MHaensel

A fun/simple version of Lunar Lander by John Beringer, from 80 Micro June 1981. M1L2 Lunar Lander.txt

Tandy Deskmate has an interesting history. I like the text-based version that came with the Tandy 1000. Deskmate 3 was apparently much more popular, with a graphical interface, upgraded applications, and the ability to host other programs. Do/did people really use Deskmate? Or was it mostly a bullet point to drive sales?

From what I hear, Tandy Radio Shack (TRS) had bargaining room when people started to actually spend money. My neighbor arranged some kind of bundle deal around 1984, for a TRS-80 Model IV, a shelf full of brown-binder software, Orchestra-90, a Realistic stereo amplifier with speakers, and a bunch of miscellaneous stuff. He literally went from "no computer" to "complete super-deluxe setup" overnight! I have a hunch he walked into a store, said he was willing to spend about $2500, and started bargaining from there. For people who had experience back in the day, did you ever bargain for a good deal on computers/peripherals at Radio Shack? Did they give discounts for bundles?

@GeorgePhillips thanks for the real-life test. It's not a big problem, I mostly paste code in from a Windows text editor.

I think the question is, do you see the same thing on your Model I? Do you have to tap keys for "RUN" much slower than "RU" when repeated? Also, congrats on having a real Model I!

Interesting! I'm running the emulator on Windows. Here's a way to recreate what I'm doing: Open trs80gp as a Level I model I. Open the soft keyboard. Drag the soft keyboard to one side, use it to monitor which keys are being pressed on the host keyboard. Click to put the focus on trs80gp. Tap "R" repeatedly as fast as you can. Hit enter to go to the next line. Tap "RU" repeatedly. Start slow and speed up until the Model I starts dropping characters. Hit enter to go to the next line. Tap "RUN" about the same speed. The Model I has serious trouble. Slow down tapping "RUN" until the Model I keeps up. The rollover thing was a smart idea, but I don't think that's causing the problem. I don't see much difference if I'm very careful to press keys separately, or if I drag my fingers to intentionally induce rollover. Of course, there's several layers of software between my laptop keyboard and the emulated Model I . . .

On an emulated Model I in trs80gp, keyboard response is slow. Level I basic goes maybe 2 keys per second before letters get dropped. Level II basic is a little better. Level II DOS is fine up to about 40 wpm, but if I go faster it still drops characters. Is the emulator being faithful to the original? Is a real model I like this?

That Pac Man game is better than it looks. Among other things, it would encourage kids to think ahead about actions and consequences. (If I tilt the board this way, the ghosts and Pac Man will both move this way . . .) And the reconfigurable board would give it a couple extra days of playtime. It's also a reminder of how HUGE Pac Man was in the 1980s. Literally anything Pac Man would sell. I was a kid and collected Pac Man stickers because Pac Man. Erasers, music, clothes, books, toys, games . . . if it had Pac Man on it, kids bought it, or parents bought it for their kids.

It looks like a cool prop from a sci-fi movie.

@discgolfer72: Congratulations on one heck of a find/giveaway. The Epson FX is pretty much the standard dot-matrix printer for the time. Lots of other printers emulated it. The TRS-80 Daisy Wheel II is moderately rare and quite expensive to ship.

I left a few important rows out of that table . . . ============================ Time to format a floppy disk ============================ Size OS Version Time ============================ 500KB TRSDOS 2.0a 2:50 500KB TRSDOS 2.0b 2:50 500KB TRSDOS II 4.4 4:38 500KB TRSDOS II-16 6:00 1.25MB TRSDOS II 4.4 7:25 1.25MB TRSDOS II-16 10:35 ============================

Unfortunately, I found one big anti-feature! "DOS woes erode Tandy's lead" (80 Micro, September 1982) talks about the problems TRS had moving to the 12/16/6000. I'm a little bummed because I like to imagine the 12/16/6000 as underdog super-machines for 1983. However . . . Those nifty 1.25MB floppy drives? TRSDOS 2.0b doesn't see them. As far as it's concerned, you've got the same 500KB disks you could buy in 1979. TRSDOS II 4.x supports 1.25MB disks - very, very slowly. The article says it's 3.5x slower than TRSDOS 2.0 for floppies. Directory listings suggest that's about right. So does formatting a disk. ============================ Time to format a floppy disk ============================ Size OS Version Time ============================ 500KB TRSDOS 2.0a 2:50 500KB TRSDOS 2.0b 2:50 1.25MB TRSDOS II 4.4 7:25 1.25MB TRSDOS II-16 10:35 ============================ Tests were run on an emulated Model 12 in GPT. Results are probably different than you'd get on real hardware, but the *relative* performance matches what people described at the time.

As part of my ongoing experimentation with an emulated TRS-80 model II, I've found some nice features. The floppy disk expansion system was very well-integrated. You got 2 megabytes of data storage several years before that was easy. And there was a whole series of business-oriented programs written specifically to use all those drives. The following work with no effort, no matter which disk the file is on: * Run a program from TRSDOS * LOAD "PROGNAME/BAS" from BASIC * The business graphics analysis pack has setup programs to configure it for different printers. Those programs find the TRSCHART program on any disk. The included hex debugger is a blast! It's nice to be able to access any area of memory and easily change it. You can also dump areas of memory to a file and load them back. After being limited to PEEKs and POKEs on my Commodore, this level of access is wonderful. Y2K compliance before it was a thing! The following all support a 4-digit year: * TRSDOS 2.0 * TRSDOS II * SCRIPSIT 2.1 I'm sure there are others I'm missing. According to the Radio Shack computer catalogs, several of the business programs could share related data: * Profile + SCRIPSIT = form letters * Order entry + accounts receivable = automated billing * Order enter/Inventory control + sales analysis = sales figures based on actual order/stock levels Overall, this is a really nice system. $1250 in software would set you up for general use: Visicalc SCRIPSIT Business Graphics Analysis Pack Profile In terms of business software, you'd spend much of your time looking over at IBM compatibles and saying, "I already DO that!"

Another Model II, roughly $565 shipped.

The tension breaker displays random characters in random patterns on-screen. Watch a screen saver on your Level II Model I! M1L2 Tension Breaker.txt