[net.rumor] Coleco ADAM

geoffs@brl-tgr.ARPA (Geoffrey Sauerborn ) (02/05/85)

In article <282@teklds.UUCP> davidh8@teklds.UUCP (David Haight) writes:
>
>	I am the (un)fortunate owner of a Coleco ADAM.

 ( Me too)

>	....  Does anyone
>	know a source for schematics and/or documentation
>	on the internal micro-code?
>
 As far as I've heard and read, Coleco was (is?) very hush-hush as to
giving out memory maps, disassembled code,...etc.

	{As I recall, under a very strict licensing agreement
	they supposedly would loan the info to third party 
	developers; with the stipulation that *any* software
	developed which Coleco thought was not of market 
	quality (or some such vague term), could be confiscated
	by Coleco. And at any time they could revoke the license.}

I think there were (are?) at least two reasons for this:

	1. To hogg as much of the software market as they could.

	2. To protect their video game's internals too - since it must be
	   a subset of the whole Adam.

They didn't learn from Texas Instr.
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.ps .000001
(my opinions only)