Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
The Model 4's were the last of the TRS-80 line, affectionately nicknamed the
"Trash-80", produced by Tandy. It is of course ironic to say the least that I
happened to find this machine sitting, quite literally, atop a trash can at
the end of someone's driveway. Of course, a rescue was in order. I took it
home, cleaned it up, and discovered that it was still in working condition.
When I first started using this machine, I noticed that the display was very
intermittent, disappearing suddenly and then reappearing. Although I wish I
were more electronically inclined, I was rather proud of the fact that I was
able to trace the problem to a bad solder joint on the power supply, which I
was sufficiently able to mend. At this point, the unit is now fully
operational.
Although there was no software present, I did find a disk image of LS-DOS 6.3
on the web, which I wrote out to a 5.25" disk using Matthew Reed's Model 4
Emulator. Never having used a TRS-80 prior to this, I must say I am quite
impressed with this system, considering its age. For now, I am hoping to some
day upgrade this machine to 128K RAM, and replace its single-sided disk drives
with double-sided ones.
Links of interest:
TANDY Corporation
Ira Goldklang's TRS-80 Revived Pages
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