The Dragon 32/64 Story - The UK Tandy Color Computer | Nostalgia Nerd

I was a Dragon programmer 1982-1984 and this is a real treat. absolutely first rate. i learned so much from this. thanks so much.

I actually entered the Weetabix competition back in the day. I haven't heard back yet, but I'm still hopeful...

The Dragon taught me a valuable early lesson in compatibility. A visiting British guy brought one with him to show my friend who I was doing Coco programming for, and we tried it out. Nice machine but it choked on several Coco programs. I said nothing but I remember thinking, this machine isn't going to go anywhere, and I don't want to waste time porting stuff to it.

Percy: "Could it be that I hold in my hand a nugget of purest Green?". Blackadder: "No, you're just playing games on the Dragon 32."

My first computer. It was brilliant, with a real keyboard, and that glorious 6809 processor. Made a career of programming thanks to my Dragon!

Ahhh, the childhood memory of the family slowly typing in a game from a basic listing in a magazine, rotating between the 3 of us the jobs of reading, typing and checking. Then, after about 8 hours of intense copying, starting to save it to tape and my mum getting up to make us all a cup of tea... and tripping over the power cable and losing everything (including previous part-complete save to tape because we had just started writing over it)

I had a Coco 1 which I gave away to my cousin when I bought the Coco 2. Then shortly after I bought the Coco 3 and upgraded to 512K. Tandy did have a multi cartridge add-on which I also bought, a sound synthesiser, a graphics tablet, and I put together a double-sided Teac floppy disk drive for less than the cost of Tandy's single sided floppy drive. What many people don't remember is that after the Coco matured, a Unix-like OS was available for it, the OS9, a multi tasking, multi-user OS on a 6809. Pretty impressive. I dabbled with this but couldn't do much with it as I didn't have any real-world use case for it at the time. My Coco1 came with 16k. Upgraded to 64k which only 32k was usable. I had installed a tiny toggle switch to the side of the case that enabled the 2nd bank of RAM. From memory, this needed customised ROM which also enhanced the machine's functionality. Also fitted later was a lower-case kit where the character generator was removed, the lower-case board was inserted in its place, and the character generator back onto the daughter board. It was also possible to copy the ROM-Paks by putting a tape on one of its tracks which inhibited the Coco from auto-executing the ROM. The standard joysticks were shocking and felt flimsy compared to the joysticks that were available for other computers. So the Coco community discovered we could modify the tougher 4-way micro-switch joysticks for the Coco. I converted one for myself and several for Coco friends. These are all the mods and enhancements that I can think of at the moment. Would like to hear your mod stories if any. I still have my Coco 3 but never really got to use it that much at the time. I had also bought Amstrad CPC464 about a year prior to that (I felt like a traitor moving from the Motorala to the Z80), then moved onto the Amiga 500 (and back to Motorola, Yayyy!) In Australia the Dragon32 could only be seen from the Coco magazines and at the time I thought it was outright clone by the Brits as all software was almost fully compatible. Maybe I can be corrected if this wasn't the case.

Another very professional video...thank you. As a kid, I do not recall seeing Dragon machines in Western Canada, but did play many of the same games on my 8 bit Atari computer, ST and Amiga. The keyboard and system design does really remind of the Atari 800 computer. It is also ironic about the lack of programmers, for I thought there was major compatibility between the MOS 6502 and Motorola 6800 line of CPU's. Cheers.

Nice video. The games you showed at the end look really good, I was pleasantly surprised after what I expected from the system specs. Game coders really knew how to squeeze everything they could out of the old 8 bit gems.

My first micro was a Speccy, bought on mail order from Scotland. No gadget has moved me as much as my first micro. I had the micro drives and all :)

we had a zx80, followed by zx81, zx spectrum, Dragon 32 and finally Atari ST. Always had a soft spot for the Dragon, I think it was the coloured label on the keyboard. Favourite games a tie up between Ugh and Lunar Rover Patrol.

Brilliant! Thank you! Tonnes of interesting detail and very well put together. The soundtrack didn't distract from the narration which I really appreciated. Great job!

Great documentary, I've often wondered about this machine! I remember having a Speccy back in about 1987, and friends at school had mostly either Spectrum's or C64's - but I remember someone with a Dragon 32, and remember at the time I'd never heard of it when he said. Always had a curiosity about these at the back of my mind since!

I think I am really liking this channel, very informative for us non UK computer users. Sure I like LGR but seeing things from the other side of the pond (as a Brit would say) does fascinate me since the computer market was so different over in the UK. You now have a sub from me sir :D

What a fantastic video, really enjoyed it.  I remember the Dragon coming into the market and recall some of the ups and downs being reported in the gaming press, but the full history and longevity of the brand was entertaining to watch.

Thank you. It's always nice to see information about the obscure computers of the 80's era.

wonderful video mate. very in depth. I learned quite a few things there. pleasure to have been a small part of it.

Very informative and well researched. I learned a lot. Great work :)

Great video. I mostly only ever saw Commodore, Sinclair and Acorn machines, mostly the Speccy, C64 and Amiga, with the Beeb being used at primary school, but we got the computing magazine Input delivered to our house so would often see the Dragon computer's screenshots and BASIC listings. SO MUCH GREEN :)

I love learning about old tech that I didn't know about. Glad I found your channel. You seem to know everything about 1980s British computers.