SAM Special 2 - The SAM Coupe Fax Box

Matt Bielby David Wilson Duncan Macdonald     1) Z80B microprocessor running at 6Mhz. (That's almost twice the processing speed of the Speccy, fact fans!)     2) Control by customised VLSI 10,000-gate ASIC chip (designed by Bruce Gordon himself, no less!)     3) 256k RAM upgradable to 512k via a plug-in board, priced £39.95.     4) 32k ROM containing SAM BASIC, disk bootstrap, BIOS.     5) The Motorola MC 1377P Video Chip takes care of the graphics. The SAM offers four modes - a) Spectrum-compatible mode; b) the utility mode useful for applications such as word processing; c) a mode suited to games which takes up only 12k per screen (eight times the resolution of the Spec, fact fans); d) artists' mode allowing use of 16 colours out of the range of 128 over the 49,252 dots on the screen. All 128 colours can be used on the screen at once by use of interrupts.     6) Sound from Phillips SAA 1099 Synthesiser - six channels, eight octaves, stereo with amplitude and envelope control, plus choice of waveform. The ST only has three channels! So nerr!     7) Seventy two full travel keys, membrane type, including ten software-defined function keys.     8) The design of the SAM Coupe was undertaken by the Nick Holland Design Group. They were given a loose brief to produce a design that was practical and comfortable to use. The standard 'QWERTY' typewriter keys are set back from the edge of the casing so as to provide a support for your wrists when typing. One of the reasons the SAM was christened the 'Coupe' was because, viewed from the side, the machine resembles a fastback car.      FRONT VIEW     The two cunningly-disguised rectangular bits [at the front] can be removed to form docking slots (oo-er!) to fit the SAM with MGT's special slim-line disk drives. Should you already possess a +D disk drive then you'll be pleased to hear that you can use this with SAM. You will however need to purchase an adaptor from MGT.      BACK VIEW     The ports/buttons, from left to right...     BREAK This is the break button for breaking, escaping and crashing programs.     MIDI IN/OUT(+NETWORK) These are SAM's MIDI input and output sockets. MIDI, or Musical Instrument Digital Interface to give it it's long name, is used to link your SAM to musical instruments coming in, and a network of computers.     JOYSTICK This is the joystick port. It takes a standard 9-pin Atari-joystick (ie any except Sinclair joysticks). MGT can also sell you a special dual-joystick adaptor.     MOUSE The mouse interface. This again takes a standard 8-pin DIN 'mouse'. Yep, this is another MGT optional extra.     RESET This is SAM's reset button.      EXPANSION CONNECTOR This is your expansion connector. It's a standard 64-pin Euroconnector. This is where you can bung in things like a printer, scanner, video or video camera linked through a digitiser, or a modem.     CASSETTE This is where you plug in the cassette recorder's 3.5mm jack lead. It's a combined in and output socket like the sound socket on the +3.     LIGHT PEN/GUN(+AUDIO OUT) This is a standard 5-pin DIN connector into which you can plug in a light pen or gun. It also functions as a stereo sound output.     ON/OFF This is the SAM's personal on/off switch.     SCART This is the special 21-pin SCART socket. It's basically an output for SAM's superb-quality video and full-stereo audio outputs, which gives a much better audio-visual signal that the normal UHF socket to a television ariel input. This is of most benefit if you want to use a monitor, video digitisers or professional audio-visual recording equipment.     POWER Last, but not least, this is the 6-pin DIN connector which accepts SAM's 15-volt DC power supply. This also outputs TV video signals through to your power pack. Why? Because the lead that connects SAM to your TV comes out of the power pack, that's why!

Published in the March 1990 issue of Your Sinclair

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