Portable computer has full screen

Press, 6 November 1984, Page 26

Portable computer has full screen

Data General has high hopes for its new personal computer, a compact machine that is designed for people who do business away from their desks. The Data General/One has impressive features, but it also has some unfortunate characteristics.

Another dimension was added to personal computing last week with the release in New Zealand of an eminently portable personal computer which is compatible with the IBM Personal Computer. The Data General/One portable computer has a 25line liquid crystal display (LCD) and is said by the company to be the first portable personal computer to incorporate a full-size display. ‘lt is the first complete personal computer that is truly portable,” said Mr Doug Barr, marketing manager for Data General New Zealand, Ltd. “There are absolutely no compromises in the product compared with a desktop IBM Personal Computer.” Not only does the fourkilogram package have all the features of a desktop personal computer, it can also run under its own battery power for up to 10 hours. Watching a demonstration of the Data General/One, it is easy to imagine that portable computers will play a big role in the personal computer revolution. Fully-functional portable computers, no larger than portable typewriters, will be carried everywhere to provide information where it is most needed. They will also be a compact form of computer on the desk or at home. Data General particularly hopes to sell its portable computer to people who do business away from their

desks, such as auditors, consultants, builders, architects, servicemen, insurance agents, writers, reporters, software salesmen and travelling executives. One insurance company in the United States ordered 2000 units for its salesmen when the Data General/One was announced. Unfortunately the screen on the Data General/One will annoy some users. The characters are fuzzy and difficult to read from any direction except straight on. Data General staff said that the LCD screen performed best under bright lights and they had installed spotlights shining on the screens for the demonstration to representatives of the news media. The staff also noted that the existing display could be easily replaced when the technology improved. At the release of the Data General/One in the United States in September, Data General announced that it already had orders for 14,000 units. In the United States it sells for just under SUS3OOO. New Zealanders will find it harder to justify, with a local price of $8754 for a Data General/One with 128 K bytes of memory, a single floppy disc drive, the MS-DOS operating system and an. AC adapter. The second disc drive costs an extra $l4OO and the battery pack is also extra. Competition for the Data General/One will come from machines such as the Hewlett-Packard HP 110

and the Apple lie. The HP 110 has only a 16-line screen and does not have a built-in disc drive. Apple’s new computer does not run MSDOS. The Data General/One uses an Intel 80C88, a CMOS version of the 8088 microprocessor. Memory can be expanded to 512 K bytes, giving it the capability of running packages like Lotus 1-2-3. The floppy disc drives are 3%-inch units which each hold 747 K bytes. Because they are not compatible with the 5¥4-inch IBM Personal Computer drives, the machine can not claim 100 Bit cent IBM compatibility, owever, it will run Lotus 1-2-3 and the other wellknown test of IBM compatibility, Flight Simulator 11, once these packages are transferred on to 3%-inch discs. An impressive extra feature is the availability of an expansion chassis that takes circuit boards compatible with the IBM PC. A 5%-inch drive is also available, again compatible with the IBM PC, which is expected to be used by software developers to get their software on to I the SVz-inch discs. Graphics programs, such as Microsoft Chart, can run on the bit-mapped LCD screen. The MS-DOS operating system is partially built in to ROM withip the Data General/One. Over 70. popular MS-DOS packages are

specially-designed, automated assembly line near Tokyo. Most sales of the Data General/One in New Zealand are expected to be made by dealers, still to be signed up by Data General New Zealand. The company will sell directly to New Zealand’s

already available in the United States on the 3Vzinch discs. The new portable computer was designed and developed jointly by a team of engineers from Nippon Data General and Data General’s United States laboratories. Nippon Data General, which is 85 per cent owned by Data General, will manufacture the computer on a

larger companies and Government departments. Special software is available to allow the computer to connect into larger Data General computers running the company’s Comprehensive Electronic Office software and the computer can also emulate Data General terminals.

World-wide, Data General is hoping to sell more than: 100,000 Data General/One computers over the next; year and capture 12 to per cent of the market for’ portable computers. ’

“We intend to be number one in the portable personal’ computer market," said Mr Barr.