New Tandy Chain to Sell AST Advantage! PCs : Retailing: The Irvine company will turn to the Texas electronic giant to market its computers in ‘super stores.’

AST Research Inc. said Wednesday that its Advantage! line of personal computers will be sold in a new chain of computer “super stores” operated by computer manufacturer and retailer Tandy Corp.

The AST products will be sold at all Computer City SuperCenter stores, including the flagship store in Garden Grove.

The warehouse-type stores, which are operated separately from Tandy’s Radio Shack chain, specialize in selling high volumes of name-brand computers.

The stores carry products made by Apple, IBM, Compaq, Tandy, and now AST.

Ten stores are due to open by December and 50 are planned by 1992, said Fran McGehee, a spokeswoman for Computer SuperCenters International Inc., a Tandy subsidiary.

“We are reaching out to new customers in small offices and home offices in our continuing expansion,” AST co-chairman Safi U. Qureshey said.

The Advantage! line was developed by AST to to crack the general consumer market with an easy-to-use PC. The company launched the line in July through the Circuit City consumer electronics store chain.

Tandy purchased the Computer City flagship store and rights to the name from Matsushita Corp. and Inacomp Computer Centers in June.

It plans now to follow through on the former owners’ plan to establish a national chain.

The 20,000-square-foot stores will be much larger than the average Radio Shack store and will be patterned after large electronics stores like Circuit City.

Personal computer manufacturers have been selling their products increasingly through super stores as prices come down and PCs gain more acceptance in the mass market.

AST’s Advantage! line will offer such computers as the desktop and lightweight notebook models.