bsouther@uok.UUCP (11/03/83)
#N:uok:10700003:000:5247 uok!bsouther Nov 1 00:56:00 1983 For those of you who are interested, here's a summary of an article found in the November '83 "Computers & Electronics"..... First Look at Timex/Sinclair's New Color Computer The Timex/Sinclair 2068 (formerly called the T/S 2000) has been released to the general market, and for those who have had experience with the T/S 1000's shortcomings -- membrane keyboard, memory wobble, slow and unreliable cassette loading, limited BASIC, no color, no sound, etc. -- great things are to be experienced with the under-$200 basic computer setup. When Sinclair came out with the Spectrum in mid-1982, it was assumed that Timex would soon bring it to North America. In January of this year, Timex did show a very close copy of the Spectrum to dealers and the press, but delivery was delayed and rumors abounded. Finally, in June, Timex unveiled the Timex 2068, a 48K RAM/24K ROM color computer with a suggested retail price of $199.95 (there are already plans to offer it - mail order - for $148.32). A 16K version of the computer was introduced in June, but it appears that only the 48K version will be available. The Timex 2068 comes in a grey plastic case whose upper surface is painted with a dull aluminum finish. The full-sized keyboard uses light greyy keys with black lettering on the keys and above and below. It's a relatively large computer (comparatively), measuring about 15" by 7.5" by 2", and weighs about 4 pounds. The keyboard has the same type of keys as the Brother EP-20 Personal Electronic Typewriter, with QWERTY layout and full- travel keys. The F and J keys (home keys to touch-typists) have raised finger-bumps for easy locating, and several of the top-row keys have colored legends above them (corresponding to the colors they control -- how convenient!). There are 42 keys, including a SPACE bar and a CAPS SHIFT on each end of the keyboard. As per previous computers, all keys have multiple functions. There are single-key accesses to 16 graphics blocks and 21 hi-res, user defined (64 pixel) graphics characters. They have added a copyright symbol, @, an English "pound" sign, and (hold on to your hat) an exclamation point! There are two industry-standard (Atari-type) joystick ports, one on either side of the computer, and there's a 64-finger gold plated edge card on the back--the main computer bus. There are also five jacks, marked MONITOR (yep!), EAR, MIC, POWER, and TV. The TV channel is selectable 2 or 3. The T/S 2068 uses a Z80A, but by using a neat little thing developed by Timex up to 256 "banks" of 64K memory can be accessed in 8K chunks, giving a full-system banked access of over 16Mbytes! The ROM is 24K (16K + 8K banked), and contains a powerful BASIC interpreter and operating system. There is an opening on the T/S 2068 for cartridges similar to Atari software cartridges. The display is software-selectable in many aspects. There are eight colors available for PAPER, INK, and BORDER. Each color has two BRIGHTness levels, and FLASHing is available for each character. INVERSE VIDEO is also available. There are also four display modes, as compared to the one mode of the Spectrum. Mode 1 (normal) is 22 lines of 32 characters, plus two for entry, editing, etc. Also available in this mode are 16 pre- defined graphics characters. Mode 2 is 64-column mode, with 22 lines of 64 characters each. There will be some trouble in using this mode, though, as the computer uses two 32-character pages with characters appearing on alternating spaces. Mode 3 is another "normal" mode, like Mode 1. It can be used for fast graphics by switching between Modes 1 and 3. Mode 4 is called "Ultra-High Color Resolution" mode. It has the same resolution as Mode 1 (32 character lines, 256 pixels per line), but there's an important difference -- each row of pixels in a character space (a space is 8 rows of 8 pixels each) can be assigned the various color parameters. The frontiers in programming that this opens are immense, but of course require great programming skills. The BASIC adds 50 commands/statements/functions that are not available on the Timex 1000/1500, such as FREE, STICK, SOUND, ON ERR, and RESET. Other currently unused features include FORMAT, OPEN, CLOSE, and ERASE (for the currently unavailable disk drive). Three great additions to the Timex BASIC are DATA, READ, and RESTORE -- three commands which have been sorely needed. The T/S 2068 has a complex three-voice sound generator and a channel for the BEEP command (which can produce 130 semitones). The cassette operates at 1500 baud, and reportedly is very reliable over a broad range of volume settings. The printer's COPY command faithfullyy replicates the INK part of the screen while ignoring the PAPER color dots. The power supply is rated 17.5V @ 1 amp, which would give a rather high 17.5 watt consumption. However, in use the T/S 2068 draws only 215 ma at around 21 volts, so it actually used less than 5 watts. Thus ends the C&E report on the Timex/Sinclair 2068 Color Computer. Personally, I think it sounds like a nice thing to look in to, and at $150-$200, it's not a bad deal at all! Brad Southers University of Oklahoma uok!bsouther
bsouther@uok.UUCP (11/03/83)
#R:uok:10700003:uok:10700004:000:110 uok!bsouther Nov 1 00:58:00 1983 Oh, by the way, the author of the article in C&E was Fred Belchman (credit where credit's due......) Brad