What circumstances made the IBM PC so successful?

Answer 1

This may not be a complete answer to what you are looking for, but if I were to guess I would have to say that IBM's became so popular because of the fact that they are one of the most sturdiest computers ever made. IBM iswidely known for their standards in durability Even though the IBM PC's don't have all of the cosmetic wows of say an Apple they are usually more durable and therefor last longer.

IBM became commercially popular because it's corporate strategy was to ensure the customer received support and solutions for all their business problems. Typically the larger the "user", the faster the solution. IBM's massive organization, as compared to all it's competitors, was capable of solving any problem at any cost if it's management felt it to be necessary to maintain good customer relations. IBM's PC computers were not leading edge by any standards, however, they did establish the standards for compatibility of software and internal architecture. The PC actually created a dilemma for IBM since it had capability to run and off load applications from their "bread and butter" computers, the mainframes. This was diametrically apposed to their corporate marketing/selling strategy for years.