Overview
Released in November 1984, the Tandy 1000 was followed by a series of models which appended two or three letters to the name, after a space (e.g. Tandy 1000 EX, Tandy 1000 SX, Tandy 1000 TX, Tandy 1000 RL, Tandy 1000 RLX). In a few instances, a slash and a number or additional letters were appended to these letters (e.g. Tandy 1000 TL/2, Tandy 1000 RL/HD).
The machine was primarily aimed at the home and educational markets, and it copied the IBM PCjr's 16-color graphics (PCjr's graphics were an extension of CGA video) and 3-voice sound, but didn't use the PCjr ROM cartridge ports. As the Tandy 1000 line outlasted the PCjr by many years (and in fact did not make it to market until shortly before IBM announced the discontinuation of the PCjr) these graphics and sound standards became known as "Tandy-compatible" or (for the graphics) "TGA" (standing for Tandy Graphics Adapter) and many software packages of the era listed their support for Tandy standard hardware on the package.
Tandy 1000 computers were some of the first IBM PC clones to incorporate a complete set of basic peripherals on the motherboard using proprietary ASICs, the forerunner of the chipset. All Tandy 1000 computers featured built-in Tandy video hardware with color graphics (CGA compatible with enhancements), enhanced sound (based on one of several variants of the Texas Instruments SN76496 sound generator), game ports compatible with those on the TRS-80 Color Computer, an IBM-standard floppy disk controller supporting two drives, and a parallel printer port, all integrated into the motherboard. This is in addition to the hardware standard on the IBM PC, PC/XT, and PC/AT motherboards: keyboard interface, expansion slots, memory subsystem, DMA, interrupt controller, and math coprocessor socket. (Hard disks were high end, not standard, equipment for home computers until the late years of the Tandy 1000 line, explaining the absence of an integrated hard disk controller from most Tandy 1000 motherboards.) An IBM PC, XT or AT would require at least 4 expansion cards for similar hardware: one video graphics adapter card, one floppy disk controller (FDC) card, one serial and parallel port card, and one sound card with a joystick port. (A third-party multi-IO card might merge the ports and FDC onto one card.) Therefore, the 5 XT slots of the original Tandy 1000, 1000 TX, 1000 SX, and similar models remained available for other hardware, making them equivalent or better than the 8 slots in IBM's XT and AT models (which had 8 slots because the original PC's 5 proved inadequate.)
The earlier models of the Tandy 1000 had a composite video output, and could be used with a color or monochrome composite monitor, or a TV with an RF modulator. The original 1000 and SX had a light-pen port. Unlike most PC clones, several Tandy 1000 computers had MS-DOS built into ROM and could boot in a few seconds. Tandy bundled DeskMate, a graphical suite of consumer-oriented applications, with various Tandy 1000 models.
The original line was equipped with the Intel 8088 CPU, which was later extended to faster clock speeds and also the 8086 and 80286 processors. Tandy 1000s (at least all early models) used Phoenix BIOS. Common models of the machine included the Tandy 1000, 1000 EX, 1000 HX, 1000 SX, 1000 TX, 1000 SL, 1000 RL, and 1000 TL.
For most Tandy 1000 models other than the compact EX and HX that did not come already equipped with a hard drive, Tandy offered hard disk options in the form of "hardcards" that were installed in one of the computer's expansion slots and consisted of a controller and drive (typically a 3.5" MFM or RLL unit with a Western Digital controller) mounted together on a metal bracket. Although this arrangement provided a neat physical coupling between the controller and the disk, single-sector internal transfers and dependence on the speed of the host machine to transfer data to memory meant that a trial-and-error approach was still needed to set the disk interleave correctly to ensure optimum transfer rates. Even then, transfer rates could be as low as 40kB/s for 8088 and 8086 machines.
Eventually, in 1993, Tandy Corporation sold its computer manufacturing business to AST Computers, and all Tandy computer lines were terminated. This was done because changes in the market made it increasingly difficult for Tandy to make a profit on its computer line. When that occurred, Radio Shack stores began selling computers made by other manufacturers, such as Compaq.
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