{"id":111,"date":"2023-07-11T21:37:15","date_gmt":"2023-07-11T21:37:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.iains-net\/?p=111"},"modified":"2025-12-22T12:10:40","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T12:10:40","slug":"nc100","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vintage.bohemiancave.org.uk\/index.php\/nc100\/","title":{"rendered":"Amstrad Notepad NC100"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In 1992, laptops were not really a thing, even if you could afford such a thing. Windows 3.1 was released the same year and DOS was still the Operating System of choice thus User Friendly was not really a thing either. Alan Sugar though differently. User Friendly is a tag line he used on a small range of computers, the NC100 being one of them. Price was important too, as for the rest of Amstrad products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Amstrad (standing for Alan Michael Sugar TRADing) is a brand name with a varied track record. Amstrad Hi-Fi equipment was build to a price point – a low one. Often it looked like it had all the features, but when it came down to it the features were often half-baked, didn’t work and the equipment just sounded awful. On the other hand there were devices like the CPC line of computers. They were reputedly good machines (for the time). The NC100 and the NC200 <\/a>(it’s bigger brother) were also of this ilk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The form factor might seem rather odd through modern eyes, but it’s one a few notebooks took – the Cambridge Z88<\/a> (by Sir Clive Sinclair of ZX Spectrum fame) is another. Epson and Tandy both produced machines like it, too. The devices are all about A4 size, have a full size keyboard and a short, wide display. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Hardware<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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The NC100, like many portable computers at the time (such as the Psion<\/a> organisers, Windows CE 1 and 2 devices from many manufacturers) runs on AA batteries. In this case four of them. It reputedly lasts 20 hours on them too. Like many other contemporaries it also has entirely volatile memory (Flash memory was expensive and very few devices used it), in almost all cases a Lithium CR2032 was employed to keep the memory alive should the main batteries die or need to be changed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Software on the NC100 was contained in a 256K ROM, under a small hatch on the bottom. I don’t think a upgrade (or replacement) was ever released. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Running programs and file storage were all done in just 64K of RAM. An additional 1MB of storage could be inserted on a PCMCIA card, but compatible RAM cards are hard to find these days, so I haven’t been able to try this.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Input and output were through the ubiquitous (at the time) RS-232 port. A standard (again for the time) centronics parallel port is also available for connecting to a printer.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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The display on the NC100 is 480 pixels wide by 64 pixels tall (equating to 80 columns by 8 rows). This is wide and tall enough for any of the build-in functions. It’s monochrome blue rather than black and has no shades of blue (pixels are just on or off), and it’s not backlit. Despite that, it’s not terrible, but neither is it great.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The keyboard is full size and nice enough to type on. The layout is pretty ordinary except for a couple of oddities (compared to modern full-size keyboads).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Firstly, escape has been replaced by Stop – it does what you’d expect Escape to do. Then there’s two delete keys – normally these would be called Delete and Backspace. Finally, there’s the slightly odd layout of the arrow keys, along with the brightly coloured Function and menu keys. They’re used for switching apps – more about that in the Software<\/em> section below. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That arrow key arrangement catches me out all the time after more than 30 years of using the inverted-T PC layout.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Summary<\/h3>\n\n\n\n