> Having lived through this era, living in the UK, Byte always seemed more commercially orientated than hobbyist, but I would buy and read it all the same.

The hobbyist arena tended to fall more towards magazines like Popular Electronics, and the focus was much more the lower circuit levels. Byte dipped their toes into that arena via a few of the regular columnists, but that was not their target (despite the fact that many of us subscribers were "computer hobbyists" by most any definition of that term).