It was interesting that Radio Shack found a "second life" in making IBM Compatibles that were very much their own, particularly with the improved graphics described in the article.
In the late 1980s when I was in high school I traded my TRS-80 Color Computer 3 for a 286-based clone which came in a big box with many expansion slots and that you plugged a keyboard and monitor into, like a modern full-size desktop computer. One of my friends I shared programs with had a Tandy PC which had a built-in keyboard but used an external monitor like a Commodore 64 or my CoCo -- there was a period in which they were fiercely competitive and influencing the industry. They didn't survive Win 95.
I remember watching my friend play A10 Tank Killer on his Tandy 1000SX, it was almost unplayable, something like 1 frame per second.
We used that Tandy 1000 SX to measure the speed of a bullet, using a tight assembly loop written in DOS debug that polled the joystick fire buttons. One joystick fire button was hooked to a sound trigger next to the gun. The other button was hooked to a switch downrange on a target.
Not a huge deal, but the screenshots for Leisure Suit Larry are actually for Leisure Suit Larry 2. Played a lot of the first one as a kid. Inappropriate, but also just fun to explore the world and see what you could do and interact with. And you could kind of just exist in the game world.
Radio shack/Tandy clung to a sea of small parts as surface mount came in. Most of these parts went for scrap. As surface mount dominated the repair/salvage of most parts became uneconomic. Without the parts 'albatross' around their neck they could have given Dell or Compaq a better run for the money.
Hack labs across USA/World keep small work alive with shared infrastructure, surface mount, hot plate reheaters etc, CAD design and low cost mailed board makers are very much a thing these days
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[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 39.0 ms ] threadhttps://www.abortretry.fail/p/the-tandy-corporation-part-1
https://www.abortretry.fail/p/the-tandy-corporation-part-2
https://www.abortretry.fail/p/the-tandy-corporation-part-3 ← NOPE
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https://www.abortretry.fail/p/the-tandy-corporation-part-1
https://www.abortretry.fail/p/the-tandy-corporation-part-2
https://www.abortretry.fail/p/tandy-corporation-part-3
https://www.abortretry.fail/p/the-tandy-corporation-part-1
Well, it's right there in the name: AbortRetryFail
In the late 1980s when I was in high school I traded my TRS-80 Color Computer 3 for a 286-based clone which came in a big box with many expansion slots and that you plugged a keyboard and monitor into, like a modern full-size desktop computer. One of my friends I shared programs with had a Tandy PC which had a built-in keyboard but used an external monitor like a Commodore 64 or my CoCo -- there was a period in which they were fiercely competitive and influencing the industry. They didn't survive Win 95.
We used that Tandy 1000 SX to measure the speed of a bullet, using a tight assembly loop written in DOS debug that polled the joystick fire buttons. One joystick fire button was hooked to a sound trigger next to the gun. The other button was hooked to a switch downrange on a target.