Texas Instruments Compact Computer 40
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The Texas Instruments Compact Computer 40 or CC-40 was an early battery-operated portable computer manufactured by Texas Instruments. Released in March 1983 and priced at US$249, it weighed 600 grams (22 ounces) and could be powered by four "AA" batteries or an AC adapter. It was intended as a portable business computer, and used TI's TMS70C20 CPU, an 8-bit microprocessor that ran at 2.5 MHz.
The CC-40 had 6 kibibytes of onboard Random Access Memory (expandable to 18 KiB), 34 KiB of Read Only Memory, and a 31-character LCD display. It was capable of operating for 200 hours off one set of batteries, and memory was not erased by powering the unit off, so an unpowered unit could retain data for several months. However, no disk or tape drive was released with the unit, and a digital "wafertape" unit depicted on the computer's box was never released, reportedly because it proved too unreliable. The inability to store data permanently hurt the CC-40's sales. The CC-40 did have ports for connecting a printer and a modem.
Software was only available on cartridge, or by typing simple programs into its built-in BASIC interpreter.
[edit] References
- Thomas, David (1983). Learn BASIC: A Guide to Programming the Texas Instruments Compact Computer 40. Texas Instruments, Inc. and McGraw Hill, Inc. ISBN 0-07-064257-5.
