Personal Computer News


New Printer Puts A Spanner In The Works

 
Published in Personal Computer News #099

New Printer Puts A Spanner In The Works

Q. I own a ZX81 with a Memotech 64K memory and have been using, without any problems, utility software programs written in machine code, i.e. a database, an assembler and recently a word processor. For the latter I bought an Alphacom 32 pritner which is adequate for my current requirements.

My problem? With the printer physically connected all my programs LOAD but the system crashes when I try to operate them. I have tried two other Alphacom 32 printers, with the same result.

On removing the printer from the system everything works normally again. There appears to be no problem when writing programs in Basic. Is there any way I can amend my software by PEEKing and POKEing or am I stuck with an unusable printer?

C. H. Gardner
Newcastle

A. A classic case, we're afraid. Before you buy an add-on you really should check to see if it works with your other add-ons.

The Alphacom won't work with your Memotech RAM-pack, and according to Memotech, won't work with any Memotech product for the ZX81. The problem seems to be that Alphacom and Memotech use some of the same lines, so their products aren't compatible.

Memotech claims that is Alphacom's fault, as Memotech was there first, but from your point of view it doesn't make a great deal of difference - you've either got a useless RAM pack or a useless printer.

C. H. Gardner