EdgeStar SW5L 70D User Manual download pdf (Page 7)

page 6 Tandy's Little Wonder

CoCo History

From Birth to the Present...

HOW THE COCO WAS BORN:

The initial Tandy/Motorola connection occurred sometime

in the mid-70s when the two were invited by the U.S.

National Weather Service to assist in developing a "weather

radio" system. In 1977, a year after starting talks with

Motorola about the possibility of designing a low-cost

home computer that could be hooked up to a regular TV set,

Tandy was invited to participate in an agricultural experi-

ment. Project "Green Thumb", as it was called, would employ

information retrieval to give farmers data, updated hourly by

computer. Terminals used in this project were developed by

and sold by Radio Shack in conjunction with Motorola.

Terminals were distributed to 200 farms in Shelby and Todd

counties, Kentucky. The "Green Thumb" network was spon-

sored by the National Weather Service, U.S. Department of

Agriculture, and the University of Kentucky.

By late 1977, Motorolas' MC6847 Video Display Genera-

tor chip was developed. Although it was unclear if the VDG

came about because of project "Green Thumb" or Tandys'

search for the "low-cost" home computer, in 1978, when it

was married to the MC6808 CPU, the Color Computer was

born. This "prehistoric" Color Computer, however, con-

tained to many chips to make it affordable for Tandy’s

anticipated target market. Motorola solved this problem late

in the year by replacing the network of chips which made up

the memory management circuits with its newly developed

MC6883 Synchronous Address Multiplexer (SAM) chip.

In December of 1979, about a year after production began on

the MC6809 microprocessor, reports circulated that it

would be Microsoft, and not Motorola, that would write the

Basic interpreter for the new "TRS-90". The name TRS-90

was eventually dropped in favor of a much more "colorful"

name.

THE FIRST YEAR (Jul ’80 - Jun ’81 )

On July 31st, 1980, two months after unveiling their TRS-

80 Videotex terminal, Tandy publicly displayed its three new

computers for 1981: the TRS-80 Model III, the TRS-80

Pocket Computer and the TRS-80 Color Computer. In

September, the Color Computer started appearing in

Radio Shack stores. It sold for $399.00 and came with 4K

RAM, 8K Microsoft Color Basic 1.0, a 53 key calculator

type keyboard, built-in video modulator to allow connecting

to any television, RS-232 interface, a 1500 baud cassette

interface, joystick connectors, and a slot where Program

Paks could be inserted. In BYTE magazine’s October issue,

an article speculated that of the 3 new Radio Shack machines

the TRS-80 Color Computer would probably create the most

interest in consumer markets. Steve Odneal and Wayne

Day, in the market for machines at this time, purchased

Color Computers and yes, Virginia, some jumpered C-

boards were sold. Tandy, meanwhile, was rumored to have a

quality control hold on the Color Computer following sev-

eral reported failures after only a few hours of operation.

'68 Micro Journal published the first data sheets for the

new MC6883 (SAM) chip in November, but there were few

Color Computer owners out there to read it. Radio Shack, at

the same time, released the first Color Computer software.

This ROM-Pak cartridge software included Chess, Check-

ers, Quasar Commander, Personal Finance, and a Diagnostic

Pack. By the time December rolled around, there was a 16K

upgrade available from Radio Shack, Which would be re-

quired for the delayed Extended Color Basic ROM, which

was only a month away from introduction.

If the Color Computer you got as a Christmas gift was your

first ever computer, you were probably unaware that the

"Getting Started with COLOR BASIC" manual accompany-

ing the early machines contained only 13 of the scheduled

24 chapters. Radio Shack explained, in the December issue

of its TRS-80 Microcomputer News, that when the ma-

chines were ready to ship, the manuals weren’t! Rather than

keep the Color Computer from customers, they sent what

was available. It was probably more a case of not wanting to

lose out on Christmas sales that prompted the decision to

ship with incomplete documentation. With the only avail-

able information being found between the covers of the

unfinished "Getting Started with COLOR BASIC" manual,

the first year was like being in the Dark Ages for the small but

hardy band of early Color Computer owners.

The place to look for information was either from your local

Radio Shack store (probably the person who sold you the

computer) or from Tandy’s customer service. Salespeople,

unless they were also "computer people", could offer little

if any information. If you were lucky enough to find a

salesperson with computer know-how, chances are it was

Model I/Z-80 know-how. No help there. Customer service

in Fort Worth, on the other hand, had plenty of information,

and was only a toll-free call away. Unfortunately, Raymond,

Martin, and Kathy wouldn’t tell you much more than what

was in your manual. Another dead end.

One of the first books detailing the internal workings of the

6809 was published in late 1980. Authored by Dr. Carl

Warren, "The MC6809 Cookbook", contained all the

information required for assembly language programming.

Unfortunately it preceded the first Color Computer editor/

assemblers by about 8 months and this book was pretty much

overlooked.

Computer magazines, at this time, were filled with articles

and reviews about every computer except the Color Com-

puter. When anything did appear, it was usually comparing

the Color Computer (unfavorably) to the Atari 800. Review-

ers pointed to the "chicklet" keyboard, limited screen dis-

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