I have owned a Z88 for about five months now. I thought I would give my impressions of it.
I have always been interested in laptop computers and wanted to buy one for a long time. But they were either too expensive or not powerful enough. That is until the Z88. It is both powerful and inexpensive. You have got to compare the price to other brands of laptops. The price is about $500.
The Z88 may be considered pricey if you add up the cost of all its accessories. But I do not feel that you really need all of those accessories. Some additional memory is necessary. I think that one 128K ram pack should be sufficient for most people. If you have really exceptional needs, you can add more memory. You can expand the machine to over 1.5 megabytes. You may be able to do without the linkup packages for other computers. I made a cable with parts from Radio Shack and used the QL Q_Link communication program with excellent results. This also eliminated the need to buy an eprom to store programs permanently. I use a QL disk for archival backup.
About the only other things you need are a carrying case and perhaps a modem if you don’t already have one. There are many affordably priced 1200 baud pocket modems on the market that will work fine with the Z88. You may be able to use an existing case for the machine. It will fit into almost anything. Or you can buy a custom case at your Z88 dealer. Sharp’s sells a nice one for $24.95.
You can buy an AC adapter for the machine for under $15 at Radio Shack. I use the model 273-1650 universal adapter set at 6 volts and positive tip polarity.
If you do any travelling at all, the Z88 is for you. It is very portable. It measures 11 1/2 inches by 8 1/4 inches by less than an inch. It has a full size keyboard with a real nice soft feel. There is an 8 line by 106 column supertwist LCD screen. The main reason for the Z88s small size and weight is no disk drives. How do load in software? Answer… You don’t! It comes with virtually everything you need on a rom built into the machine. The software is extremely well designed and integrated. I think that most people will find the software meets their needs.
The main program on the Z88 is called Pipedream. It is a combination word processor, spreadsheet, and database. It appears to be a spreadsheet that has been adapted to be a word processor. But the word processor functions were not skimped on one bit. This is the most powerful word processor that I have ever used! It is just amazing that this program is included in a portable machine.
You choose the commands for Pipedream with the MENU and cursor keys like all the functions on the Z88. Or you can use hotkey commands to choose functions. This is a little faster than the menus and the hotkeys are not hard to remember. At first it may seem awkward in editing existing text with Pipedream. But once you get used to its idiosyncracies you will find no problem.
I really like Pipedreams ability to do columns without any problem. This is really nice for newsletters. This review was written using Pipedream. Note the two 35 column columns. You can have as many columns as you like and they can be in any width. I also like the block move functions. It was fun watching the blocks move on the built in page map while writing this review.
Another program that I use is the terminal program. You can send and receive ascii files fairly easily with the help of the Z88 command line interpreter. Xmodem should have been included on the machine. You can buy a rom based xmodem program for $89.95. I think that I will use my QL xmodem program and then port files over with the Z88 Import-Export program.
The Z88 comes with BBC Basic. This is a very nice basic. It even includes procedures like the QL has so it is extendable. It also has a built in assembler to write machine language. Syntax-wise BBC Basic is almost identical to Microsoft Basic. Any Microsoft Basic program typed in or downloaded will work fine as long as there are no screen commands present. There is one problem with the basic however. There is no editor built-in. You must retype the whole line to correct an error in a line. If you have to do a lot of editing, you can always port the program to Pipedream and edit it from there.
There is a Filer to do all the usual file operations such as copy, rename and move files. You can also create subdirectories, and access the command line interpreter. The CLI is sort of like batch files on DOS machines.
There is a Diary program that enables you to write notes for each day. This also works in concert with the Calender. You can move the cursor anywhere on the perpetual calender and then read your notes for that day.
The Z88 also has complete desktop accessories. There is a perpetual calender, a clock, a 10 memory calculator with conversion between U.S. and metric, and a sophisticated alarm that will even let you run programs at a specific date and time.
One unusual feature of the Z88 is that you can run any program while running another program. While editing a file in Pipedream, you can check a date, the time, or your files press ESC and you are back in Pipedream.
There is also a control Panel that enables you to set all sorts of defaults for the computer such as RS232 settings, sound, the page map etc.
Those are most of the features that I can think of. This computer is so loaded with features that any review is only going to mention some of them. This is an excellent and amazing machine.
– David Bennett
Taken from the November issue of PACC Talk – Official Newsletter of The Pittsburgh Area Computer Club.
Ed Comments: Thanks David, for a nice run down on the Z88. And why shouldn’t the Z88 be the most practical “personal computer” alive? After all, Sinclair introduced the first personal computer, the ZX-80. Since that time EVERYTHING is advertised as “personal computers”, even my $3800 IBM AT Clone, which is really a “Business Office Computer”. T’other day I looked at a Mitsubitchi “Lap Top” that comes with two 3.5″ dd’s and weighs bout the same as a concrete building block and costs a measly $4495. If you carry it around fer a while one arm’s gonna get longer’n tother. The Z88 is more practical to take everywhere and do everything with than anything that I have seen to date. Its a winner both as a “portable” and as a “personal”, and as a “desk top”. Me? I dont have a lap, and I refuse to call any computer a “lap top”, which ain’t no practical name fer nuthing. -BJ