LGR - MSX 2 Computer System Review
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Date: 2022-04-14
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Comments and reviews: 10
sunspot42
These never took off in America because by the time MSX machines became available in quantity, the Commodore Vic 20, TI 99/4A, Coco, Atari 600 and 800XL, Commodore 64 and Apple // series were all fairly entrenched, covered a range of price points and were themselves all involved in a huge price war. If these had come out in 1981 or 82 they might have done much better, but there was no room for these in the US market, and the price war Jack Tramiel touched off with the C64 made the US market too expensive for the Japanese to enter with an inexpensive, non-PC compatible home computer.
If the Japanese had focused on cloning the IBM PC sooner, and gotten a product out the door before the fall of '82, they could have beat Compaq to the punch and might have entered the US market at the high end. That wasn't impacted by the Commodore price war and they might have established themselves as major players, instead of just as component manufacturers.
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These never took off in America because by the time MSX machines became available in quantity, the Commodore Vic 20, TI 99/4A, Coco, Atari 600 and 800XL, Commodore 64 and Apple // series were all fairly entrenched, covered a range of price points and were themselves all involved in a huge price war. If these had come out in 1981 or 82 they might have done much better, but there was no room for these in the US market, and the price war Jack Tramiel touched off with the C64 made the US market too expensive for the Japanese to enter with an inexpensive, non-PC compatible home computer.
If the Japanese had focused on cloning the IBM PC sooner, and gotten a product out the door before the fall of '82, they could have beat Compaq to the punch and might have entered the US market at the high end. That wasn't impacted by the Commodore price war and they might have established themselves as major players, instead of just as component manufacturers.
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Derrius
Hello
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Go good desks and Library's and go good Technologys. And logs. And go air and airwaves. And go discs. And go good logs and good desks and spirals and notes.
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Hello
Go good things and art and go science. And go good Library's. , And go good computers and technology s.
Go good desks and Library's and go good Technologys. And logs. And go air and airwaves. And go discs. And go good logs and good desks and spirals and notes.
Go good things and dictionary's and go good things and drives. And go s and r drives and go z and c and h drives. And also logs and notes and also some and reads with books and Microsoft and Cisco and with apple and with Logitech and Intel and with string or computers and systems and Xerox and IBMs. That with publishers and with new York publishing and mc Millian Publishing and also Xerox and reads and with print and printers and with office and systems. Also some and Xerox and with reads and booklet materials.
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Armand
I had an MSX 2+ in the late 80s, I think it was called F1xDJ or something. It was black and had an amazing sounchip besides the PSG, I it was FM music or something. It was really a great machine, the things you could do with the built in BASIC were miles ahead of any other 8bit computer of the time. I programmed a painting program some database and even some music player myself, and with a powerful japanese sequencer I was able to create some cool techno music. I don't remember why I even sold it at the time. It was a beast -
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I had an MSX 2+ in the late 80s, I think it was called F1xDJ or something. It was black and had an amazing sounchip besides the PSG, I it was FM music or something. It was really a great machine, the things you could do with the built in BASIC were miles ahead of any other 8bit computer of the time. I programmed a painting program some database and even some music player myself, and with a powerful japanese sequencer I was able to create some cool techno music. I don't remember why I even sold it at the time. It was a beast -
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Maarten
Do you know that that keyboard has N-key rollover or something close? With the sound chip and 128 KB of graphics (going up to 512x212 resolution) I found most PC's - including my own one that I bought by working on the land - extremely limited. Of course with the 16 bit memory addressing divided up into maps of 16 KiB it was going nowhere fast. So MSX-2 never really got an upgrade; nothing MSX-2+ or even MSX-R was going to change that. It kinda sucks if you can only address half of the memory that's in your system at a time.
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Do you know that that keyboard has N-key rollover or something close? With the sound chip and 128 KB of graphics (going up to 512x212 resolution) I found most PC's - including my own one that I bought by working on the land - extremely limited. Of course with the 16 bit memory addressing divided up into maps of 16 KiB it was going nowhere fast. So MSX-2 never really got an upgrade; nothing MSX-2+ or even MSX-R was going to change that. It kinda sucks if you can only address half of the memory that's in your system at a time.
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Josha
I've bought 5 of them about 20 years ago at 2nd hand stores for no more than 5 euros per msx. The one here in the video, the double sided version without adjustable keyboard nms8245, the separate keyboard one nms8250. The other two are msx1 computers from Goldstar and one from Canon. And a C64 for 1 euro, fully working. Amazing they sell for so much now. And those konami scc cartridge games really get expensive. Luckily I bought one for 10 euros 20 years ago too, and an fm-pac clone with a ym2413 synth chip. Good stuff!
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I've bought 5 of them about 20 years ago at 2nd hand stores for no more than 5 euros per msx. The one here in the video, the double sided version without adjustable keyboard nms8245, the separate keyboard one nms8250. The other two are msx1 computers from Goldstar and one from Canon. And a C64 for 1 euro, fully working. Amazing they sell for so much now. And those konami scc cartridge games really get expensive. Luckily I bought one for 10 euros 20 years ago too, and an fm-pac clone with a ym2413 synth chip. Good stuff!
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UncleDeluxe
When I was a kid in the 80s, a friend of mine was lucky that his dad was from Japan and worked at the NEC office in Northern California. They used to go to Japan all the time. Beyond having all the cool Japanese toys, his dad used to have all the cool computers and video games. They had an MSX- I want to say it was before anyone had an NES because I remember it being mind blowing compared to my Atari 2600. They also had a PC Engine LONG before the Turbografix-16 was released here.
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When I was a kid in the 80s, a friend of mine was lucky that his dad was from Japan and worked at the NEC office in Northern California. They used to go to Japan all the time. Beyond having all the cool Japanese toys, his dad used to have all the cool computers and video games. They had an MSX- I want to say it was before anyone had an NES because I remember it being mind blowing compared to my Atari 2600. They also had a PC Engine LONG before the Turbografix-16 was released here.
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Passant
Nice machine, I used to own one back in the eighties, when I was in my teens. You're mistaken about the OS not being build-in, though. The MSX BASIC interpreter was built into ROM and it functions as the OS. It's what you use to start native applications (when they're not on cartridge. MSX-DOS was a CP/M clone and only intended to run legacy 8-bit CP/M business applications to appeal to SOHO users. In practice it offered only limited CP/M compatibility and was rarely used.
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Nice machine, I used to own one back in the eighties, when I was in my teens. You're mistaken about the OS not being build-in, though. The MSX BASIC interpreter was built into ROM and it functions as the OS. It's what you use to start native applications (when they're not on cartridge. MSX-DOS was a CP/M clone and only intended to run legacy 8-bit CP/M business applications to appeal to SOHO users. In practice it offered only limited CP/M compatibility and was rarely used.
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PrivateSi
i drooled at the adverts for these in the UK computer press. The graphics looked really good and I loved the keyboard. Never owned one as they were too expensive and we already had a family speccy. The ST and Amiga came out shortly afterwards so they never really took off here either but some MSXs were sold in the UK. I never saw them in the shops.
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i drooled at the adverts for these in the UK computer press. The graphics looked really good and I loved the keyboard. Never owned one as they were too expensive and we already had a family speccy. The ST and Amiga came out shortly afterwards so they never really took off here either but some MSXs were sold in the UK. I never saw them in the shops.
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Vikotnick
My first computer was that exact MSX2. My mother felt generous and bought a wireless joystick with it! I remember it was terrible since it was IR so you had to have a sensor set up and not block the line of sight at any time. Plus it was stiff as a board.
Good memories though and a good step for my next computer. A C 128.
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My first computer was that exact MSX2. My mother felt generous and bought a wireless joystick with it! I remember it was terrible since it was IR so you had to have a sensor set up and not block the line of sight at any time. Plus it was stiff as a board.
Good memories though and a good step for my next computer. A C 128.
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TheSulross
Would rather have an Apple IIgs with that 65816 CPU than a Z80 system. But then LGR would quickly point out that MSX got a lot of software (i. e, games) support while the IIgs got scant software written to take advantage of its 16-bit 65816. Is okay, my main interest would be to write my own C compiler for that 65816.
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Would rather have an Apple IIgs with that 65816 CPU than a Z80 system. But then LGR would quickly point out that MSX got a lot of software (i. e, games) support while the IIgs got scant software written to take advantage of its 16-bit 65816. Is okay, my main interest would be to write my own C compiler for that 65816.
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