Dragon 32

The Dragon 32 is an 8-bit era computer, manufactured by Dragon Data Ltd, that enjoyed moderate success in Europe. It is based on the Tandy TRS 80 colour computer, and is partially compatible with it. It can use some of the same ROM cartridges and most of the same peripherals. Unfortunately, most ROM calls suited to one machine will fail on the other.

The Dragon 32 improved on the Tandy TRS 80 with a full size keyboard and Centronics parallel port. Two years after the release of the Dragon 32, Dragon Data Ltd released the Dragon 64, which as the name suggests had 64k RAM. It also had a slightly updated ROM and RS232 port.

One unusual feature of the Dragon 32 was that it could not display lower case characters without the aid of a special cartridge. Instead, it displayed lower case characters as upper case with inverse video.

Standard spec:

• Motorola MC6809EP (6809 variant) CPU @ 900 KHz (0.9MHz)
• 32K RAM, 16K ROM with Microsoft Extended BASIC Interpreter 1.0 (1982)
• 32x16 text display, max 256x192 monochrome graphics (8 colours available at lower resolutions)
• 4 channel 7 octave sound
• 53 key QWERTY mechanical keyboard
• RF TV and composite monitor output
• 2 analogue joystick inputs
• Centronics printer/parallel port
• Tandy TRS 80 compatible cartidge slot