This is the second model of the Comx 35. It has a better keyboard than the original which had a simple chiclet one, and also added a joystick connection.

The computer was manufactured in Hong Kong by Comx World Operations Ltd, and was imported to The Netherlands, the UK, Sweden, New Zealand, Italy, Singapore, Turkey and China.

It is one of only a small amount of machines to use the RCA 1802 processor. This was also used in some space probes, and for the time had some quite impressive specs. It had 32kB of RAM, of which 30 was available for programs, which could be expanded to 67kB, and a 16 kB ROM. It had 2 channels for sound, one of which was for tone generation, the other for special effects and white noise. The computer operating system is Comx BASIC 1.0.

The video interface or ‘Vis’ is an interesting feature, as it detects whether to run the system in PAL or NTSC, the latter runs the processor fractionally faster. The default character set is only in upper case, and 6x9 in PAL or 6x8 in NTSC, while the display is 40 column.

There were no graphics modes, but the character set could be programmed to simulate a 240x216 hi res display.

There is a 44-pin connector for peripherals that could be connected via interface cards. These included an expansion box, that allowed for four cards to be attached, or a floppy disk controller, that allowed 5.25 disks to be used, or a printer card, that supported serial and parallel.

A dedicated thermal printer had its own card, and there was one that added 80 column support, and F & M made an unofficial card that added two joystick ports.

In the Netherlands, West Electronics provided much software for free, except for charging for the cassettes and shipping. As a result the Comx was most popular in this country. Software competitions were held by West to create new programs, and some impressive titles exist, based on well known games, such as Donkey the Kong.

Manufacturer: Comx World International ltd
Date: 1983

This exhibit has a reference ID of CH68300. Please quote this reference ID in any communication with the Centre for Computing History.

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