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The Amstrad User

307 bytes added, 00:53, 27 September 2012
The magazine was widely available throughout Australia and New Zealand from 1985 through to the end of 1990. It was also available to the general oceania region - nearby countries such as New Caledonia, Brunei, French Polynesia, Indonesia, Kiribati, Malaysia, Nauru, Niue, Samoa, Singapore, Tonga, Tokelau, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands - although on a more limited and not as timely basis.
It was a reasonable sized magazine. Early issues being around 32 pages, with the magazine peaking at 72 pages. Most issues though, were 64 pages including the re-brand/name change in 1991, detailed below.
'''1991 - Name Change'''
After issue 71 (Dec 1990), it became known as "The PC Mag plus The Amstrad User" (Jan 1991 was the first issue @ $4.50 per issue) - issues were no longer numbered. It still contained Amstrad CPC/PCW/PC content and was obviously trying to appeal to the broader PC clone market (IBM Compatible owners) - rather than specifically just the Amstrad. This was a hard decision the Editor said (In [[Issue_71_(_Dec._90_)]]) - Amstrad Australia in Sydney had dropped the CPC range (along with the PCW8512) by 1989 and was refusing to support or import them (including the CPC plus range) even though the parent company in the UK was still releasing models. They decided instead to concentrate on the PC compatibles. This was reflected by the change in the message seen at the top of the magazine - it started out as "The magazine for PC Beginners" and eventually changed into "For Amstrad, IBM and other PC Compatibles beginners" - although, there was content that was not necessarily only for beginners.
It The magazine started out at 64 pages and eventually became 48 pages. Amstrad content was approximately 20 pages and this was a mix of CPC & PCW content - so it was obvious that CPC content was a lot smaller then it used to be. CPC content continued to shrink over time. The magazine ran until September 1991 (9 issues in total) with Strategy Publications ceasing to produce the magazine around then due to obviously declining magazine sales and , popularity of Amstrad machinesand the rise of other PC compatible magazines. It is unknown if Strategy Publications completely ceased operations, changed their name or merged with another publisher.
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