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AMSTRAD PC - NC 100 (Amstrad Action) | AMSTRAD PC - NC 100 (Practical Electronics) |
Z88 Revisited It's slimline, black, battery powered, has a letterbox LCD screen, operating system, utility software and BBC Basic in ROM, but isn't a Cambridge Computers' Z88. It's Amstrad's new Notepad NC100 portable computer, which the company claims is 'the world's easiest to use computer'. Amstrad says it is so confident of the claim, its £3 million NC100 promotion challenges customers: "If you can't use an Amstrad Notepad in just 5 minutes, you'll get your money back." This comes from the company owned by Alan Sugar who was recently quoted as saying that the customer wasn't always right! It's difficult to avoid comparisons with the Cambridge Computer Z88, launched by Sir Clive Sinclair back in 1986. At a glance they might look identical, although the NC100 has a proper keyboard compared to the Z88's 'dead flesh' rubber design and several NC100 keys sport bright colours to liven up the otherwise sombre black facade. Internally, the feeling of deja vu continues; A 6MHz Z80 processor replaces the Z88's 4MHz version. There is no built in disk drive. The Z88 pioneered removable memory cards and the NCI00 has one PCM-CIA mini-card expansion slot which can cope with up to one megabyte of memory to supplement the onboard 64K of low power static RAM. Amstrad says four standard alkaline AA penlight cells will power the NC100 for up to 40 hours. One thing the Z88 cried out for was a fail-safe battery back-up and the NC100 has it in the form of a Lithium cell.
The NC100's narrow blue-tint LCD screen looks like it was lifted straight out of the Z88, which would be no bad thing as at the time the Z88 had the sharpest screen going. A usable graphics resolution of 480 by 64 dots is provided by the screen. This translates into eight lines by 80 columns for, say, a word processor display. On the other hand the built in calculator mode uses the whole display as a jumbo-sized numeric read-out. Amstrad's NC100 is reminiscent of the famous Z88 >> Amstrad's ease of use claim stems from the simple use of icons and 'hot-keys' - the latter heavily used by the Z88. You can be ready to start typing into the word processor with just two keystrokes. Although I haven't had a chance to play with a NC100 yet, it doesn't appear that the Z88's ambitious windowed context-switching user interface has been emulated. Built in software includes a word processor with 48,000 word spelling checker, address book, calendar/diary, alarm, calculator and the BBC Basic programming language. The latter is a clear sign that Amstrad has eyes on the education market which embraced the Z88 with great enthusiasm. Besides schools, Amstrad says it is targeting the 80% of the population which still hasn't come to terms with modern personal computers. The NC100 can exchange files with a PC via an optional PC connector and , theoretically, it could be a big seller for Amstrad - unlike the Z88 which had rave reviews but was a commercial failure with less than 100,000 sold in six years. Cambridge Computers still sells Z88s in small quantities, but most of the company's efforts these days are directed at the satellite TV dish/decoder market. Amstrad's undoubted marketing skills might endow the NC100 with the success the Z88 deserved. The NC100 is priced £199.99 including VAT. For more information contact Amstrad on Tel.0277 228 888. PE |
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