18 Feb
2003
18 Feb
'03
7:06 a.m.
We had several Victor 9000's. They ran CP/M and a
proprietary MS-DOS. They
had built-in codec. They actually predated the IBM PC back in 1980. They
Strange machines, particularly the disk controller, which uses GCR
encoding, and not suprisingly, is similar to the one in a Commodore 8050.
They also have a number of interesting undocumented features. The
'Centronics' port actually uses GPIB driver chips, and could be turned
into a full GPIB port with the right cable and software. There's also a
user port inside on a 50 pin header, with an almost completely unused
6522 VIA to drive it. And of course the sound input connector inside.
were the best available computers at the time, when
the TRS-80 was
Dubious claim. In 1980, there were graphics workstations (PERQ 1a,
certainly), VAXen, supercomputers, etc...
-tony