 June 1983 issue | |
| Publisher/Editor | Wayne Green |
|---|---|
| Categories | Computer magazine |
| Frequency | Monthly |
| Publisher | 1001001 Inc. (as 80 Microcomputing or 80 Micro), CW Communications (as 80 Micro) |
| First issue | January 1980 |
| Final issue Number | June 1988 101 |
| Country | United States |
| Based in | Peterborough, New Hampshire |
| Language | English |
| ISSN | 0744-7868 |
80 Micro was a computer magazine, published between 1980 and 1988, that featured program listings, products and reviews for the TRS-80.
Wayne Green, the creator of many magazines such as 73 , founded 80 Microcomputing as a spinoff of his Kilobaud Microcomputing solely for Tandy Corporation's Radio Shack TRS-80 Model I microcomputer. Like his other magazines it encouraged readers to submit articles and reviews. [1] A 1980 advertisement for the magazine promised that it would "tell you the truth … the good things about the TRS-80 and the not so good" because "Wayne Green has never been one to mince words". [2] By 1982 80 Micro was the third largest magazine in terms of obtaining advertising, selling 152,000 issues; [3] only Vogue and BYTE were larger. Renamed 80 Micro on issue 30 in June/July 1982, the magazine's November 1982 issue had 518 pages, the most in its history for a regular issue. [1]
Green attributed the magazine's success to Radio Shack's policy of not allowing other companies to distribute their products through their stores, while other stores would not carry the products as Radio Shack customers did not visit them. 80 Micro became the most accessible venue for small companies to advertise their TRS-80 products. [4] [5] Despite a Tandy executive writing a column for the magazine, [6] Tandy also prohibited the Radio Shack stores it owned from selling or displaying 80 Micro so as to not lose sales to the magazine's advertisers, [7] [5] and Green—who claimed that most stores kept a copy hidden from "company spies"—asked readers to persuade franchise and other non Tandy-owned stores to sell the magazine. [8]
80 Micro's success encouraged other publishers to start platform-specific computer magazines; [4] Harry McCracken described PC World as "essential an 80 Micro clone that happened to be about Windows, not TRS-80's". In May 1983 CW Communications purchased 80 Micro and most of Green's other magazines. As Tandy introduced other computers 80 Micro also covered them, but in 1983 it discontinued coverage of the Model II/12/16 and moved coverage of the Color Computer to the separate Hot CoCo. In January 1988 80 Micro began only covering Tandy's MS-DOS computers such as the 1000. The change failed, and the magazine published its last issue in June 1988. [1]
Programming contests for young children were featured annually, and were noted by both the Scholastic Corporation [9] and the Boy Scouts of America. [10] The magazine challenged readers to write complete games, sometimes including scoring, on just one line of BASIC code. Creativity was remarkable and included techniques to allow for a slightly longer line of code than originally envisioned. The magazine featured program listings for the machine, primarily written in BASIC and occasionally Z80 assembly language. These programs were printed in the magazine, but could be purchased on cassette tape and diskette media under the name Load 80 to save some typing. The magazine also featured articles, letters, reviews and humor (including - from January 1980 through July 1983 - the monthly Kitchen Table International satire/parody column).
The TRS-80 Micro Computer System is a desktop microcomputer launched in 1977 and sold by Tandy Corporation through their Radio Shack stores. The name is an abbreviation of Tandy Radio Shack, Z80 [microprocessor]. It is one of the earliest mass-produced and mass-marketed retail home computers.
The RadioShack TRS-80 Color Computer, later marketed as the Tandy Color Computer, is a series of home computers developed and sold by Tandy Corporation. Despite sharing a name with the earlier TRS-80, the Color Computer is a completely different system and a radical departure in design based on the Motorola 6809E processor rather than the Zilog Z80 of earlier models.
Tandy Corporation was an American family-owned leather-goods company based in Fort Worth, Texas, United States. Tandy Leather was founded in 1919 as a leather supply store. By the end of the 1950s, under the tutelage of then-CEO Charles Tandy, the company expanded into the hobby market, making leather moccasins and coin purses, making huge sales among Scouts, leading to a fast growth in sales.
VisiCalc is the first spreadsheet computer program for personal computers, originally released for Apple II by VisiCorp on October 17, 1979. It is considered the killer application for the Apple II, turning the microcomputer from a hobby for computer enthusiasts into a serious business tool, and then prompting IBM to introduce the IBM PC two years later. More than 700,000 copies were sold in six years, and up to 1 million copies over its history.
The TRS-80 MC-10 microcomputer is a lesser-known member of the TRS-80 line of home computers, produced by Tandy Corporation in the early 1980s and sold through their RadioShack chain of electronics stores. It was a low-cost alternative to Tandy's own TRS-80 Color Computer to compete with entry-level machines such as the VIC-20 and Sinclair ZX81.
The TRS-80 Model 100 is a notebook-sized portable computer introduced in April 1983. It was the first commercially successful notebook computer, as well as one of the first notebook computers ever released. It features a keyboard and liquid-crystal display, in a battery-powered package roughly the size and shape of a notepad or large book. The 224-page, spiral-bound User Manual is nearly the same size as the computer itself.
Ohio Scientific, Inc., was a privately owned American computer company based in Ohio that built and marketed computer systems, expansions, and software from 1975 to 1986. Their best-known products were the Challenger series of microcomputers and Superboard single-board computers. The company was the first to market microcomputers with hard disk drives in 1977.
EACA International Ltd was a Hong Kong manufacturer active from 1975 to 1983, producing Pong-style television video games, and later producing thousands of personal computers.
Video Genie is a discontinued series of computers produced by Hong Kong-based manufacturer EACA during the early 1980s. Computers from the Video Genie line are mostly compatible with the Tandy TRS-80 Model I computers and can be considered a clone, although there are hardware and software differences.
Scripsit is a word processing application written for the Radio Shack TRS-80 line of computers. Versions were available for most if not all computers sold under the TRS-80 name, including the TRS-80 Color Computer and several pocket computer designs, as well as the Tandy version of the Xenix operating system. Tandy Corp. also produced a version running under MS-DOS for its line of PC compatible computers. Some of the 8-bit versions are tape-based and have no ability to read or write to disk.
Kilobaud Microcomputing was a magazine dedicated to the computer homebrew hobbyists from 1977 to 1983. It was one of the three influential computer magazines of the 1970s, along with BYTE and Creative Computing. It focused mostly on the kit-build market, rather than the pre-assembled home computers that emerged, and as the kit market declined in the early 1980s, Kilobaud lost relevance and closed in 1983. After this, company continued publishing other magazines dedicated to particular platforms rather than the kit market.
The Tandy 10 Business Computer System was a short-lived product developed by Radio Shack in the late 1970s as a business-oriented complement to their TRS-80 Model I desktop computer. Released in 1978, the Tandy 10 was built for Radio Shack by Applied Digital Data Systems (ADDS), and was only sold by Radio Shack's dedicated computer center stores.
Wayne Sanger Green II was an American publisher, writer, and consultant. Green was editor of CQ magazine before he went on to found 73, 80 Micro, Byte, CD Review, Cold Fusion, Kilobaud Microcomputing, RUN, InCider, and Pico, as well as publishing books and running Instant Software.
The TRS-80 Model II is a computer system launched by Tandy in October 1979, and targeted at the small-business market. It is not an upgrade of the original TRS-80 Model I, but a new system.
The TRS-80 Model 4 is the last Z80-based home computer family by Radio Shack, sold from April 1983 through late 1991.
Home computers were a class of microcomputers that entered the market in 1977 and became common during the 1980s. They were marketed to consumers as affordable and accessible computers that, for the first time, were intended for the use of a single, non-technical user. These computers were a distinct market segment that typically cost much less than business, scientific, or engineering-oriented computers of the time, such as those running CP/M or the IBM PC, and were generally less powerful in terms of memory and expandability. However, a home computer often had better graphics and sound than contemporary business computers. Their most common uses were word processing, playing video games, and programming.
Airmail Pilot is a video game published in 1979 by Instant Software, in which the player pilots a Curtiss JN-4D "Jenny" biplane carrying mail from Columbus, Ohio to Chicago.
Galaxy is a 1981 video game published by Avalon Hill and developed by Microcomputer Games for the Apple II, TRS-80, Atari 8-bit computers, Commodore PET, Commodore 64, IBM PC compatibles, FM-7, and TI-99/4A. It was originally published as Galactic Empires by Powersoft in 1979.
Apparat, Inc., was an American software developer, peripheral manufacturer, mail order company, and retailer active from 1978 to 1988 and primarily based in Denver, Colorado. They are best known for NewDos/80, an alternative operating system to TRSDOS for Tandy Corporation's TRS-80 line of home computers, sold through their Radio Shack stores. Apparat themselves sold modified TRS-80s through their mail order catalog. The company pivoted to selling peripherals for the IBM Personal Computer in 1982, continuing in this market until Apparat went defunct in 1988.