Year: 1989
Initial Price: ?
The Epson Equity LT (model Q150A) weighs in at only 14.3 pounds, with the hard drive and supertwisted backlit LCD. Parallel and serial (9-pin) ports are standard, as is the color
monitor port. Two option slots house the hard drive and optional 300/1200 baud
modem card.
Measurements are 12.2″ deep by 13.6″ wide by 3.2″ high. Standard RAM is
640K; ROM is 16K. Epson uses the V30 microprocessor, with dual speed of 4.77
or 10 MHz. The review unit came with one 3 1/2″ floppy and the 20 MB hard
disk.
There’s a real-time clock/calendar, and a 50-byte CMOS RAM for
configuration purposes. The LT runs on a 100/120 VAC, 200/240 VAC power supply
(and battery charger), or 9.6 NiCad rechargeable battery pack.
Epson includes MS-DOS 3.2, GW-BASIC, and a utilities disk, along with
their usual excellent manuals.
Although the keyboard has a soft, non-tactile touch, it was easy to type
on nevertheless. The function keys are on top, and a standard numeric keypad
is included in the 85 keys.
The seven LEDs indicate POWER, LOW BAT, L & R DRIVE, CAPS, NUM and SCROLL.
Since the temperature operating range was listed at 41 to 95 degrees F, I
didn’t take it poolside, as it’s well over 100 degrees outside at this writing.
Storage range, however, is -4 up to 122 degrees F.
Setup is no big deal. Epson didn’t opt for the 25-pin serial port, so be
sure to have an AT-compatible (DB-9P) serial cable on hand or an adapter.
There are two sets of DIP switches, one on the upper right above the
NumLock key and the other on the back panel. The set above controls the LCD
screen, allowing you to select dark characters on a light background, or vice
versa.
To the left of the DIP switches are the reset and CPU speed switches.
Depending upon your usage, you may not even have to change the back set of
DIP switches.
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