This is not the Laser you're looking for...
As my post on the Sinclair 2068 may have indicated, I’ve been combing eBay looking for some of the old 8-bit machines. One of the machines I was interested in finding was a computer with many names. It first appeared in the UK as the Texet T8000A, only to reappear later the same year as the Laser 200. After a bit of research, it seems that this machine also appeared around the world also as the Salora Fellow, Selton 200, Smart-Alec Jr.(!), Dick Smith VZ 200, and the Vtech VZ 200.
Here it is in it’s Dick Smith VZ200 guise.
Photo credit: By I, John Dalton, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2488905
To be honest, it was a bit crap compared to the machines it was competing against (primarily the ZX Spectrum), and struggled to get much market share. Nevertheless, I thought it would be kinda cool to get hold of one just because of the gorgeous tan keyboard.
As it turns out, there aren’t very many of these things available on eBay, with the only example I’ve found recently being a Dick Smith VZ200 selling for $359 plus shipping. No thanks.
But, searching for Laser computers did turn up a few more items that I wasn’t familiar with, one of which was available at a very reasonable price, and it still works. Here it is.
This is the Laser-50 Personal Computer. This Laser is made by the same people that made the Laser-200 (Vtech), but it’s a very different creature.
First off, OMFG it has an (almost) proper keyboard. These keys are full size, have full travel, and are pleasantly clicky. In fact, you could probably touch-type on this if they put a proper f*cking spacebar on it! In the manual it talks about not having a space bar to make the machine more compact, but come on, you were so close.
Next up, who the hell came up with the abomination that is the labeling to the right of the display?
Hot pink and royal blue? Whatever floats your boat. But the murky olive-green text? You can read it fine on a close-up photo, but believe me, reading that text with 49-year-old eyes even in a well-lit room is a nightmare. But the final bizarre feature is that somebody thought it would be a terrific idea to place a hot pink grid behind the murky olive-green text. What the hell were they thinking? Although the text is printed over the grid, the hot pink totally overwhelms the text making it even more difficult to read.
And yes, this little rascal actually has a display.
The display can, well, display sixteen characters. If you type more than 16, the screen will scroll giving you a tiny, tiny window on your vast BASIC program listing.
Now I bet you’re thinking, this little display is intended for use if the Laser-50 isn’t connected to an external display, like the Grundy NewBrain model AD (see below).
Photo credit: Rama & Musée Bolo
And you’d be absolutely… wrong. If we spin this beastie around we see that there are 3 ports on the back. Some kind of edge connector, a DC input, and a 3.5mm audio port to allow saving and loading programs. That’s it.
There isn’t an RF or video out on the side either. The left-hand side has a little knob to extend little legs to change the keyboard angle, and an on/off switch. The right-hand side just has the little knob.
That’s right folks. That sixteen character display is all there is.
