Sharp MZ

The Sharp MZ -800 was a home computer, the Japanese company Sharp, who came on the market in 1985. The device was released in Japan under the name Sharp MZ 1500.

Technology

The MZ -800 continued the concept of MZ- series and was the successor of the MZ- 700th Technically, the computer based on a Z80A processor with 3.55 MHz. The unit was equipped with 64 KiB of RAM, but the memory could be extended to 128 KiB.

New for the MZ series from Sharp was the graphic resolution of 640 by 200 pixels, which represented a significant improvement over the MZ- 700 series on the MZ- 800 ( and the MZ80B ).

The MZ -800 is backwards compatible with the MZ -80 and MZ- 700th In contrast to the MZ -80 ( 1979) MZ -800 does not have a built-in monitor and is therefore flatter. It was available in three versions: the basic model (MZ -811 ), with built Datasette (MZ -821 ) and with an additional integrated Vierfarbplotter (MZ -831 ). Instead of Datasette a Quick -disk drive for a 2.8-inch floppy disk with sequential access could be installed. It was also possible to connect an external 5.25 "floppy drive. For games there was a joystick.

Unlike other home computers the ROM of the device from the MZ series did not contain any programming language, but only a boot monitor with basic input-output commands. This made it possible to read data from tape or disk to read individual memory cells and alter their contents in hexadecimal notation and to write data back to mass storage. The assembler source code of the monitor was included in the supplied manual as an expression. Sharp described the concept as a clean computer. Applications or programming languages ​​had first to be read from tape or from disk after switching on. Were set comes with the proprietary S -Basic ( an interpreter ), and some games. But there were also compiler for Pascal or Basic, and for Fortran, and working with Z-80 assembler available. Under CP / M the then known office applications could be operated.

In Germany, the computer was to purchase at a retail price of 1198 DM.