Quartile rating: 6.5/10 · 1 rating
Launched in 1982 by three friends in a Houston diner, Compaq Computer set out to build a portable PC to take on IBM, the world’s most powerful tech company. Many had tried cloning the industry leader’s code, only to be trounced by IBM and its high-priced lawyers. Explore the remarkable David vs. Goliath story, and eventual demise, of Compaq, an unlikely upstart who altered the future of computing and helped shape the world as we know it today.
Silicon Cowboys tells a genuinely compelling David vs. Goliath story about Compaq's rise and fall with solid pacing and good access to key players. The documentary benefits from a fascinating subject — the birth of IBM-compatible computing — and interviews with founders add authenticity. However, the cinematography is fairly standard talking-heads-and-archive-footage fare with little visual distinction. The narrative arc is engaging but follows a conventional rise-and-fall documentary structure. Novelty is moderate: the Compaq story is underserved in popular tech history, giving the film some distinctiveness, but the filmmaking approach itself is by-the-numbers. The ending, covering Compaq's eventual decline and HP acquisition, is satisfying and somewhat bittersweet but not especially surprising or profound.