80-US (January 1979)

80-US (January 1979)



The TRS-80 was one of the first home computers available and therefore had some of the earliest computer publications dedicated to it. 80-US is one of those. The January 1979 issue includes:

• Going First Class - Our experience with a new Selectra-Print
• Text 80 - A text editor without frills, for those who can't remember all the sub-commands
• Bowling Revisited - An authentic Level II version of the Computerized Bowling Alley
• An Audio-Visual Demo - How to connect pictures with sound, using existing equipment
• Notes on BASIC Programming - Keeping track of your Level I variables
• Renew That Program - A sometimes successful way to bring a disk basic program back to life
• Math Drill Ala King - A fun math program, with some Level I tutorial material included
• Erode - For your mid-winter madness, try and break thru the barrier in the time allowed - 4 levels of expertise
• View from the top of the Stack
• Reviews
• Hangups
• Editorial
• Random Access
• Letters

...and more!

Buzzard Bait (Color Computer)

Despite nearly matching the longevity of the Commodore 64, Tandy’s Color Computer line never really had the third party software support that the Commodore 64 and other 8-bit computers of the time had. The fact that Radio Shack did not really court third party development combined with the fact that the hardware was only sold at Radio Shack probably had something to do with that.

Buzzard Bait is one example of the games you would typically find for this system. As you can see, it is a blatant rip-off (er…clone) of the arcade game Joust. It actually isn’t terrible (except for the sound which was a limitation of the CoCo series). There were lots of clones of more popular arcade games on the Coco but the quality varied wildly. Some were decent like Buzzard Bait and some were terrible.

Buzzard Bait was released by a company called Tom Mix Software in 1983. Like much of the software for the CoCo, you could only find it easily via mail order but the company did have a BBS that you could order through so that’s pretty cool. It was available on both disk and cassette and given the fact that it wasn’t marketed through major retail establishments, original copies are probably pretty rare. I didn’t see one on eBay at a glance and that’s usually a pretty good indication. This is one you will probably need emulation to try. However, for a better conversions of Joust, you are better off checking out the official conversions for the Atari 8-bit, Atari 7800 and Atari ST.

Color Computer Magazine (November 1983)

Source: Color Computer Magazine - Vol. 1, No. 9 - November 1983

The Radio Shack TRS-80 Color Computer, also known as the Tandy Color Computer or simply the Coco was a line of home computers produced from 1980 until 1991. It was the only common computer I am aware of that used the Motorola 6809 CPU. This was an 8-bit CPU but had some 16-bit features and was powerful for its time.

There were three interations of the Color Computer with various features and improvements but for the most part they maintained backwards compatiability in terms of software. Some add-on hardware also maintained compatability across iterations.

There weren't very many magazines that covered the CoCo relative to other popular machines at the time but The Color Computer Magazine was one such magazine dedicated to this machine.

The November 1983 issue included the following:

The Radio Shack TRS-80 Color Computer, also known as the Tandy Color Computer or the Coco was a series of mostly compatible home computers produced from 1980 until 1991. It was the only common computer I am aware of that used the Motorola 6809 CPU. This was an 8-bit CPU but had some 16-bit features and was powerful for its time.

The Coco wasn't really as popular as Commodore, Apple or Atari computers but it was supported by Radio Shack for a long time and still had a magazine or two dedicated to it, including Color Computer Magazine.

The November 1983 issue included the following:

Features

• Super Spiro! – A type-in program for generating spirographs, including parameters for several different ones.

• Color Computing for Kids – A programming article for kids. Included is a tutorial on FOR/NEXT loops in BASIC with math examples and an example printing a Thanksgiving message.

• Star – A simple type-in program for drawing a star-like object on the screen.

• Sorcerer’s Puzzles – A type-in game that features several puzzle challenges.

• Slither – A type-in machine language game. This game existed on may computers in many forms. You control a snake as it goes around the screen eating things. As it eats it grows longer. If you run into yourself, you die.

• Unforgettable Characters – Creating custom characters on the Color Computer.

• My MC-10 Speaks ML! – The MC-10 was a sort of cut down version of the Color Computer designed to compete with even cheaper computers like the VIC-20. Other than BASIC programs, it was mostly incompatible with the Color Computer and far more limited. It was not a success. This article covers machine language programming on that machine.

• Custom Color – Despite the name, this is actually an article about music and sound on the Color Computer and computers in general.

• One-finger Hexload – A program that allows you to enter hex numbers without prefixing them with '&H' which was normal procedure on the Color Computer. Useful, for example, for typing in machine language programs.

• Graphics? Yes! Part II – Draw lines and circles - A tutorial for creating graphics in BASIC, including examples. This month the focus is on drawing lines and circles.

Departments

• PEEK (11,83) - An overview of the magazine's contents this month.

• INKEY$ - Letters from readers covering topics such as piracy, machine language for beginners, productivity software and more.

• GOTO School - A column on education and computers. This month, the advantages of monochrome monitors and how computer information services are beginning to supplement encyclopedias as a go to resource.

• DEFUSR - Questions and answers, this month featuring questions about the Tally MT160L printer, power supply problems, using 64K without DOS and more.

• Reviews
  • Micron Eye - A digital imaging system for the 16K Color Computer.
  • Astro Blast - A Space Invaders clone for the Color Computer.
  • Colorkit 1.2 - A toolkit that provides a wide variety of programming tools for the Color Computer.
  • Kaleidophone - A program (and hardware) for creating visual effects based on audio input.
  • The BASIC Book - A book comparing BASIC version for different home computers. Useful if you wanted to convert a BASIC program from one platform to another.
  • Sketch Pad - A drawing pad for drawing on your Color Computer.

• New Products - Some new products covered this month include a new Daisy Wheel Printer, a program for creating pie charts, and Infidel, the latest interactive fiction game from Infocom among a number of other things.

• FOR...NEXT - What's coming next month...

• End Of File - An editorial on computer use in education.

…and more!

K-Power, Issue Number 8, November/December 1984

via pinterest.com

The November / December issue of K-Power