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From: ward@tsnews.Convergent.COM (Ward Griffiths)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.tandy
Subject: Re: tandy 2000-help
Message-ID: <925@tsnews.Convergent.COM>
Date: 4 Dec 90 23:10:39 GMT
References: <90337.221530DPE101@psuvm.psu.edu> <90337.231316RFM@psuvm.psu.edu>
Organization: Convergent Technologies, San Jose, CA
Lines: 52

RFM@psuvm.psu.edu writes:

>Tandy 2000 was produced (misproduced) by Tandy about 5-6 years ago. A real
>Orphan. It has an 80186 microprocessor, not sure about speed. An ALMOST-MSDOS
>machine. No MSDOS software will run on it out of box; Tandy got a few
>companies to wrtie 2000-versions of their software; Lotus was one, I
>forget others. It did great graphics. A dead-end machine.
>I always thought that the Tandy 1200 was the best machine they ever built--
>a real truck. It was manufactired by Tandon. Tandy dropped it 'cuz
>it wasn't precularly Tandy -- you could drop any card in it. Tandq
>then opted for its 1000-series machines, which, if you bought one, pretty
>closelty tied you to Tandy for upgrades, etc. They wouldn't take
>full-size cards. Whay am I thinking about buying a Tandy?
>Bob M.

Actually, the 2000 was a damn fine machine well ahead of its
time: a true 16-bit DOS machine that was introduced about a
year and a half before IBM's PC/AT.  The 80186 as 8 Mhz is
faster than the original 6 Mhz '286, the graphics was far
superior to anything available on "true" compatibles untill
much later, and the keyboard had separate numeric/cursor
keys, something IBM didn't think of for quite a while after
that.  The problem was that because of the different memory
map of the '186, and the superior graphics, many programs
which diddled with hardware directly to improve the pathetic
performance of "true" compatibles rather than make documented
system calls, especially just about anything with copy
protection, would not run correctly.  A lot of other programs
worked fine right out of the shrink-wrap.  The Tandy 2000
wasn't the only system that suffered from this, the TI
Professional comes immediately to mind.  But my T2K is running
Wordstar 5 without a whimper.  A lot of commercial software
can also be made to run with fairly simple patches, many of
which are maintained by an active bunch of users on
CompuServe.

Then again, I have a tendency to accumulate orphaned
hardware.  Besides my 2000, I've got a TRS-80 Model 16
running Xenix and an AT&T 3B1.

The Tandy 1200, a "true" XT compatible was basically a piece
of crap.  Among other things, they had a 40% motherboard
replacement rate during warranty.  A big-time financial
loser from the points of view of store managers, as warranty
repairs are a black hole in the bottom line on which a Tandy
store manager's bonus is based.

-- 
The people that make Unisys' official opinions get paid more.  A LOT more.      Ward Griffiths, Unisys NCG aka Convergent Technologies
===========================================================================          To Hell with "Only One Earth"!  Try "At Least One Solar System"!

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