeonard]

The board was noisy, and I find it funny that you can hear the video ram updates interfering with the audio when the Sensation! native presentations run on the system during heavy animation.

[@clairejensen4859]

The good old days of computers pre Windows :)

[@dave4shmups]

Great stuff! I think this was the last computer released by Tandy. I’ve read that it wasn’t very successful because it didn’t use the Pentium processor.

[@markshade8398]

I worked there back then, even ran a "computer center" for the business sales (outside sales like schools, large volume etc). In 1992 the Pentium was not yet common place. The overwhelming number of systems on the market (even Compaq, HP, Dell, etc. we're still 486. That changed just a short time later. But for example, super sized companies (10,000+ users and larger) were still buying 486 66mhz PCs in mass as late as 1995. Pentiums were reserved for "high end" purposes. I worked for a nationwide bank in 1995 and was surprised to see them buying 486s.

[@dave4shmups]

Thanks for the reply! That’s interesting.

[@jackilynpyzocha662]

I had the 1000 RLX, but wanted a Sensation, with the DVD player.

[@gio048]

Cool video😎😎😎😎😎😎😎😎😎

[@barrykidd1977]

I got one of these in college. 1993. Pentium 1 came out 10 months after I got it. Made me so mad. I used my Sensation until graduation, and kept it as my answering machine until a BSOD from a hard drive failure in 2002.

[@Joe-od7ho]

None of that happened, bro. Nice fan-fiction.

[@barrykidd1977]

@@Joe-od7ho Actually it did, asswipe.

[@QuaaludeCharlie]

Seems like yesterday , and Poof it was brand new , now it's ready for a Vintage Showcase on youtube or in the Man Cave , Something to pass down to some generstion you hipe and pray do not pitch it out

[@elgeneralxx]

Can somebody tell me How can i send a text message over a telephone?

[@Lachlant1984]

Wow, what a demo. Here's what I want to know. What games did the Sensation PC come with apart from the games included with Windows? Did it come with Myst? Did it come with DOOM? Did it come with Wolfenstein 3D? Maybe it came with SimCity 2000. I'm pretty sure that Compaq and Packard Bell made PCs very much like this one at the time this machine was made, still, this would have been a very good home PC at the time it was new.

[@Lachlant1984]

@@djnak7856 PC manufacturers love to fill their PCs hard drive with bloatware, don't they, they still do it to this day, when I bought an HP laptop last year, there was a lot of adware on the hard drive, needless to say, I deleted it.

[@thatguyfromca]

Is that the AOL voice?

[@willn8664]

WinMate was way ahead of it's time.

[@ShawnShady76]

Sweet!! I live in North Korea, any idea when these will hit the market? I can’t wait!! 🤩

[@watchthis4451]

Your comment had me ROLLIN' with laughter. Thanks! But seriously, to answer your question, they should hit the North Korean market immediately after the brick phone and Rubiks Cube are introduced.

[@Anarchist86ed]

But Can It Run Crysis?

[@jedi4049]

Had megaman on this

[@MajorWeakness]

I sold hundreds of these

[@toddt6730]

I wish my salespeople were as good as they are,I'd be rich

[@siouxmoux3]

Tandy Sensation MPC turns out it was not so Sensational.

[@legolas7r]

Came here because of Young Sheldon

[@RISCGames]

If anyone has a Tandy Sensation for sale, please send me a message. Thanks!

[@poorringo]

Clint Thompson I have one but I haven't booted it up in years and I just have the PC left, no monitor or key/mouse.

[@JJsMessyBench]

I have one in good working shape.

[@stormgirl09]

i wonder if they knew 15 to 20 years from then all this would fit in our pockets and be as common as a house hold TV or car.

[@nowanlokan3524]

I can guarantee you they thought of it...but had no clue it'd be in 10-20 years. At best they probably assumed 30-40...

[@Tevlex]

did the wigs really look so stupid in 1993?

[@DirtyBob7777]

R.i.p. tandy.... such crap...

[@chloedevereaux1801]

11:00 stephen hawkins first job :D what a joke pc