NEC PC-100

The NEC PC-100 was a Japanese home computer available on October 13, 1983. It operated on 8086 CPU 7 MHz, 128KB RAM, 128KB VRAM, a Japanese language capable keyboard and a two button mouse. It had three models and its color monitor, PC-KD651, which could be used vertically or horizontally, had the price tag of 198,000 yen. Its biggest advantage over other computers of that time was its high graphical capability of 720 by 512 with a selection of 16 color out of 512 color available on its high end model30. Its OS was MS-DOS and was also equipped with a spreadsheet program Maruchipuran (Multiplan) and a text editor JS-WORD as well as the game Lode Runner.

For the RAM standard, see PC100.
PC-100
DeveloperNEC, ASCII, Cybernet Kogyo
TypeHome computer
Release dateOctober 13, 1983 (1983-10-13)[1]
Introductory priceMonochrome US$2,500
Color US$3,300
CPU8086 CPU @ 7 MHz
Memory128KB RAM (expandable to 768KB RAM), 32KB ROM
Display14-inch color CRT (PC-KC651)(Rotatable monitor)[2]
Graphics720 by 512 pixels (512 colors and can display 16)

The development was operated by NEC Electronic Device Business Group, ASCII (Microsoft dealer in Japan) and Cybernet Kogyo, a subsidiary of Kyocera.[3]

Far ahead of its time and too costly, PC-100 did not sell well. A complete set with the printer PC-PR201 that could print alphabet, hiragana, katakana and kanji, came to nearly a million yen. For a comparison, the Nintendo Family Computer released in July of the same year was only 14,800 yen and the vaunted Apple Lisa 2 sold for 2.2 million yen. The cheaper PC-9801F2 also by NEC outsold it.

  • model10 (398,000 yen) - a 5-inch 2D (360KB) floppy disk drive
  • model20 (448,000 yen) - two 5-inch 2D floppy disk drives
  • model30 (558,000 yen) - two 5-inch 2D floppy disk drives

Trivia

Possibly due to the standard inclusion of a mouse, a blue anime style mouse with "PC-100" on its chest looking little like Superman was used as a promotional character.

References
  1. The Industry:Japan on 16K a day, By Alexander Besher, InfoWorld, 28 May 1984, Page 67, ...Modeled blatantly after the Lisa, the NEC PC-100 was the star introduction at Tokyo's Japan Data Show last October...
  2. NEC PC-100 Color Video Pinout
  3. 富田, 倫生 (1995). パソコン創世記 (in Japanese). ボイジャー. Retrieved 2019-03-11 – via Aozora Bunko.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.