Hitachi, along with Sharp and Canon, were among the Japanese video manufacturers who have decided to diversify into computers. They brought with them a strong reputation for reliability and value for money.
The Hitachi MB-16000 was one of the first Japanese IBM PC compatibles.It was certainly well equipped and was able to compete at the highest level of PC and compatible systems of the time. It came complete with a colour monitor.
One of its interesting characteristics was its "enhanced" graphic mode: it was primary designed to be a CAD computer. A colour and monochrome version existed.
It ran MS-DOS. It was possible to connect an optional 10 Mb hard disk and a 256 Kb RAMdisk card was designed especially for this computer.
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Dennis adds:
However, it was unable to run any standard PC applications which required graphics. A UK club was formed to sleuth out any such programs which it could manage. By the end of 1986 the "sure to be a great success " "best value on the market" (as the 1984 reviewers said) was dead and gone under the onslaught of IBM PC's and Apples, to say nothing of Atari and partners!
Please consider donating your old computer / videogame system to Old-Computers.com or one of our partners.
The 5.25'' drives were only 320kb not 360kb as usual on PC. It had a "reset" key directly on the keyboard, you can see it on the picture as the "F11" key, it looks bigger than others because it was surrounded by plastic to prevent miss typing.
Monday 27th December 2004
Albert (france)
NAME
MB-16000
MANUFACTURER
Hitachi
TYPE
Home Computer
ORIGIN
Japan
YEAR
1982
KEYBOARD
Full stroke 90 keys with numeric keypad and 11 function keys
CPU
Intel 8088
SPEED
4 MHz
CO-PROCESSOR
Optional 8087 math coprocessor
RAM
128 KB (up to 384 KB)
VRAM
192 KB
ROM
16 KB
TEXT MODES
40 or 80 chars x 25 lines
GRAPHIC MODES
640 x 400 / 320 x 200 / 640 x 200 / 320 x 400
COLORS
16
SOUND
Beeper
SIZE / WEIGHT
49 (W) x 25 (D) x 30.5 (H) cm (system unit)
I/O PORTS
RS232c, Centronics, RGB, Disk, Light Pen, 8 bit slots (5)
BUILT IN MEDIA
Two 5.25'' DS/DD floppy discs
OS
MS DOS
POWER SUPPLY
Built-in power supply unit
PERIPHERALS
5 expansion slots, 8'' floppy drives, 10 MB hard disc
