Date   : Tue, 21 Aug 2007 10:43:19 +0100
From   : julesrichardsonuk@... (Jules Richardson)
Subject: OT - Alphatronic - Was Re: Acorn

Alex Taylor wrote:
> On 21/08/07, Fragula <fragula@...> wrote:
> I think the Alphatronic PC was marketed under the "Royal" brand in
> various places. I've seen pictures where there was a "Royal" logo in
> place of the "TA" logo that mine had. IIRC Royal was originally a
> typewriter company, that had been bought out by Triumph-Adler.
> 
> There were other (incompatible) models with the name Alphatronic - the
> "Alphatronic PC" was one of them. I found a few references on
> old-computers.com, or somewhere similar.

I think TA themselves used the name across several of their products - the 
things I've got are these:

   http://www.heimcomputer.de/english/comp/alphatronicpc.html

... possibly the worst keyboard I've ever used on any machine ever; there's 
virtually no travel on the keys, so it's a bit like typing on a ZX80/81 
membrane keyboard, but without the tactile "sponginess" that their 
construction gives as you're typing on hard plastic.

I think one of mine's a stock machine, one's got a custom terminal emulator* 
in ROM, and the other one has monitoring code in ROM and was hooked up to an 
X.25 PAD.

* Most of the ones at uni had such ROMs; I believe they were coded in-house 
(ditto with the PAD monitor ROM), so someone there evidently had enough smarts 
to hack around with them.

I only really hung onto them for sentimental reasons :-)

[I'm not sure how people feel about off-topic stuff on here... personally I 
like a little providing it doesn't get out of hand as it keeps the list alive 
- but I don't ever remember a discussion on here about what's acceptable and 
what isn't!]