'Garage find' Philips P330 computer

If you think you have collected all items from Bond films, you might have to add this obscure item to your list. A rare Philips P330 computer, similar model as seen in the For Your Eyes Only (1981).

(note: this is not the actual screen-used computer seen in the film, but it is the same type of computer)

The Philips P330 computer

When the current seller of the machine was cleaning up his parents' garage in a town in The Netherlands, he stumbled upon a large vintage computer the size of a table - after looking online he came across the page on the Bond Lifestyle website where he learned that the same type of computer was used in a James Bond movie.

This is how the Philips P330 computer was stored in the garage

In the movie a Philips P330 computer can be seen on the St. Georges spy ship in the opening scene of the film. And Q's famous Identigraph machine is a Philips P430 computer, a very similar machine.

A Philips P330 in For Your Eyes Only
Photo © EON Productions, United Artists

The Philips P330 was introduced in 1978 by Philips to update their earlier P300 and P350 models. It was an office / bookkeeping computer the size of a table, and had an integrated dot-matrix printer, optional hard disk and a cassette drive. The computer found in The Netherlands does have the optional cassette drive, which the computer in the film does not have.

The computer was purchased second hand to be used as for bookkeeping. The computer still has the dot matrix printer (including original paper), the complete table, instruction manuals, startup floppy discs and a lot of its original accessories.

The Philips P330 is looking for a new home

It's not a coincidence that a P330 has turned up in The Netherlands: Philips is a Dutch electronics company an the P330 was used there by local business for accounting and invoicing. According to one source online, the simplest version of the P330 cost over 80,000 HFL (Dutch Guilders), approximately 40,000 euro ($45,000 or £35,000).

Looking at the wear under the number pad, this P330 was used a lot. Here also the optional cassette deck can be seen.

Other Philips computers in For Your Eyes Only
In the same film scene on the ship, we can see another prominently placed Philips P5003 computer, with integrated keyboard and monitor. This computer is smaller than the P330, although in the film only the top part (screen and keyboard) is seen.

Later in the film, we see the Q's Identigraph, a machine invented by Q to identify a person based on the description of the facial features of the person. James Bond (Roger Moore) visits Q (Desmond Llewelyn) to find out the identity of a hitman (who turns out to be Emile Leopold Locque). The machine is actually a Philips P430 computer which is, just like the P330, the size of an office table, with an integrated hard disk, dot-matrix printer (with which the photo of Locque is printed), 12" monitor. Bond watches the progress on a separate Philips screen.

A similar Philips P430 is used as Q's Identigraph in the film

Philips provided several electronic gadgets for the Bond films in the 1980s.

See all Philips products in Bond Films

The P330 computer in The Netherlands is now offered for sale, with some collectors already showing interest. The computer might need to be refurbished by an expert before it can be operated again. For enquiries, please contact Bond Lifestyle.