NEC PC-9801

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The NEC PC-9801 (or the PC-98 for short) is a Japanese microcomputer manufactured by NEC. It first appeared in 1982, and employed an 8086 CPU. It ran at a clock speed of 5 MHz, with two µPD7220 display controllers (one for text, the other for video graphics), and shipped with 128 KB of RAM, expandable to 640 KB. Its 8-color display had a maximum resolution of 640×400 pixels. Its successor, the PC-9801E, which appeared in 1983, employed an 8086-2 CPU, which could selectably run at a speed of either 5 or 8 MHz.

In the 1980s and early 1990s, NEC dominated the Japan domestic PC market with more than 60% of the PCs sold as PC9801 or PC8801. In 1990, IBM Japan introduced the DOS/V OS which enabled to display Japanese text on ordinary IBM PC/ATs' VGA adapter. After that, the decline of the PC98 began. The PC-9801's last successor was the Celeron-based PC-9821Ra43 (with a clockspeed 433MHz), which appeared in 2000.

FreeBSD/pc98 runs on PC-9801s equipped with an Intel 80386 or compatible.

Software for the PC98 generally ran from program and data disks (Disk 0 & 1) or (A & B), and NEC did not have a strong GUI to go up against Microsoft's Windows 95 when it took Japan's PC market by storm. NEC's decision to work with Microsoft to offer a PC98 compatible version of Windows 95 could be seen as the first step towards the 9800 series computer's downfall, as consumers were no longer required to have an NEC-built system to run software designed for Windows.

The PC98 is different from the IBM PC in many ways; for instance, it uses its own 16 bit C-Bus instead of the ISA bus; BIOS, I/O port addressing, memory management, and graphics output are also different. However, localized MS-DOS or Windows will still run on PC-9801s.

Seiko Epson manufactured PC-9801 clones, as well as compatible peripherals.

[edit] As a game platform

The PC9801 had thousands of game titles designed for it, many of which did not require fancy graphics but made creative use of the system's limitations (it was originally designed as a business machine) to great commercial success. Despite having hardware specifications far inferior to the Fujitsu FM Towns and Sharp X68000 personal computers, the massive install base and steady flow of game titles (in particular "dōjin" style dating sims and RPGs) for the "Kyuu-Hachi" ("9-8" in Japanese) kept it as the favored platform for PC game developers in Japan until the rise of the DOS/V clones.

In this way the PC9801 might be seen as the Japanese equivalent of the IBM PC (and its successful battle against the Amiga), except that NEC kept much of its hardware and platform proprietary or under license (until the bitter end), so while it had a virtual monopoly in the Japan market, later IBM PC clones with DOS/V and Windows from companies such as Hitachi and Panasonic that did not require such license fees (like Epson's 98 clones) flooded the market and took the NEC giant down. The proprietary technology that was NEC's strength turned into its weakness as its competitors could use off-the-shelf technology to build cheaper IBM PC clones at a time when NEC was charging much steeper prices for its PC9800 series computers.

Emulators popular for the PC9801 today include T98-NEXT, NekoprojectII(np2), and ANEX 86.