Combo

Combo (pronounced kom-boh)

(1) In informal use, a small jazz or dance band (as distinct from a big band).

(2) In informal use, many forms of combined items (bundled “meal deals”; products sold with a collection of options offered at a nominal discount against the price calculated on the basis of the extended value etc).

(3) In informal use, to combine.

(4) A sequence of actions combined as one for certain purposes.

(5) In informal use, the combination (the numerical sequence) of a combination lock.

(6) In video gaming, an action composed of a sequence of simpler actions, especially a composite attacking move in a fighting game; two or more game-play elements (characters, items, options etc) which are powerful when used together.

(7) In collectible card games, a strategy under which the objective is to win by playing a specific combination of cards (or similar), usually in a single play.

(8) In historic Australian (derogatory) slang, a white man (1) who lives among Aboriginal people and adopts Aboriginal culture or (2) has entered into an ongoing sexual relationship with an Aboriginal woman or (3) has taken an Aboriginal wife, usually in a common-law marriage (all now archaic).

(9) In computing (in the design of graphical user interfaces (GUI)), in the informal use “combo box” (A GUI widget that is a combination of a dropdown list or list box and a single-line textbox, allowing the user either to type a value directly into the control or choose from the list of existing options).

1924: A clipping of comb(ination) + -o.  Combination (the act of combining, the state of being combined or the result of combining) was from the Middle English combinacioun & combynacyoun, from the Old French combination, from the Late Latin combīnātiō.  The colloquial -o suffix (wino, ammo, combo, kiddo et al) appears widely in English but is most common in Australia where in certain sub-cultures it appears to be obligatory (they have names like Shaneo, Toddo, Wayneo etc).  The first use was of small jazz groups and dance bands and was used to differentiate the smaller ensembles from the then popular “big bands”, the implication also that while combos were often ad-hoc things with the membership varying from evening to evening whereas big bands had a more stable (usually salaried) membership and usually took the name of the band leader.  Combo is a noun, comboing & comboed are verbs and comboable is an adjective; the noun plural is combos or comboes.

The VW Kombi and the Samba

1951 VW Kombi.

Although there was for years in English-speaking markets something of a tendency to call all the Volkswagen Type 2s Kombis, the Kombi was just one configuration in a range which eventually extended beyond a dozen distinct types.  Kombi was a clipping of the German Kombinationskraftwagen (combination motor vehicle), another of those compound nouns at which they excel.  The Kombi coachwork featured side windows and removable seats in the rear compartment, permitting the thing thus to be used either for passengers, freight or a combination of the two.  Other types in the range included pure delivery vans (no rear seats) with a variety of door options, a high-roof version best suited to transporting cargo which was bulky but not especially heavy, pick-ups (Transporters) with either a single or double passenger cabin and the other classic, the Microbus, intended purely for people and thus configured with fixed seats in the rear.  It was the Microbus which made its mark with the US surfing community in the 1960s and it became identified with the counter culture, something perhaps assisted by its large, flat surfaces which lent themselves to the psychedelic paint schemes associated with the era.

Not a Kombi: 1959 VW Microbus Deluxe (Samba).

The Microbus was also offered (between 1951-1966) in a “Deluxe” version which featured both a folding fabric sunroof and some unusual “skylight” windows which followed the curve of sides of the roof.  Available in 21 & 23 window versions, these are now highly collectable and such is the attraction there’s something of a cottage industry in converting Microbuses to the be-windowed specification but it’s difficult exactly to emulate the originals, the best of which can command several times the price of a fake (a perfectly restored one in 2017 selling at auction in the US for US$302,000).  Such was the susceptibility to rust, the survival rate wasn’t high and many led a hard life when new, popular with the tour guides who would conduct bus-loads of visitors on (slow) tours of the Alps, the sunroof & skylights ideal for gazing at the peaks.  To add to the mood, a dashboard-mounted valve radio was available as an option.  The Microbus Deluxe is actually rarely referred to as such, being almost universally called the “Samba” and the origin of that in uncertain.  One theory is that it’s a borrowing from the Brazilian dance and musical genre that is associated with things lively, colorful, and celebratory, the link being that as well as the sunroof and windows, the Deluxe had more luxurious interior appointments, came usually in bright two-tone paint (other Type 2s were usually more drably finished) and featured lashings of external chrome.  It’s an attractive story but some prefer something more Germanic: Samba as the acronym for the business-like phrase Sonnendach-Ausführung mit besonderem Armaturenbrett (sunroof version with special dashboard).  However it happened, Samba was in colloquial use by at least 1952 and became semi official in 1954 when the distributers in the Netherlands added the word to their brochures.  Production ended in July 1967 after almost 100,000 had been built.

Combo in nature but not Kombi in name: 1959 VW Double passenger cabin Transporter (which the factory called the Doka, from Doppelkabine (double cabin).

The very existence of the VW Type 2 (the Beetle was the Type 1) was an act of serendipity, one entrepreneurial dealer from the Netherlands in 1947 noting during a visit to the factory the use of a rather cobbled-together “pick-up” based on a Beetle chassis.  With Europe in the throes of post-war rebuilding and so much industrial production still disrupted, there was a shortage of such vehicles and he sketched what would now be called a “forward control van” which the factory agreed to develop.  However, such was the demand for the Beetle that it wasn’t until 1950 than production of the Type 2 began and, despite the legend that the two share underpinnings, that’s only partially true because to gain the necessary strength, a different floor plan was required.  Still, with many mechanical components there was much interchangeably between Types 1 & 2, something which added greatly to its appeal and it was instantly successful the first generation staying in production until 1966 and although in most of the world the classic air-cooled / rear-engine configuration was in subsequent decades replaced, Type 2 in that specification were made in Brazil until 2013 and although demand was still strong and the line was profitable, the country was the last developed market in the world to introduce the safety regulation which had seen the old Kombis go elsewhere extinct.  The South American line had been the last link with the Nazi’s Kdf-Wagen (which became the Beetle, the first prototype of which dated from 1935, renamed to the snappier Volkswagen (literally “people’s car”).  Kdf (Kraft durch Freude, literally “Strength Through Joy” was the Nazi state’s leisure organization which was involved in everything from holiday resorts and cruise liners to the regulation of workplaces (the classic Nazi “carrot & stick” approach) but it was also used as a slogan an in that sense joy was compulsory and the state had ways to punish those not thought sufficiently joyful.

Combo cards: 3Com Ethernet XL PCI 3c900 NIC (RJ45-AUI-BNC) (left), NVidia GPU (HDMI-VGA-DVI) (centre) & Startech 2S1P (2 x DB9 Serial-1 x DB25 Parallel) (right).

In personal computer hardware, combo devices have existed almost as long as the industry.  When, with rather modest expectations, IBM released the PC-1 in 1981, it was a US$5000 thing which even by the standards of the time was slow and not particularly capable but (1) it was an IBM and that really gave it a legitimacy no other name could and (2) it was delivered with lots of “open architecture” slots which meant third-party manufacturers could (license and royalty-free) produce all sorts of plug-in cards which extended the functionally.  Soon, there were cards offering sound, support for color monitors (IBM liked people to watch acid-green text displays because they thought the PC-1 would be used mostly as a way to hook into their big mainframes), higher definition graphics, additional ports and before long, connections to the various adapters which could be used to connect to networks.  Things advanced rapidly however and before long there were various ways of connecting to stuff and such were the realities of production-line economics that for manufacturers it often made sense to combine different things on the one card.  While for example a manufacturer could offer three different NICs (network interface cards) to support three different connections, what proved most popular was the combo card which included the three most common types.  The approach also suited customers who might want an additional serial & parallel port but found a combo card with both a better deal than buying two cards.  The approach is still followed today by the GPU (graphical processing unit) manufacturers which have at various times offered combo card with ports for VGA (technically “Video Graphics Array” but really long a reference to the pin-layout), HDMI (High Definition Multimedia Interface), DVI (Digital Video Interface, of which there were many) & DP (DisplayPort).

Just about any combination of stuff can be a combo including mix & match makeup.  Lindsay Lohan also was part of Pepsi’s promotional campaign for a “dirty soda”, a concoction of Pepsi Cola & milk (Pilk), served with cookies; on the internet, opinion was divided.  One of the most prolific users of combo seems to be the fast food industry, a combo meal (there are often variations) two or more components (typically a burger, a soda and fries) bundled at a price lower than purchasing the items separately.  For the industry, the combos are a high profit item because they stimulate demand, increasing volume with only a marginal increase in labour costs.

Before the release of the Barbie movie in July 2023, it had probably never occurred to the industry there would one day be demand for a burger with hot-pink sauce but it’s now at Burger King, available as part of a combo meal.  First to make the Barbie-themed meal available was Burger King Brazil, the combo including a cheeseburger topped with bacon bits and dressed with a hot pink sauce, said to have a “smoky” flavor.  Also included is a pink vanilla milkshake with strawberry Nesquik powder mixed in and when the straw is put in, it’s topped with a pink frosted donut.  Barbie being the star, the side order of “Ken’s potatoes” is just a plain order of fries, a sly nod to the “he’s just Ken” message.