Misplaced Pages

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Russian. (June 2020) Click for important translation instructions. Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Misplaced Pages. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Russian Misplaced Pages article at ]; see its history for attribution. You may also add the template {{Translated|ru|Специалист (компьютер)}} to the talk page. For more guidance, see Misplaced Pages:Translation.

The Specialist (Russian: Специалист) is a DIY computer designed in Soviet Union. Its description was published in Modelist-Konstructor (Russian: Моделист-Конструктор), a magazine for scale model builders in 1987. It was the first such publication in a magazine not oriented on electronics.

Overview

The original construction was developed by a professional technical school teacher two years earlier. It was much more advanced than previous DIY computers, because it had a higher graphical image resolution (384x256) and a "transparent" video system, which did not slow down the CPU when both the CPU and the video system tried to access the RAM simultaneously. It gained limited popularity with hobbyists, though some factories produced DIY kits (Lik for example).

Technical specifications

• CPU: KR580VM80A (Intel 8080A clone) clocked at 2 MHz.
• RAM: 32 or 48 KiB.
• ROM: 2 KiB, expandable to 12 KiB. ROM contains monitor firmware.
• Video: monochrome graphics mode. The image resolution is 384 × 256 pixels. Text can be displayed using 64 columns × 25 rows of characters. Images for the upper case Cyrillic and Latin characters in KOI-7 N2 encoding are built in the Monitor ROM.
• Storage media: cassette tape. The recording format is compatible with the one used in Radio-86RK.
• Keyboard: membrane type, 72 keys. The keyboard matrix is attached via programmable peripheral interface chip KR580VV55 (Intel 8255 clone) and scanned by CPU.

References

1. Волков, А. Ф. (1987). "Ваш помощник - компьютер" [Computer is your assistant]. Моделист-Конструктор (in Russian). No. 2. p. 19. ISSN 0131-2243.
2. Волков, А. Ф. (1987). "Ваш помощник - компьютер" [Computer is your assistant]. Моделист-Конструктор (in Russian). No. 3. p. 36. ISSN 0131-2243.
3. Волков, А. Ф. (1987). "Ваш помощник - компьютер" [Computer is your assistant]. Моделист-Конструктор (in Russian). No. 5. p. 42. ISSN 0131-2243.
4. Волков, А. Ф. (1987). "Ваш помощник - компьютер" [Computer is your assistant]. Моделист-Конструктор (in Russian). No. 6. p. 20. ISSN 0131-2243.
5. Волков, А. Ф. (1987). "Ваш помощник - компьютер" [Computer is your assistant]. Моделист-Конструктор (in Russian). No. 7. p. 42. ISSN 0131-2243.

This computer hardware article is a stub. You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it.

• v
• t
• e

• Soviet computer systems
• Computer hardware stubs