The Story of the TRS-80 MC-10 Microcomputer, Tandy's Weirdest System - Tandy Lab  

This again is so cool! I wrote 37 video games for Tandy Corporation from StarBlaze through Robocop, Predator and Tetris in the 80's and early 90's. I recently donated all of my Color Computers and accessories to the Oklahoma Historical Society / OKPOP museum as I've been inducted into the museum for the video games i wrote. This brings back so many wonderful memories of working with Mark Seigel and Srini Vasan of Tandy Corporation in developing these game during the 80's and early 90's! Many, many thanks! Greg

This was my first computer when I was 10 year old. It began my love for computers and programming and 35 years later still remember this with fondness, wish I hadn't of thrown it out when I upgraded to the CoCo 3.

This was my first computer. I remember picking it up from Radio Shack with my mom and dad. I learned a load of basic with this. I would pick up Hot Coco magazines from the corner store and type in the code all night long and then play the game. Then I was writing my own games. I still have it and I will never let it go. 10 CLS

Surprisingly, there is more (and better) accessories now for the MC-10 than there ever was from Tandy back in the day. You can see some at bottom of the page here: thezippsterzone.com/hardware/. A composite video out board, a Supercart (with 512K each of SRAM and Flash memory, a sound chip, and 2 joystick ports), and the MCX-128 (128K RAM, 16K ROM socket (which includes MCX BASIC, which expands Microcolor BASIC to support high res graphics commands like the Coco Extended BASIC does, almost 32K RAM for BASIC programs (Tandy maxed out at 20K), and also allows a Drivewire like functionality called Emcee server, so that you can load programs from your PC using a serial cable (the same cable as the Coco Drivewire uses, so you can share one cable with both systems). Software has also improved over the past decade or two; Jim Gerrie has put up hundreds of BASIC games and programs up for free download, and ports of Pacman, Flappy Bird, Space Invaders and others (written in assembly) have been done. But the keyboard still sucks, and the graphics are somewhat crippled in that Tandy designed the hardware so that the VDG chip can only use the onboard 4K of RAM, which means you can't use the highest graphics modes the the VDG can support without modifying the motherboard itself. (You can see some videos of some of the better games (unfortunately with an overly loud drum track over top the actual game sounds) here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-CbcSPQ56yyU.html

I had one. I wrote a battleship game that connected two of them together by way of the cassette port. Each player had their own MC-10 and screen and would play their side of the game out of view of their opponent. It was a fun project that I don't think was ever duplicated.

What was awesome about this machine was that it was simple enough to understand completely. There was a fully annotated ROM disassembly and using poke commands, you could build on that with machine language, make os calls, and do all kinds of direct machine control. There were community magazines and support that made a mediocre product into a great introductory computing experience.

My first computer ever, so of course I thought it was fantastic. I wrote amazing programs for it, and I was sorely disappointed that they disappeared from the stores soon after that.

The MC-10 was my first computer that my father gave me for my 13th birthday in 1984. I learned programming on it and even translated many games from other systems C64/MSX/BBC-B (mostly text based) to my mc-10. This small computer started my career in the Oracle/SQL Database world.

I had one of these back in the day. I found $100 in a parking lot and after waiting 10 minutes to see if anyone came looking for it, I used it to buy a TRS-80 MC-10! The only thing I did with it was write some basic programs. I wish I had kept it...

I have one of these, a PAL version, boxed. Almost the same inside, except it's far easier to convert to composite. Just announced, is the new MCX unit, that gives and extra 32K RAM, and the full version of extended BASIC, several 8K banks of flash RAM, and the ability to load and save, to an SD card. It makes it just about identical to my Dragon 32, although with more RAM

Like several others here, this was my first computer as well. I remember wanting the Atari 800 so badly for the longest time since that's what we were using in my math class. I kept begging for a computer for a long time but my parents kept telling me they're too expensive. I'd have to visit friends to use theirs, and watch as they all got TI/99-4a's, VIC-20's and eventually the legendary C64. Finally, in November for my 13th birthday I got my own computer! The mighty TRS-80 MC-10. It was none of those other machines but at least it was mine. A month later for Christmas I got the 16K expansion pack! So I really warmed up to it and created 5 games in BASIC, a lottery number picker, a word processor and a BUNCH little nerdy tests and "demos" on that thing! It was some of the most fun I've had growing up, although I'd still visit friends with envy. hehehe Now, I own 4 of them in my vintage collection! Nostalgia is powerful!

Greetings from Colombia, I have one and it is very good, what happens is that you have to compare it in its niche market and with those parameters it was one of the best. Also today there is a large community that continues to create programs and new modern hardware devices that make it more functional, you should investigate more.

So proud to say...I owned one of these and my Dad, bought it for me for Christmas !!!

I owned one as a teenager. "Don't turn it off, I'll lose all my work!" I used to buy Modern Computing and enter lines of code all night just to see if it would work.

Yep, my first computer. My older brother bought it for us. Wrote my first program in BASIC on it, and boy I had a lot of misconceptions. I remember one time tearing my hair out because my program wouldn't work right, and it was because I was putting IF statements on the same line separated by colons. :)

I just got one of these. After finally getting all the right plugs and an old CRT TV I'm about to try programming in 4 Kilobytes.

The first computer I had was an MC-10 (with 16KB RAM expansion module!) back when I was 15. I learned a lot with it.

I still have mine somewhere in my parents' house, complete with the 16k ram module and a program cassette of "Lost World Pinball"--yes there was at least one game that Tandy made for the MC-10, and it was pretty fun to play. I probably kept a few of my pitiful attempts at BASIC programs in my box o' cassettes; it would be interesting to digitally archive those tapes in Audacity and see if they can still be read.

This was my first computer, so it has special memories for me. Typing a basic program whole afternoon to get a "?syntax error in 10" in the first run... those were the times... My dad had a model 1, I still have the data recorder.

I'm not sure i'd describe a computer that sold 600k units in Sinclair 1000 form and 1.5m units in ZX81 form a "colossal failure".

I went to Radio Shack alot in the late 70s till the early 90s when all they tried to do was sell you cell phones. It wasnt the same store after 1997. I never remember seeing this computer at all when I went in. I actually worked twice for them part time I. The early 90s and then again in 1996. The store I worked for in 96 was still an old looking store with that 80s woodgrain look. I worked for them for about 6 months or a little more I cant exactly remember it was my part time job I worked in the evenings after working all day at my fulltime job. However by 96 all the Tandy branded stuff was gone and the computers were IBM Aptivas by then. I miss my radio shack from the 1980s.

was my first computer with the 16k addon. i would spend hours typing in a game from rainbow magazine, and then hours finding typos. i was disappointed, and frustrated with it, and it became a dust collector replaced with a vic-20

Very cool to see all the comments from folks for whom this was their first computer and got them started in programming. My first computer was the original Coco 1, and getting it I'm sure was a bit of a stretch for my folks. If this had been around at the time I expect I would have been happy for them to opt for something less expensive like this.

This was my first ever home microcomputer, I bought it as an entry level computer. Used it for a few years then later bought a Sinclair ZX Spectrum+. Still have the TRS 80 MC10 and sold the Sinclair ZX Spectrum+ in the late 1980s.

How do people not look at this guy and think "criminally insane"?

I had one in 1984. First learned BASIC on it. Ah, what memories…

As with others here, this was my first computer in my early teens. A gift from my great aunt, I used the death out of it until I finally moved up to the CoCo 2. That 16K upgrade module got hot as hell though!

The MC10 was my first computer. I was 7 years old. It really changed my life. :)

Bought one as a hobby, taught myself basic. Was a great way to understand simple computer fundamentals. 4k, can you believe that.

“Maybe someday you could fit a computer in your pocket” a clever sneaky mention of raspberry pi, tablet, and phone computers

The MC-10 doesn't use anything from the original TRS-80 other than similar syntax for it's BASIC. The small size is possible due to the built in functionality of he 6803 microcontroller, and minimal circuitry used. No market? The TS-1000 sold over 1 million machines in year, it's parent the ZX-81 sold 1.5 million machines, and clones may have sold over 1 million units worldwide. Customers disappointed with the TS-1000 may have been a major reason other machines targeting that market in the US didn't sell well. If the MC-10 had been introduced at the same time as the TS-1000, Tandy probably would have sold a million of them. It runs rings around the TS-1000, and it's BASIC is even faster than the Apple II or C64 for a lot of programs. The serial port didn't use the hardware UART, but I won't go as far as saying it was near useless. The MC-10 could connect with serial printers and modems of the day just fine. It should easily handle 2400 baud modems with the right software, and drive a printer at 9600 baud. MCX-BASIC communicates with the PC over the serial port at much higher speeds. The MC-10 has a CLOADM command to load machine language programs, and a CSAVEM was published in a magazine shortly after it's release.

I went from this, to the coco, to the Model 4, to the Tandy 1000, and from there on I had to go beyond Radio Shack. When I had the MC-10 I also had a 300 baud modem that I would use to go on BBSs and other services. And like many others here, I learned Basic and Machine languages starting with this little machine. All that said, my favorite of the Radio Shack line was the Model 4.

This was my first computer also. I learned basic by using the keyboard hints, and today - I have achieved quite a bit in my computer career, all due to the inspiration and intimacy with the right sized computer for me at the time. Thanks for your videos, definitely a blast from my past - I had the coco 2 and the coco3 afterward, I had high anticipation for the 128k of memory on the unit, but was probably most disappointed in it the 68B09E processors enhancements... Apple stole my heart and then IBM compatibles.

I still have my 2 MC10's and I'm 61 years old! I will retire next month and I hope to power them up just because it was the computers that taught me about computers and gave me a wonderful career. One MC-10 I butchered and attached wires from a DP-25 connector to 24 of the keyboard keys. I made a flight stick type joystick and a steering wheel. 10 For X=0 to 100 20 A$ =Y 30 Print CHR$(62) 40 Print CHR$(147) 50 GOTO 10 Darn I forgot how to make a ">" go across the screen this was my bullet... :-(

It was my first home computer in 1986 but not the first computer I ever used. The first computer I had used was in grade school in 1984 and it was the TRS-80 model 4. I was mostly disappointed with the MC-10 since it only had 4K of ram. I didn't have the 16K ram expander unfortunately. A lot of the programs I typed in from books wouldn't work due to the amount of ram it had. Some of them did work from time to time. It wouldn't be until years later that I would have an MC-10 with the 16K ram expander and got some of those programs working.

My first comp was the Alice. I (really) had a lot of fun with it (usually greeting it with a "CLS:REM bonjour"), and the manual was good (on the French version we had a cover illustration by late illustrator Moebius, picturing a futuristic Alice character ; we were diving into a rabbit hole, after all ^^). Like many I learned a lot from magazines, and I noticed I could type with virtually no modifications BASIC programs made for VIC-20 and Dragon-32 : They seemed to run the same Microsoft BASIC :-) Later I had the 16k RAM extension, with a little booklet about undocumented features (and I think CSAVEM was part of them) and the basics of machine language with a few example, including graphics modes not available in BASIC (because the BASIC working memory was just after the screen memory, so a higher resolution would mess with the BASIC) Still have it, and will run it again when I get an old small TV set :-)

It might have been acceptable going up against a VIC-20 with a datasette. By the time it arrived, its competition was the C64 with a 1541 drive, and the compactness and price just weren't enough to go head-to-head with the legend.

The MC-10 was my 1st computer. Taught myself Basic with it as a teen. Games, ie Egg Drop with square eggs, lol. I still have it with the 4" printer, 16k Ram mod and tapes. Nice blast from the past.

It was the first computer I ever owned. I spent hours typing in and creating BASIC programs. What I had at the time was what I could earn as a kid. My parents were not supportive of my interests. From there, Color Computer 2. So much better and soon after a disk drive. I got the family Sony Trinitron when it was replaced with a projection TV. SO clear and nice for the CoCo2. From there, incremental growth and expansion. OS9 and programming in assembly. When Linux became a thing, I found myself rejecting Windows/PC in favor of something that made a lot more sense and OS9 led the way.

I think it was brilliant, it was all my parents could afford. It was my first, then went to the TRS80 COCO 2, then Commodore Amiga 128. I learnt Basic and the started ASM with peek and poke codes to add cheats. It was the foot in the door to my career with computers where I am working as an industrial programmer. It was a shame it didn't continue...

This is the first computer my brother owned! Either this or a Tandy pocket computer? I wrote a very bad version of breakout on it around 9 or 10 year old. The ball only did a direct reflection when it bounced off the walls paddle or bricks. And the resolution was 1/2 character. I was only able to get a couple aliens on screen at a time for a space shooter. I think this may have been the first computer I used basic on, but my school had Apple IIs so I might have used them first?

I never knew anyone who had a Radio Shack computer. The only computers I had at home growing up were a Commodore 64 and my dad's Compaq. While the Commodore 64 was a fine computer, I secretly wished I could have had a lot of different computers to play with, because they were all so unique.

This was my first computer, back in the day, later we got a Tandy 1000

My first computer was a Texas Instrument with 1k internal ram and a 4k expansion which my old man had bought for himself first. My first true useful computer was the CoCo 2 and I also got an MC-10 followed a few years later by the CoCo 3.💖 I love the CoCo trilogy even though I ended up owning the last 2 of that line. And using the MC-10 was a joyful experience as well.

Had one!! loved it!

There actually has been a device, the MCX32-SD, that adds 32 KB RAM, for a total of 36 KB, as well as gives you a better BASIC interpreter, finally with the ability to save machine language, and a version of DOS that works with an SD card, so you don't have to use the cassette interface if you don't want to. It's a very nice little device. Give MCX32-SD a google.

The TS-1000 supposedly sold over a million units in a single year, so I'm not sure I'd call that a failure, but then so many people hated it that it probably killed Timex's future in the market. The Aquarius may have sold (shipped?) even fewer machines than the MC-10, but at least the company released a few games for it. Tandy's launch of the MC-10 could best be described like this... they threw a newborn child into the water and said swim. They released two or three tapes with games, and never did any more with it. Compared to the TS-1000 and Aquarius it was a much more capable machine, but it was too small, too neutered, and too unsupported to succeed. The MC-10 design is a clever engineer's dream, aka a disaster. The keys feel okay but the keyboard is too small to touch type on, the keyboard design complicates reading the keyboard, the memory map prevents BASIC from using much of the address space for RAM even with an external expansion, the video circuit is neutered in multiple ways so you can't use all the 6847 video modes there is enough RAM for let alone use the highest res modes, they reserved room for 16K of ROM in the memory map but only provided a room for a single 8K ROM, and the serial port is a bit banger design that completely ignores the 6803's built in hardware serial port. That's the highlights of my rant on the design.

I had one, with the expansion pack! Bought it new during the liquidation phase. I think it sold then for 49$ canadian, and the expansion was 19$. Did not use it much. Had put my own cassette deck on it. It sure was a cheap way to get going on BASIC. But zero compatibility with the CoCo software. Too bad... Sold it a long time ago.

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A computer in your pocket? Wherever you go? Who on Earth would use something like that?

I wouldn’t call the ZX81 a colossal failure. It may not have done very well in the US, but Sinclair sold over 1.5 million of them overall.

Worked for me !!!

My 1st computer. I wrote a lot of basic programs on this monster.

This was actually my first computer. I got one Christmas of ‘84 that my folks paid $50 for new. I learned basic on it, and had a lot of fun, but wound up getting a CoCo2 shortly afterwards.

Have you ever used an MC-10? What did you think of it?

A friend of mine in Engineering school had an MC-10. Since I had a Coco3, I was pretty familiar with MC-10 Basic. I did some programming work for him. Had the MC-10 been just a "little" better, it would have been more successful.

If they had had all the tech 3 or 4 yrs earlier would it have sold better?

The Sinclair ZX80 (Timex Sinclair 1000) was hugely successful in Europe, particularly the UK, there is a world outside of the US.

I had one, it was my first computer. Poke 34343,255 used to crash it nicely 😂 CLOADM & CSAVEM worked on mine, and if not used correctly would generate an ?FM error (file mode)

That Aquarius needs cleaning.

The time of computers not just in your pocket but everywhere is where we are at for good or ill.

Big in France, huh, I guess that helps explain Jerry Lewis.

I bought one at a second hand shop, without knowing what it was. Since then I never managed to power it up, as the power adapter was missing. Anyway I'm glad to have a rare piece in my collection, hopefully I'll find its adapter and make it work again someday 😁 To be honest, it doesn't look bad at all! Who knows, maybe the expansion port can be used to develop some kind of external device, that will make it shine again (or finally?)

The timex 1000 wasn't a commodore size bit but to call it a colossal failure is untrue. It sold well above expectations. The timex 2069 was a colossal failure. The 1000 was not.

I have one of these. I've had it for a long time and can only remember using it for about 30 minutes. What is it really good for?

I had a Timex. At that time I saw the Tandy MC-10 too late. I remember being so sad Ididnt buy this tandy instead

what about mainframes and supercomputers too? theyre soooo powerful!!!! yep....

I'd love to add an Alice to our collection!

I'll admit, I've never even heard of this thing

No modern accessories? Ehrm.... there's a 128k card that fits into the memory expansion connector and expands BASIC as an option at bootup. It can load and save to virtual disks over drive wire server. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-FXY279q7YNg.html

The purpose behind these computers was cost, not size. No one back in those days bought one because it was smaller than a Color Computer or TRS-80 Model III. No thought that this was the direction the market was heading. The singular driving feature of these computers was simply cost. There was a race to the bottom (of price), and these computers were in the ~$100 range, which in todays dollars is equivalent to ~$250. What killed these computers was the nearly immediate drop in price of the higher end units like the Color Computer, which, the year the MC-10 came out, a 16k CoCo 2 was $239. People saw the better keyboard and the expandability of the Color Computer 2, and chose it over the MC-10 for those reasons AND the fact that $239 was a price point people were willing to pay. Sinclairs and MC-10s and the like were an experiment to see how low computers could be made, and since both machines were desktop units, the size of the MC-10 was considered a drawback, not a selling point. Also, no one aside from a very niche market even considered the pocket computers of the day, and no one was envisioning the smartphones of today. What killed these units was the fact that physically larger systems that were more capable of typing on like a typewriter, that had more compute capabilities as well, combined with the fact that the larger systems halved in price over the course of the previous year is what killed these computers. More than anything, these super low end computers were a failed expermiment with the market determining where the sweet spot in popularity (thus sales) was at. No one ever considered buying one of these units to run a business or do anything more serious than tinker, or something to buy for their kid. The physical size had NOTHING to do with why these systems were marketed, and people complained about the fact that they were too small. It wasn't the industry trying to create a PDA or handheld type device at all. This video is pretty ridiculous in it's reasoning.

I want one.

Clean your keyboard

U must be Canadian. hahahaha. Subbed.

I had one it was my first computer

Ah Tandy. The kids from the damned.

So this machine isn't compatible with Coco cartridges? Ugh, what a rip-off!

Wait where are the Indians?

My first computer. Nothing but disappointment 😔

6:22 nice French bro

Let's be honest, the Speccy was both smaller and better...

Tandy made many mistakes.

I remember back in 1983 right before I purchased my Atari 800XL. A friend had one of these computers and was trying to sell it to me for only $50. I took it home for a week to play around with it. What a piece of crap. I was glad to return it to my friend, and very glad I purchased the Atari instead. I feel bad for all those kids back in the day that got stuck with the the Tandy MC10, because parents knew nothing about computers and went with the cheapest thing they could find.

This was my first computer at 16 years old. I loved it - upgraded to a Coco2 - but really was sorry to get rid of it... I learned BASIC on it and used it a LOT.