Zenith Data Systems

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Zenith Data Systems (ZDS) was a division of Zenith founded in 1979 after Zenith acquired Heathkit, who at that time had recently entered the personal computer market. They sold personal computers under the Heath/Zenith and Zenith Data Systems name. Their earliest computers were based on the Z80 processor and ran the CP/M operating system. Later machines would be IBM compatible. In 1983 the United States Navy and Air Force awarded a joint contract to Zenith Data Systems to purchase 6000 Z-100 series computers. In October of 1989 Zenith's computer division was acquired by the French company Groupe Bull. They continued to sell personal computers under the Zenith Data Systems name until 1996 when Zenith Data Systems merged with Packard Bell and NEC, creating the company Packard Bell NEC Inc.

Two reasons ZDS/Groupe Bull had to merge with Packard Bell were the cost of repairs and cost of software upgrades for a large US government contract. Zenith Data Systems lost a lot of money as a result of the US Air Force contract Desktop IV. In order to meet the price point for the contract, ZDS made very cheap computers with motherboards which frequently were defective out of the box and required on-site service, often by a third party which billed ZDS, to resolve the issue. The Air Force also insisted on making ZDS pay for the upgrade to Windows 95 on 200,000 of the machines since ZDS had agreed to provide software upgrades for the computers for free.

One unique feature of most Zenith PC-compatibles was the key combination Ctrl-Alt-Ins, which would interrupt the running program and break into a machine-language monitor. This monitor program was included in ROM, and allowed the user to trace or resume program execution, change machine settings, run diagnostic routines, or boot from a specific device.

The Zenith MinisPORT was the only laptop to ever use the 2-inch floppy disk, developed for use in still video cameras.

Later models of Zenith computers, laptops in particular, included a MACHINE.EXE program, which allowed the user to change hardware-specific settings from within other programs (such as batch files). This amenity was years ahead of its time, with standards like APM and ACPI providing similar functionality in modern systems.

ZDS were also well known in the UK for sponsoring the Full Members Cup, a football competition, for its last few years.