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Computer memory lane

We've got one of these on show in the school lobby.

570px-Disk_smith_vz200_operating.jpg

A Laser 200. I believe it comes from Hong Kong, and is possibly a Tandy/Radio Shack TRS80 clone. The screen display looks very much like a TRS80 Color Computer, CoCo. It appears to have single BASIC keyword entry, rather like a Sinclair ZX, however the screen display looks nothing like a Sinclair ZX Spectrum. So not quite sure what it is.

EDIT:

Does anyone know what this might actually be? If it is a Hong Kong clone of a well known 8-bit machine, of if it's unique? A search for "Laser 200" comes up with mostly aircraft. The picture from Yahoo Images shows it as "VZ200", but it's definitely the same computer.
 
mikedt said:
We've got one of these on show in the school lobby.

570px-Disk_smith_vz200_operating.jpg

A Laser 200. I believe it comes from Hong Kong, and is possibly a Tandy/Radio Shack TRS80 clone. The screen display looks very much like a TRS80 Color Computer, CoCo. It appears to have single BASIC keyword entry, rather like a Sinclair ZX, however the screen display looks nothing like a Sinclair ZX Spectrum. So not quite sure what it is.

EDIT:

Does anyone know what this might actually be? If it is a Hong Kong clone of a well known 8-bit machine, of if it's unique? A search for "Laser 200" comes up with mostly aircraft. The picture from Yahoo Images shows it as "VZ200", but it's definitely the same computer.
Click to expand...

I've found what a Laser 200 actually is:
VTech Laser 200 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It does come from HK. But it doesn't seem to be a clone of anything that I know. Apparently it's got the same display chip as the Radio Shack TRS80 Color Computer, but it has a Z80 CPU. The CoCo was 6809. And the single keyword entry keyboard looks very similar to the Timex/Sinclair ZX layout. The company that made it is still around, VTech. They make educational electronic toys. I think it might have been popular with schools in China, because it's in our school museum of old things, like black & white TVs, tape recorders, 8mm & 16mm projectors, typewriters, etc. all Chinese.

Apparently it was marketed in the UK as "Texet", but can't remember seeing one though. Texet calculators were always a cheapo Hong Kong knock-off of Texas Instruments(TI) calculators in the 1970s. Texet is still around, they're a Manchester importer of cheapo stuff from China.

Most HK 8-bit computers were just straight clones of things like Apple IIs or TRS80s, such as the EACA Video Genie. A TRS80 model 1 clone, which I do remember in the UK.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_Genie

The Dragon 32/64, made in the UK, was pretty much a clone of the Radio Shack TRS80 Color Computer. Because it was largely based on a Motorola reference design.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_32
This why I find the Laser 200 from Hong Kong to be somewhat unusual, because it's not an obvious clone AFAICT, it's an original design.
 
I got a Aquarius Home Computer just like the 'Laser 200.' Only with blue keys. Runs MS-BASIC V2 as well. It seems a bit like a clone of a TI-99 since it had a ton of external wired add-ons in a similar vain but not nearly as popular. Fun to hack together in a older programming language though when I got nothing else to do...
 
I'm a little young for the Cap'n Crunch years, but I did buy a legal blue box from Radio Shack of all places. I used it to bypass the PBX systems at the hotels that I was staying at to get free access to my long distance carrier. :laugh:
 
Speed Daemon said:
I used to own the original Apple 2 clone, the Franklin Ace 1000. Twas a pretty nice machine for its time.

ace1000.jpg
Click to expand...

Did that come from Hong Kong? Because in the early 80s there was many Apple II and TRS80 clones that came from the former British colony. I'm sure these two computers where often cloned, because they were made entirely of standard off the shelf components, like the IBM PC. HK clone makers would not have worried about duplicating copyrighted ROMs either. I can't ever remember seeing or hearing about a Commodore 64 clone, because that used quite a few custom chips, like the SID sound chip.

Another 8-bit computer that was heavily cloned was the British Sinclair ZX Spectrum, especially behind the Iron Curtain. This could easily be cloned using standard of the shelf components, including a Soviet or East German made Z80 CPU. The Speccy also had a relatively simple and low cost design. Basically the Z80 CPU, a 16k ROM, RAM, and some standard TTL logic.

The ZX Spectrum is probably the most popular computer to emulate as well, because of it's relatively simple design. And the ROM copyright holders, Amstrad, have given written permission to use their copyrighted ROMs in emulators. If you download a ZX Spectrum emulator, it will work straight away. You don't have to go hunting around warez sites looking for copyright infringing ROM images, to make it work. Many emulators, like Apple, Radio Shack or Commodore, don't include ROM images for copyright reasons.
 
nickdalzell said:
I got a Aquarius Home Computer just like the 'Laser 200.' Only with blue keys. Runs MS-BASIC V2 as well. It seems a bit like a clone of a TI-99 since it had a ton of external wired add-ons in a similar vain but not nearly as popular. Fun to hack together in a older programming language though when I got nothing else to do...
Click to expand...

Now I wonder if the Laser 200 had licensed the BASIC from MS? As it came from Hong Kong, probably not. :rolleyes: The Mattel Aquarius also came from Hong Kong, it was designed and made by Radofin. They both are quite similar.

I know the Mattel Aquarius OK LOL!! A rather pathetic little thing, that's what I thought at the time. Suppose that's what happens when a toy company tries to do a computer. It was a complete failure when they tried to market it in the UK. 1983 they were trying to sell a home computer with only 4k of RAM! When most of the competing home 8-bit machines were 32k, 48k or 64k RAM. It has a Z80 processor, so it's definitely not a TI99/4 clone. Don't think there was any 99/4 clones, because I'm sure that would have had some custom TI only silicon.
 
mikedt said:
Did that come from Hong Kong? Because in the early 80s there was many Apple II and TRS80 clones that came from the former British colony.
Click to expand...
LOL...No...Believe it or not, there was a time when most US computers and components were actually made in the US, and very few other countries had the technology to produce key components like VLSI chips. Back then, "import" computers were virtually unheard of. It seems surreal in a time when it's a rare thing to find products that aren't made in Communist China; but that really was how things were before Reaganomics killed off a lot of American manufacturing.

BTW, I have it on good authority that Hong Kong was still a pre-former British territory until the lease expired in 1997. :)
 
The 80s were better times. Tons of brands made in the USA like Fisher and Curtis-Mathes...

I could have sworn the TI-99-4/A Home Computer was a Z80 CPU in there though. It also ran BASIC out of box but it was TI-BASIC which was a bit more proprietary
 
nickdalzell said:
The 80s were better times. Tons of brands made in the USA like Fisher and Curtis-Mathes...

I could have sworn the TI-99-4/A Home Computer was a Z80 CPU in there though. It also ran BASIC out of box but it was TI-BASIC which was a bit more proprietary
Click to expand...

It actually had a 16-bit CPU, the TMS9900 by Texas Instruments. But the rest of the computer was all 8-bit. I don't believe there was any benefit in using a 16-bit CPU over an 8-bit one in the 99/4, due to the design.

I know it wasn't MS BASIC, It was mostly the string handling that was different and incompatible to MS. e.g. no LEFT$, MID$ or RIGHT$. Don't think it had PEEK or POKE either, for directly accessing memory.

I'm sure the computer with the strangest and most incompatible BASIC had to be the Acorn Atom. This had a very strange way of handing many things in BASIC. Absolutely nothing like MS BASIC at all. But it did have something very unique, you could put 6502 assembly language within a BASIC program.
Acorn Atom - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I had one of these before I got a Commodore 64. Don't think there was anything particularly quirky about a C64. That was MS BASIC, along with plenty of software and accessories.
 
Speed Daemon said:
LOL...No...Believe it or not, there was a time when most US computers and components were actually made in the US, and very few other countries had the technology to produce key components like VLSI chips. Back then, "import" computers were virtually unheard of. It seems surreal in a time when it's a rare thing to find products that aren't made in Communist China; but that really was how things were before Reaganomics killed off a lot of American manufacturing.

BTW, I have it on good authority that Hong Kong was still a pre-former British territory until the lease expired in 1997. :)
Click to expand...

Of course :) HK was a British Crown Colony for 100 years. "Made in Hong Kong" was a byword for cheap 'n' nasty for a long time, especially transistor radios. And then in 1979 Deng Xiaoping said "Let there be Shenzhen!" and manufacturing of the cheap 'n' nasty moved north. These days very little made in HK, too expensive now. HK is still good if you want a suit or some shirts made though, that's not changed.
 
mikedt said:
Of course :) HK was a British Crown Colony for 100 years. "Made in Hong Kong" was a byword for cheap 'n' nasty for a long time, especially transistor radios. And then in 1979 Deng Xiaoping said "Let there be Shenzhen!" and manufacturing of the cheap 'n' nasty moved north. These days very little made in HK, too expensive now. HK is still good if you want a suit or some shirts made though, that's not changed.
Click to expand...
Funny that you should mention that. The other day my mom (who has been to HK several times) was showing off her custom tailored coat made in HK under British rule.

Personally I always thought of HK as a giant trading floor, where you could buy just about anything at cut-rate prices...at the risk of getting a fake. ;)
 
Speed Daemon said:
Funny that you should mention that. The other day my mom (who has been to HK several times) was showing off her custom tailored coat made in HK under British rule.
Click to expand...

I go to HK at least once a year, and usually have a few shirts made up while I'm there. I had a jacket made last year, that has on the tag, "Sams's Tailor, Her Majesty's Forces Services" LOL! They haven't been there since handover.

Speed Daemon said:
Personally I always thought of HK as a giant trading floor, where you could buy just about anything at cut-rate prices...at the risk of getting a fake. ;)
Click to expand...

It still is. Especially the street markets of Mong Kok and Sham Shui Po, Kowloon Side. Mind you in Tsim Sha Tsui at south end of Kowloon, and Central on Hong Kong Island, but it all comes from the Mainland. That's mostly designer luxury, Rolex, LV, etc. very real and extremely expensive. HK is a major centre for finance these days.

The agreement between the PRC and the UK, after handover was to keep HK as it is for 50 years. So many things are still very British in HK. Like driving on the left. The internet is not censored in HK. It's full title is Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, or just HKSAR for short. It can be rather difficult for Mainland Chinese to go to HK. For me as a British passport holder, it's very easy, don't even need a visa. And can stay for up to 6 months without a visa.

The former Portuguese colony of Macao is a bit of an interesting place, which was handed back to the PRC in 1999. There a lot of things there that are very Portuguese. Yet for most day to day business it pretty much follows Hong Kong, like driving on the left and British style power outlets. Macao is the only place that allows casino gambling in China. It's like the Las Vegas of SE Asia.
 
Speed Daemon said:
Is that the type that people used to carry around in what looked like a regular-sized cake cover with a T-handle recessed into the top?
Click to expand...
Sounds like it. We had to unload one and load another one into the drive so they could read/write data. Once you put it in the drive, you would twist it to remove the cover.

Yucky...
 
nickdalzell said:
The 80s were better times. Tons of brands made in the USA like Fisher and Curtis-Mathes...
Click to expand...

Ah, Curtis-Mathis, the good ole days. One of the best business models around, they took the top components from the various manufacturers and put them in their sets so you had Sony, Panasonic, RCA, and so on in one, sort of a Frankenset but it worked beautifully.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled thread...
 
We've had these threads before but it just hit me, I don't recall anyone ever mentioning 9 track tapes.

220px-9-track-drive-open.jpg


The removable plastic ring was for write protection.

9-Track-Media.jpg


We called them ninja rings of death and used to Frisbee them at anyone walking into the data center.

tape%20drives.jpg


Little known fact - those famous tape racks that you saw in all the movies were mostly filled with empty space.
 
Anyone working in a mainframe shop up till around the 1990s probably had to use those reel tapes. We had to clean them every so often and clip the ends so it would thread through better!
 
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