RAGE HARD SPECIAL

The new Sinclair may not be a Spectrum, but it is an IBM PC compatible! Hoo boy, we're going to have to get Technical Phil South to have a look at this...

No, I couldn't believe it either, but after thinking about it for a while. I've come to the conclusion that this new machine is a good thing. It's good for the Sinclair brand, taking it into the nineties with a wry grin on its monitor. It's good for the user, presenting him or her with a range of software unequalled by any other type of machine And it's certainly good for Amstrad (who bought the Sinclair name in 1985), as it could make it the biggest manufacturer and seller of PCs in the world, and earn it a cow-choking wad of cash to boot. Yep, Alan Sugar is going to be positively surfing in money this time if he isn't already.

So why a PC? At the risk of sounding like Barry Norman, why not? The world and his mum are buying PCs at the moment, so why shouldn't the Sinclair brand name be up there on the shelves among them? The PC compatible computer is an old concept, but it's a good one, and it has one big advantage - and any computer which has this goes on for years and years and years. And what's this advantage? Slots! No, I'm not being rude, I'm referring to the expansion slots inside the computer which take expansion cards (printed circuit boards which customise your computer to do any job you like - from being a satellite tracking station, to a Desk Top Publishing workstation or an arcade machine with advanced graphics). Okay that's the theory, now for the practice!!

THE PC200

The new Sinclair is a little black box, like all the other Sinclairs. Okay, it's a trifle larger than its predecessors, but there are reasons for that. The computer's casing contains a 102 key keyboard, with proper typewriter keys in black and grey. The top of the machine is slotted for ventilation, and although you could rest the monitor on top and still get the keyboard it would probably break the top of the case. The matching monitor is designed to perch behind the machine and look over the back of it. Looking at the PC200 from the front, there's a disk drive built into the side of the case. Surprisingly, the drives not of the usual Amstrad 3" type, but rather a standard Sony 3.5". There's a good reason for this, but I'll get onto that later. There are all the usual ports at the rear of the machine, RS232, Centronics printer, and an on/off switch (hoorah!), but interestingly for this class of computer, there's also a modulator socket for plugging into a TV set. Clean and simple lines, but a very powerful machine. Alright let's whip it apart.

THE DISPLAY

There are two different types of display. Either the CGA or MDA. Although this will mean something to converted PC users, it means nothing to the likes of me. Apparently all this yibbling means that CGA is the most popular graphics standard used by PC types. It's a 40 column x 25 line or 80 column x 25 line text in 16 colours, with 8 x 8 dot characters. Medium resolution graphics are 320 x 200 pixels in four colours, and high resolution is 640 x 200 with just two colours. MDA is a way of making your Sinclair outdo the Apple Macintosh in the monochrome stakes, with high definition 80 column x 25 line hi-res text, made up of 9 x 14 dot characters. Only the CGA mode is available through the TV modulator.

THE PROCESSOR

The machine runs on MS-DOS 3.3, supplied on disk, but it can run GEM 3 Desktop as well, for use with the mouse, to give you a modern windows, icons and pointers programming environment. The main processor is the popular 16 bit 8086, running at 8 Mhz, as used in the world-beating Amstrad line of PCs. (There is a socket for an 8087 maths co-processor too, making it potentially a real number cruncher!) Yes, this is a proper 16 bit computer, with 512K RAM as standard, but this is expandable using standard IBM or thir party RAM cards. BIOS, the operating system of the computer, is resident in ROM, which means you don't have to load it from disk.

THE KEYBOARD

The stumbling block of most previous Sinclair computers has been their keyboards. Well, this is the Professional series, and in keeping with that image, the keyboard is the industry standard, full travel, AT keyboard (the AT is a type of IBM computer, in case you're wondering). The keys are tightly arranged on the compact casing, with the cursor keys, control and ALT keys, numeric keypad, and also a lot of IBM specific keys, like Page Up, Page Down, Home, Delete, Insert... all the usual stuff. Oh yes, and 10 function keys, too. The Caps Lock, Num Lock and Scroll Lock keys are equipped with green LEDs to show whether they're on or off. It's a nice keyboard, and believe it or not, you can actually use it for typing!

THE SOFTWARE

WOW! There's games, if you want games. And although the software will not be Spectrum compatible, every major company is currently developing for the PC, and all new releases will have PC versions right up there with the other formats. There's a public domain library which will knock your eyes out. This is software written by programmers, hackers and enthusiasts which they don't charge for. It's free to anyone. And then there's the proper PC software. People have been programming this machine for about 8-10 years, and they know all about it. And better yet, programs for the PC run out at about 25 per cent cheaper than other types of computer, because they can guarantee such high sales. You'll never run out of programs for this machine. Ever.

THE SLOTS

Two IBM compatible slots, which can take any circuit board in the right format, one made by IBM, one made by a third party manufacturer, or even one made by your Uncle Fred with a soldering iron and a transistor radio. The range of things you can get to slot into a PC is quite staggering. Hard disks are available on cards. 20Meg models running out at about £300, you can even turn it into a fax machine by putting in a fax card! This is one feature which makes the PC future proof. If something comes along, like transputers for example, which revolutionise computing, you can slap it in the back of your Sinclair and off you go. Yes, you CAN get a transputer card to put in it!

THE DISKDRIVE

A 3.5" drive is essential in this day and age. Fewer amd fewer PCs have those clunky old 5.25" jobs, mostly because 3.5" disks have twice the storage capacity of their larger counterparts. You can add a supplementary 3.5 or 5.25" drive, which means that you can transfer programs from the small to large formats for carrying to work, college or school. One of the best things about owning this computer will be the fact that it's compatible with almost every other PC in the world? Yep, there are billions of them and the number is growing every day. It's like having a portable computer in every town in the world.

THE VERDICT

There's a very bright future ahead for this line of computers. Anyone who wants a computer, for whatever reason, games, business, pleasure, or school, can take this machine and turn it into anything they want. It's solidly built, reliable, cheap to buy and cheap to run. There are three packages you can buy. The cheapest is just the computer to connect to your TV. With a mouse, GW-Basic, MS-DOS 3.3, GEM 3, and all the manuals, you can walk away with it for just £299 + VAT. With a mono monitor, joystick, a software package called Organiser and four games, it's £399 + VAT. Add a colour monitor instead of the mono job, and it's just £499 + VAT. I think it's a fine computer, and I want one. Now where did I throw that transputer card...?

(Simon N Goodwin owns the copyright to this review. Please visit http://simon.mooli.org.uk to find original articles and updates, much new material and his contact details.)

PC OR NOT PC? THAT IS THE QUESTION

As accurately reported in Issue 55 of CRASH, the PC Show was the first public unveiling of the new Sinclair machine, or series it now seems. More like an Amstrad than a Sinclair? SIMON N GOODWIN gives his own views on this new 'Sinclair' machine.

Amstrad heaped more indignity on the Sinclair name at the PC Show, with the launch of the PC 200. The vanguard of the 'Sinclair Professional series' this is an IBM-clone with the Sinclair name glued on. The machine seems designed as a cheapish, home version of the IBM PC which Amstrad hope won't divert attention from its new, equally boring range of up-market super PCs.

In fact the PC 200 is nothing like a Sinclair, except that it's black and has rattly grey keys. It won't run Spectrum software or hardware.

This 'new' machine poses little threat to Spectrum however, since it uses IBM's ancient CGA graphics standard, which dates back to the days of the ZX81. Amstrad describe this lowest-common-denominator display as 'the most popular' PC configuration. As a result the only games mode gives 200 lines of 320 dots, in four colours from a very limited range. For non-games players there's a 16-colour text-only mode, and a monochrome 640 x 200 mode which needs a monitor display. Of course the PC is a 16-bit machine, but it wastes this theoretical advantage by using almost two and a half times as much video memory as a Spectrum.

At the back of the PC 200 a hatch reveals two sockets for IBM PC cards - but if you plug a card in, the hatch won't close! You end up with circuitry poking out of the top of the machine, exposing the inner workings to fizzy drinks, paper clips, fly's wings and anything else the non-discerning punter might drop inside (accidentally).

While this design is unfortunately British, the machine will actually be manufactured in Korea, it comes equipped with one 3.5" 720k disk drive, and a socket for an external 3.5" or 5.25" drive. Most PC games still use the 5.25" format, although Mastertronic and US Gold have promised to support the machine so 3.5" games should become easier to find with time.

A joystick socket is provided, under the keyboard, but unlike most games computers expects an analogue stick. Sound to accompany any gameplay comes from a built-in beeper, reminiscent of the old Spectrum but with the addition of a volume control, useful for turning it off. There are also serial and parallel ports for printers, modems etc.

The processor at the heart of this new Sinclair is the same 8MHz 8086 used in earlier Amstrad PC clones like the 1512 and PPC laptop. It comes with MSDOS Ver3.3 and a mouse to control GEM, the PC version of the 'graphics environment manager' built into the ST. GEM comes with utilities like a clock, a calculator and a 'paint' package. The bundle also includes four games.

It was soon evident that the machines on display at Earls Court were pre-production prototypes. Some of them had screening panels inside, others had gaffer tape or naked circuit boards. The video electronics were lashed up on a small vertical board, with extra wires running over the back of the circuit and across to the TV modulator.

Prices for finished machines are surprisingly high - £299 (+VAT, making it just under £350) for the basic model that plugs into your telly, rising to £460 (inc VAT) with a monochrome monitor or £575 (inc VAT) with colour. Despite the 'Sinclair' tag, it seems unlikely that the machine is, or will ever be, the natural upgrade for a Spectrum user. PCs, as is, are NOT games computers, and were never designed to be. The question therefore remains open; what, if anything, does Amstrad plan to offer for Spectrum owners looking to upgrade?

COLOURLESS SPECTRUM

Is it a Spectrum? Is it an ST? No, it's a disappointment.

Suffering, like us all, the after effects of the postal dispute (and PC Show), IAN CULL takes a look at a couple of 'zines, and mutters something about the PC Show. But there is that new Sinclair to get excited over. Or is there..?

The much rumoured Sinclair PC 200 was finally launched at the PC Show, although it is unlikely to been seen in the shops until November. It is quite a large machine compared to the Spectrum - 18-inches long and 13 deep - but at least it is BLACK, and has the SINCLAIR logo. However, that is where the Sinclair family heritage ends. The new computer is as similar to the Spectrum in use as was the ill-fated QL. The PC 200 is, in fact, an Amstrad PPC512 in a black case and has no real chance of running any Spectrum software, or even making use of data created on the Spectrum.

The new Amstrad, sorry, Sinclair has a 'proper' IBM-compatible keyboard (with more than twice as many keys as the Spectrum), laid out identically to an Amstrad PPC; a single 3.5 inch floppy disk drive (holding up to 720k of data as with the PPC); a mouse and built-in parallel and serial ports (for connection to printers, modems, etc). A second disk drive can be fitted externally.

The base machine, at £299 (+VAT), has no display, but does have a built-in TV modulator circuit so that a standard colour television can be used. This is almost a revolution in IBM-compatibles, since most other machines require a dedicated monitor for their display. Unfortunately, this means that the display quality is not good. The display driver is the IBM CGA standard, which is never a clear display even on 'real' business computers. The much clearer, and expensive, MDA display can only be used with the optional monitor (£100 extra for monochrome, £200 extra for colour).

On the plus side the PC 200 is at least a true IBM-compatible, running industry standard software programs - there are even two expansion ports(!). However, I would question the usefulness of these since standard IBM expansion cards are nearly twice the height of the computer! The computer would therefore need to be open permanently, allowing dust etc to cause untold damage. An Amstrad representative said that he knew of no 'extension case' which would cover any fitted expansion cards. There is also the question of how much spare 'power' is available in the machine for running expansion cards.

The PC200 is obviously designed as an 'Atari-basher', as it is the same price, uses the same disks and has the same memory capacity (512K which can only be upgraded by using an expansion slot).

Unfortunately for Sinclair aficionados (like Simon Goodwin and myself), the Atari is a far superior home entertainment system. In graphics mode, the Sinclair has only a four-colour display (see the purple mountains in the Amstrad brochure) - less than even the Spectrum, and IBM sound facilities are Spectrum quality! The Atari has sixteen colours at the equivalent resolution, plus a three-channel sound chip. There is, admittedly, quite a lot of IBM software available at launch - especially as the PC 200 uses 'proper' IBM joysticks (unlike the old Amstrad PC1512), but the Atari now has a good software base too.

Where the Sinclair PC 200 will be useful is if the owner already uses an IBM compatible - perhaps at work. Since machine should run all IBM software, a favoured word processor or spreadsheet can be used at home, in between playing games. The problem is that business computers still use the older 5.25" floppy disk standard, although the 3.5" is now also establishing itself. In addition the external disk drive can be 5.25" drive if required, but this is really only of use when transferring files. Having incompatible drives on different computers is an annoyance, having them on the same machine is almost impossible!

Moreover the ST, ironically, can even challenge the PC 200 on IBM compatibilities since there are programs available which will simulate an IBM PC on the ST. This would allow business software to be used, whilst still retaining superior games-playing capabilities. But obviously the PC 200 is much more likely to run PC programs without compatibility problems - and faster as well.

In conclusion, if you seriously wish to upgrade to a 16-bit games computer this instant, buy the Atari ST for the Amiga, if you can wait for the machine's insides to be found by more programmers). If you're more interested in the serious side of things, most particularly with PC compatibility, the PC 200 might be worth considering (among the other 10 million PC models that Amstrad also produce!).

SINCLAIR'S NEW PC200 - JUST ONE MORE CLONE

Send in the clones...

It's been a long hot summer, everyone's glad to be back at school and Amstrad has launched the ultimate Sinclair games machine. Well, no it hasn't, no they aren't and no it isn't. I fibbed. What Amstrad has produced is the Sinclair PC-200.

The PC-200 is the first non-Spectrum compatible Sinclair since the QL met an untimely start. Like the QL, it's a computer aimed at 'serious' users, like the QL it runs games but arguably less well as a Speccy and, like the QL, it has a sixteen-bit processor. There the similarities end.

The big thing about the PC-200 is its compatibility IBM standard computers. Bank managers and estate agents get excited by that sort of thing, but it's bad news for gamers as IBM graphics are nothing special. Sixteen colours maximum, and if you wont to do proper graphics you get to choose between block, white, cyan and purple (lovely) or black, white, green and orange. It's got a better text mode, with 80 characters per line and 35 lines, than the Spectrum. And forget about sprites, hardware windows and palettes - this is 1982 technology. There's no colour clash though.

The sound is almost identical to a 48K Speccy - one channel that can go beep. The PC-200 has a volume control and a built-in speaker; there's no provision for an external amplifier or sound through the TV.

The rest of the computer is a bit more interesting. The PC-200 comes with 512K of RAM, which can be expanded to the more common 640K no self-respecting PC clone is seen without. There's one 3.5" 720K disc drive stashed away on the right-hand side; the same disks as STs and Amigas use, and completely different from the +3. Spectrum programs, needless to say, cannot run on the PC-200 no matter what you do to them.

For a change, the power supply is built-in to the computer, together with an on/off switch. Another step to acceptable consumer technology, with no chance of a dodgy power socket on the computer ruining an evening's hackery.

The keyboard is similar technology to the +3, it feels exactly the same but has 102 keys to conform (there's a lot of conformity in the PC-200) to Big Blue's standards. Twelve function keys, numeric entry pod and a bunch of special word processor keys display a serious tendency to serious software.

Hidden away underneath the machine is one spot of good news. The PC standard mentions analog joysticks, so the PC-200 duly spots a socket for them. Most gamer sticks are digital bang-bang types; move the shaft and a switch doses. Analog sticks have special circuitry which reflects the exact position of the shaft: this gives games like flight simulators superb controllability.

Around the back of the box are a set of sockets. There's a printer parallel port (like the +3, but with a proper connector), a serial port that works with modems (unlike the +3) and a video socket to hook up to a monitor and a TV connector.

The PC-200 is probably the only IBM-type computer to have a TV output; IBM video is designed for Americans, who do things at a different frequency to us Brits. Amstrad designed a special conversion board which does some genuinely clever things to the signals before squirting them out at the TV. And the picture seems quite stable, even though it's been electronically squished.

Another modicum of excitement exists under the flap along the top of the PC-200. Lift this, and as well as a good view of the naked circuit board two connectors become visible. Known as slots in the jargon, they accept expansion cards in the same way that the bus on the back of the Spectrum takes plug-in gizmos. And because the IBM's been around for a few years, absolutely everything con be bought on an expansion card.

Graphics that would make Amiga owners poke their eyes out, sound machines to jar Jean-Michel, boards with megabytes of memory, hard disc drives, you name it and you can probably plug it into the PC-200. The fact that most of these cards cost more than the machine itself is what we in the trade call a shame. Hard disks aren't so bad, expect to pay about 200 quid for one with 20 megabytes of storage. No other machine has the level of bolt-on goodie support that the PC-clone like the PC-200 have.

That said, the slots don't have any sort of proper physical support for cards though. A sad omission, which could lead to a re-occurrence of a long-forgotten disease of ZX81s called Rampack Wobble. Press too hard on the keyboard, and the machine's internals flex about leading to a broken contact and tears before bedtime.

Finally there's a socket for the mouse. This comes free with the computer, together with the software to use it. There's quite a bit of software, too, and a new world of operating systems, application programs and other pulse-speeding wonders awaits.

Unlike a Spectrum, the PC-200 doesn't do anything when it's first turned on. It asks for a system disc, and then waits until it gets one. There's no built-in BASIC, for example. The operating system (which is what the thing loads from the system disc) tells the computer how to load other programs, as well as how to look after discs and the files and data on them.

One PC-200 does come with BASIC on disk; called GW-BASIC it's written by American software company Microsoft and it's not bad. It's got lots of features, is a bit more difficult to use than Spectrum BASIC and isn't that fast. But it is an international standard of sorts.

THE SOFTWARE PACKAGES

Other things on disc include GEM, which is a graphics-based desktop program. Files and programs appear as icons, move the mouse and click to use them, that sort of thing. It's good harmless fun, as is the GEMPaint program that lets the artistic do their thing in all four colours...

More expensive systems come with more software. The basic PC-200 costs around £330; for £460 you also get a black-and-white monitor with Professional Organiser (sounds fun, huh?) software and four games. At the time of writing, Amstrad couldn't say what the games would be, but at the PC show where the computer was on display for the first time there were a selection of fairly standard efforts like Trantor.

Amstrad has been trying hard to get the Oceans of this world interested in budget software for the PC-200; only time will tell how much low-price stuff turns up. Mastertronic, for example, is planning to put out stuff at £9.95 - cheap for IBM discs. Certainly, the existence of a large American market makes people like Rainbird happy to convert games - for a price.

Finally, there's the £570 package with a colour monitor and the same software as the monochrome set.

One nice thing about the PC world is the Public Domain tradition Loads of games, utilities, programming aids and even word processors and spreadsheets are legally copyable, the idea is that if you like something, you send a small amount of dosh off to the writer. Nobody gets rich, but lots of people get a lot of software.

Nobody's going to buy a PC-200 for games instead of an ST or an Amiga. It's not good enough. It's better than a Spectrum - mostly. But as an entry to the real world of computing, where zapping takes a back seat to more cerebral activity, it's cheap and neat, and it works. Now if Flare can get their kit on a PC expansion board...

(Note: Amstrad were unable to supply a review PC-200 for SU in time for this issue, so this article is based on several hours hands-on at the PC show plus some in-depth technical probing).