My Vintage Computer Collection

Tandy Radio Shack came out with several models and variations of their Color Computer series. Nicknamed the “CoCo” by fans and “Trash 80” by haters, this machine has earned it’s place in history as one of the most influential systems of it’s time.

You could get this model with 16K or 64K as there was no 32K offering back in 1983 when it was released to market. Fortunately, mine has the full 64K RAM.

According to Wikipedia: “Creative Computing wrote in December 1984 that the Color Computer was the best educational computer under $1000. The magazine said that it had fewer but better-quality educational software than the Commodore 64, and that Radio Shack was dedicated to the educational market while Commodore was not.”

The first run of this computer had flatter, more-squat keys (nicknamed “melted keys”) instead of the full keyboard that you see here. I happen to have the final run model CoCo 2 (called “26-3127B” for the 64K version) that has the enhanced MC6847T1 VDG, which allowed for lowercase letters and user-defined border colors. Yes, not having lowercase letters was a thing!

My very first computer was a TRS-80 MC-10. I will cover this in another post, but I wanted to make the connection with this bigger brother here. The MC-10 is essentially a mini version of this.

When it was released in 1983, the Atari 800XL was one of the sexiest machines out there. Not only was it less expensive than it’s predecessors, but was also more powerful with 64K RAM and built in BASIC language to get you started right away.

My buddy since childhood was one of the lucky few kids on our block to own one. I spent a lot of time over at his house, especially after he got one of these! (Convenient for me, since he lived across the street from me!) We couldn’t believe it’s graphics and sound capabilities and we’d spend hours typing in example programs from computing magazines from that time.

Over the years, this sought-after collectors item has suffered many common keyboard failures from oxidized mylar connections. Also, some later versions of the 800XL had cheaper power supplies that would fry your machine if they went bad! Fortunately, there are means to fix these back to 100% health, but it just adds to the cost of collecting these properly.

So now, I actually power this thing with a modern USB hub! It’s much more reliable and will preserve this awesome machine for many decades to come.

The Atari 800 is the computer I first learned how to program computers on! My 7th grade math teacher taught a few of us curious nerds how to program in BASIC language, which was the dominant language for home computer users of the time. That sort of set the tone for the rest of my life, I’d say!

This 800 has the full 48K of RAM installed, which was the maximum amount Atari offered at the time. Although this model was released in 1979, it still works more reliably than the 800XL that replaced it years later!

I was lucky enough to pick this up locally from someone who’s dad was the original owner and obviously took great care of it.

In 1982, the Timex Sinclair 1000 was released to consumers as a low-budget, entry-level computer. In fact, it was the first computer to sell for $100 and was the result of a partnership between Timex and Sinclair Research, Ltd. This machine was actually a modified Sinclair ZX81 with double the memory, stronger RF shielding and a replaced PAL RF modulator with an NTSC version for North American television signals.

I didn’t own one of these when they came out. I only recently started collecting these, but back then I had regular access to them through family and friends. It was pretty amazing to create stuff on these even as slow and clunky as they felt compared to the other high powered machines of the time.

The TS1000 was very limited by design, to keep costs as low as possible. Although it came with BASIC installed in ROM, it had a paltry membrane keyboard that wasn’t easy to type on. It only displayed black and white, had no sound and came with 2K of RAM. A 16K expansion pack plugs into the back and helped provide more memory for running more complex programs.

As limited as the TS1000 was, it still left a big mark in computer history and is still collected and used by hobbiests to this day.