The PC That Ruined a Wrestling Career: Vendex HeadStart from 1987 

Wow, Clint! I was happy to wait patiently for this video because I knew you were taking your time to give it the royal LGR treatment, but you continue to exceed my expectations! I'm so glad this machine and its history have been documented now, and can now be enjoyed by retro computer enthusiasts everywhere. Thank you, and well done, sir!

McMahon always wanted it both ways, calling wrestlers independent contractors so he doesn't have to give them employee benefits or a safety net, but also wanting to keep a complete stranglehold on them and treat them like full contract employees I definitely support bundy in this....over thirty years later, for an event that happened before i was born... the internet's weird

Dude, this was so good. I wasn't expecting to learn about both a late 80s IBM clone and King Kong Bundy in the same video but here we are. I sent this one to all my wrestling buddies.

Things haven't changed much over the years. Vince still says the wrestlers are independent contractors and still does not let them do any side work without his permission.

I had one of these!!! (bought in the Netherlands from V and D Shops(Vroom and Dreesmann)) in Dutch you write AND as EN so V AND D would become V EN D, hence the name VENDEX. I played Zak McKracken and the Alienmindbenders on it and my mind was bend alright.. What a FANTASTIC machine WITH FANTASTIC graphics, I was 15.. oh. the memories.

LGR and WWF. An invasion angle i would have never guessed. Bundy was a favorite as a kid, and all of this computer selling is news to me. Great job.

Good to know Vince has never changed over the last 3 decades. Considering the state of RAW though, unsurprising. Love your videos but always a bigger wrestling fan so when two interest cross paths, it's always amusing.

Wow. This takes me back. This was the first computer I ever used at home! It was bought for my older sister, at first, but when she tired of it it fell to me. I mostly used it to write my, err, novels and play Police Quest. It was starting to show its limitations by the time Police Quest 2 came out, but the game was still playable. Ours wasn't sold with the monitor included, so my dad just got a monochrome one at first and later a CGA of a different brand. It's odd because Police Quest actually looked better on the monochrome display as the CGA presented in unnatural colors heavy on red and blue. I remember opting for the mono switch often. I also remember how time consuming it was to save my place in a game using the two floppies. I still, to this day, can recall the sound of those floppies working. I also still expect this weird ticking sound to happen when I hold the back button down in a word program even as I type on new keyboards. Thanks for this.

There is just something about classic/retro computers, the sounds, the site, the feel, the total experience. Just awesome.

Okay, you hooked me with that thumbnail! HAD to see what King Kong Bundy had to do with this computer haha. Shout out to all the other wrestling nerds who are also retro-computing nerds! XD

There is nothing more relaxing that a full computer focused LGR episode!

One of the cleanest, most well preserved old PC's ive seen on this channel. Wow!

I wasn't big on pro wrestling in the 80's, but I'd heard of King Kong Bundy. Sounds like he got a raw deal!

Awesome review! Good thing the battery was removed in time. I own two of these machines, both were severely damaged by leakage. In case anyone else encounters similar issues: In one of my 888-XT's the floppy drives stopped working entirely, even after cleaning up the damaged traces. It turns out there are some 74-series logic IC's sitting right next to the battery, that will cause issues after a leaking cell. These IC's supply the floppy controller with multiple clock signals, and when they're absent, the drives won't work. If anyone reading this owns one of these machines, remove the NiCd battery -now-!

The Headstart III was my first PC, growing up. Great to see its ancestor on here! I'll add that having a version of HOT on my first PC made learning as a kid a lot easier.

I don't what it is about the computers from the 80's and 90's but the aesthetic is so damn comfy and nostalgic even though they predate me. Something about the big blockyness of it is just awesome.

Coming to an LGR video with King Kong Bundy in the thumbnail forced me into a double-take. Vince had a bad tendency to try and strongarm his wrestlers into giving him a cut of their outside ventures. Something similar happened to Jesse Ventura over a Sega Genesis endorsement (and the fallout was also similar).

Ah Vendex..Nice video, Clint! This really takes me back to the eighties when I used to play on these things as a kid at our local V&D (Vroom & Dreesmann) warehouse here in The Netherlands, which was once very succesful but now defunct because of competing web shops. These guys literally sold everything and Vendex was their in-house brand. I always like their quirky low cost Explorer model which had a home computer vibe with a foldable keyboards and looked a bit like a Tandy 1000EX/HX, Atari ST, Amiga 500 or Laser XT. I think V&D stole this idea from RadioShack 🙂 Vendex later became a daughter company of Philips. Some of the Headstart machines like your 888 were indeed rebranded machines, made by Samsung and the monitor is actually a Daewoo.. Others like the later Headstart 500 were Philips/Magnavox machines. We used to have Holborn, Genisys/G2, Tulip, Laser, Vendex, ARRA and of course Philips/Magnavox (Dutch computer companies). Sadly there isn't anything left of them. Of course Philips is still with us but they don't produce any PCs anymore :-(

Why does LGR make my day much brighter?

This thing somehow looks exactly how I remember all computers looking form this era... and now I know why.

What floored me is how it looks utterly untouched by time. I mean wtf? Was it sotred in a hermeditcaly sealed vault? The click of the on button even sounded like it was made yesterday. Mind, blown.

I would really enjoy the differing LEDs in the floppy drives myself. Excellent video!

man LGR knows how to set the mood just right on these videos. PC all set up neatly on the desk with good lighting just for the video. love it

Another well researched video! Thanks Clint!. The Dutch Vendex Headstart Turbo XT computer was probably used by many amateur genealogists back in the day to run their 'hccgenealogie' genealogy DOS program (at least we did😉). You could buy the computer at the Vroom & Dreesmann warehouses in a lot of Dutch cities like Alkmaar. Thanks again for this video! We also shared it on our Twitter account.

It makes me weirdly happy to see people wanting to send you (or other computer archivists/restorers etc) these machines that are otherwise going to be in a landfill. Part because I hate to see things go into landfills and cause more harm to the planet, but also because these machines ARE history. It's so interesting and amazing to see how quickly we have managed to improve on the technology. This machine is a year older than me, and yet only 33 years later I have a machine in my POCKET that is thousands of times faster, smarter, and space wise bigger than this.

this is top quality content mate. clearly so much time went into this! Well done!

Nice little machine, im from holland but i never knew vendex was a dutch company. Tulip was a pc company that was more known around my area, my brother had a Tulip compact III with monochrome monitor and it was more of a ibm system running ms dos 5.0

So happy to see the ATI training software. I had the XT/DOS trainer, and we had a WordPerfect/DBASE/something else trainer too. Ooh, and typing as well! Taught me an amazing amount of info from a very young age. Thank you for bringing back good memories from my Packard Bell 8088 turbo/640K/20MB/360K - got us through until 1999!

Two things that I like to listen to, LGR and classic wrestling lore.

Our family's first computer was one of the Magnavox 286 HeadStart machines. My mom about lost her mind when I put Windows 3.1 on it and she had to learn a new way to get to her word processing program.

There's something soothing about your videos. Your voice, the warm lighting and the background music truely sets a cosy mood. Nice video as usual ! Will we ever see more of your audio setup ?

Never thought i'd see so much wrestling talk on LGR on a system review. Absolutely love it. I'd love to hear a Tech Tales esque retelling of the Monday Night Wars

This brings back memories! My first IBM compatible PC was a Goldstar Turbo XT. It came bundled with Alphaworks, and GEOS. I miss it. I've looked on ebay for years but I never found a Goldstar Turbo XT.

Your respect for technology over time brings warmth to my heart LGR ❤. I hope someday to do the same for my growing 80s-90s collection of a different type :)

I went to the mall with my buddies to meet king kong bundy at a department store promoting this computer.

I love history lessons from this cadre of technology preservers! I lived through this time, but I was a student and not aware of the larger picture. So many goings-on! And I like the different drive LEDs - helps differentiate them!

I've been waiting for this video since the Vendex showed up in the unboxing video. Was hoping to see it compared to the Apex but wow that twist that they're both secret Samsung machines was thrilling and unexpected! What a wild time in computing, and it always fascinates me how so many companies thought they could succeed in the PC market by selling rebadged/outsourced machines. Like you said you're in a price war with yourself essentially and with the shrinking margin going to the OEM it's no wonder these types of brands always failed to stick in the market long term. A very neat machine though and I love the design of the machine and the printing of the labels/box/manuals

Clint, Yet another AWESOME video by you yet again, Please take as long as you want between videos, just keep giving us solid content like this. I love learning things about pcs I've never heard of.

Hi Clint. I love it when you zoom out, while the onboard speaker is doing his squelching thing, and you see your face in the reflection. Priceless. X Love your channel. Gaz from The Netherlands.

It's kind of my little ritual to watch your vids before heading to bed. Thanks for all the awesome content you've released unto the public over the years. Appreciate it!

Nice XT system! I still use my Atari PC3 XT machine on a weekly basis. It's amazing what's possible with only 8Mhz. I did upgrade it from EGA to SVGA and added a SB, UMB card and a XT-IDE card to make it more useable and robust. Next I'm going to rebuild the PSU with modern hardware (swap internals from a decent ATX PSU to the original case of the AT PSU is the idea) because I don't want the AT PSU to blow up the system some day.

LGR videos are so relaxing

Seeing Pharaoh's Tomb at the end is a nostalgic flashback in itself, when I remember watching your video about it waaay back in 2009. Great video, man.

Thank you for this video! My first computer growing up was this exact Vendex model. It’s currently sitting on my floor with a dead hard drive like yours was. I didn’t know about the compact flash adapter, and I will definitely be trying that out to get it up and running again! My dad used to code educational games for me as a kid on this pc, and it’s an important part of my interest in retro electronics today. Thank you for reminding me to work on it again!

My dad bought this in 88 in the Netherlands. Rocked it a couple of years. After this bought a XT with double density drives and then a 286 with 12,5mhz. I was a true OG then.

What a gorgeous little machine. I love the bright green motherboard.

The video quality is so crisp ! That screen zoom at the beginning made me go 'wow'!

I was the youngest of three, serving long stints on a VIC-20 and some Commodore machines when my dad declared me the computer expert - and I had to choose a clone for our house. This is the machine I picked, from a choice of no others as I can remember from some electronics retailer that vanished long ago. Those color coded floppies are things I can't forget. I discovered local BBSes on this computer, and the internet has been bumming me out ever since. Love this video, thanks for the content Clint!

Never knew that Vendex were sold in other countries than the Netherlands and Belgium, learned something :)

It was a practical and "affordable" PC for more "serious" tasks at home or on a small business. P. S.: My 20 years old 3,5" FDD do not work anymore, but those six 5,25" FDD are in great shape... as usual.

Clint, I love that you've adopted the Mario-shotgun hurt sfx from Tim Rogers' videos.

Always great to wake up on a Friday and have a new lgr vid!

Turbo? That means it’s awesome in the 1980s.

Thanks for calling it the "then WWF". I feel like the WWE is doing everything they can, when possible, to strike that name from the record. I know they changed their name and brand for a reason, but history is history, and should be maintained as such.

Aaaah Clint, the perfect compliment to my morning coffee, this gem of a video is. Good to the last drop. Thank you good sir. 😊

Hey Clint this was really cool to see !! The Vendex Headstart II was actually the computer that got me in touch with the hobby of my life :) I remember my parents getting it while they were actually intended to get an Amiga 500 at the time but at last moment the sales men at store convinced them that PC compatible would definitely be the better choice haha. How different my computer "bringup" would've been if they'd gone for that Commodore machine at the time. But anyway, I had lots of fun with this headstart II. And lateron even got my own first computer, the Vendex headstart Explorer. That was also an XT machine, but having special casing with fold-in keybard with some pretty nifty things, like DOS and some custom shell in ROM. ( I always wondered how it was able to do 2 color (blue and white) at 640x200 in graphics mode while it was only CGA :) Definitely check it out if you can! Good times ! :) Best regards !

Vendex the computer brand was publicly known as the in-house brand of the tiny Dutch equivalent of Walmart, named V & D, or Vroom en Dreesman, "en" being the dutch word for "and", so "V and D + ex = Vendex". Vroom and Dreesman was founded in 1887, expanded into Vendex International in 1982, swallowing two more tiny Walmart equivalents: HEMA and Bijenkorf. It started its slow death around 1998, when it ignored rise of the internet. By selling off its massive premium location town center buildings and then renting them back, it managed to limp along all the way to 2015 before going bankrupt.

I love the toggle switch on the video/ memory card.

I'm glad old tech like this finds a home and not a death sentence. I must say Clint you are my favorite retro pc enthusiast! I have 7 old pcs and 8 old laptops that I love to tinker with and your channel really brought out the joy and intrigue of my childhood. Btw I am getting 2 compaq luggage for free. 1 with a hdd and one without. Also I do have 6 different hardcards if you would like to take a Crack at them. Not sure I've seen that video before!

Always happy to see a new LGR vid!

Sweet addition to the collection. The fact that it looks like brand new makes it a real keeper. It's gorgeous and those mismatched LED's? Nah, that's an upgrade enhancement.

15:57 It's nice to see a few moments later that this machine is Y2K compliant : )

'Hitherto unsuspected intellectual prowess'. Thats my new favortite thing to say for the next week or so.

I watch your channel for the nostalgia..and you never disappoint!

I can't recall seeing any of these when I was young, but it makes me wonder if I saw the IBM versions at some point. There's quite a lot I saw when I was a kid, so it makes it hard to remember specifics until I check out your videos or someone elses.

That is one sleek machine, wish I had one back in the day!

Awesome video! i really do like this era of computers as it still remains to be super satisfying to hear see and use.

You should do a series of videos with your vintage stuff collection. not just the games but also programs, old computers, machines, gadgets, accessories etc you must have accumulated a veritable treasury of that stuff and it would make a great few videos

this episode was great, how the Vendex deal impacted Bundy's career is the type of in-depth research and thorough coverage I can only expect from LGR!

Bundymania lives!

I have to say this.... Youre Videos are like an island of peace in this hellscape they call RU-vid. Thx for this^^

This was my family's first computer! I was like 7 when we got it! So cool to see this! Thanks!

I started my career in 79 so these are all commonplace computers for the day back in the 80s oh, and the 90s thing started to take off technology-wise even though sarek and AMD were The Underdogs I found them to be quite impressive during their time,

$995? That was DIRT CHEAP for a desktop PC of that form factor back then.

I lusted over Headstart computers on the rare occasions we got to visit a JCPenny. We were too poor to afford, but I hoped to have one one day. Finally in 1989 as a 12 year old I worked a whole summer saving up money and headed to MW to purchase. At that time the Headstart was a 286 Monochrome. The PS/1 Color 386SX had just come out, and it ended up being what I purchased as my first computer.

Oh wow! This was my first IBM Compatible PC and the second computer I ever owned (coming off an Atari 800XL). The documentation it came with really helped me understand DOS in a way I couldn't on the Atari and really launched me into a lifelong appreciation for all things computer. Thank you for this video and the nostalgia rush!

I wonder where LGR keeps all these computers. Either throughout his home as decorations, in a storage unit or both

Clint: “So here’s this clone computer that was pretty popular…” Oh neat Also Clint: “So Wrestlemania…”

The. Manual. Contains. Pinouts. I am in awe. I remember those days, but increasingly question whether those memories are real.

Ahh, I love seeing LHX. Even just a brief glance takes me right back to playing it on my first computer - an Olivetti Prodest PC1. I'd love to have one again!

this was my first computer (at home)! edit: actually, this is a reduced version of what I had. mine had a full mobo, not this cute little thing. also, the Head Start branding was more prominent (I forgot Vendex was a thing).

I miss dual floppies..so cool..

I also watch several wrestling RU-vidrs, so it was interesting to run into a fact that they haven't covered. Thank you!

In the late 1980's I was involved in this whole project as an employee under the Dutch Vendex International flag (Audiosonic Netherlands, Vendex Software Development and Vroom & Dreesmann) as "Technical Support Specialist". I remember a lot about it and enjoyed being a part of it.

I find it fascinating how the retail price for a "low-end" mass market system has been relatively consistent for over 30 years despite the overall advances in hardware capabilities.

I see King Kong Bundy I click

1.6m subs? I've been watching for many many years. Proud of you man!!

I like all the kinds of content you produce, but the surprise discovery/rooting around with these old systems is 100% my favorite, especially for something like this which I would have never seen in person (grew up in an Apple household).

What a find, almost looks NIB

Generic clone systems like this at the time always traded quality for price/performance, such as it was. Many of us owned systems like this that we could legitimately claim were superior to IBM's own machines in many ways... but secretly we still wished we could afford to own a real IBM, or at least a computer with that level of quality that could play the games we wanted. (At the time, such a thing didn't really exist.) My roommate had an AST, then an Acer clone, while I had a Packard Bell. Systems like these served a large niche that IBM and its main competitor Compaq didn't, and helped popularize the IBM-compatible platform, but I and most of the others I knew with rebranded clones like this always felt a little inferior. Today, when you can go back and more cheaply compare systems directly, it's still pretty obvious why we felt that way.

Such a great video :) and the King Kong Bundy backstory was awesome, first time I'm hearing about it.

My Grandpa died in 2008 at age 93 years old , He had one of these , I got to Play it , So over the Years as a Collector I now have one With the Vendex label and about 7 Clones , the case is Great every time I see one reasonably affordable I buy one and the Documentation and Software , I see the advertisements in My old Bite Rags from the 80's with so many of these cases , Someone put every issue in Binders and it worked great and they were donated to me with other Magazines , LGR I see you have multiple places for storage I live in a Duplex by myself I am so addicted I have little room to Walk and still have some at Moms basement too , I plan to retire by selling them one day . :) QC

I think there's something wrong with that CRT monitor. At around @16:06 I noticed some burn-in of what looks like some weird figure, possibly a human.

These videos keep people growing and never forgetting :)

7:38 - Now that's a sound I haven't heard in a long, long time. Thanks for volume boosting that for us olds in the crowd :)

Hah! So cool seeing this thing. I'm still a couple of steps back trying to scrap together a 386, anything before 486s are getting harder and harder to find. Great video, thanks for another one. 👍

King Kong Bundy went to my high school! Great video as always, Clint.

Ahhhh. An LGR Video to start the morning. Nothing Like it!

I don't know a thing about old computers but the quality of this video is reason enough for me to be watching it regardless.

I remember the ads with King Kong Bundy, also the amazing print ads for PCs in the 80s.