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Is 640 K the highest RAM available for Tandy 1000 EX?

There's no Tandy expansion that will take it higher than 640. AFAIK, there's no third party PLUS expansion either. But the PLUS slot is just ISA on a pin header, so you may be able to get an EMS card to work with an adapter. But ISA EMS cards tend to be full height, full length cards which won't fit in the expansion bay either. If it does work, you're probably going to be limited to 1 meg. Just UMBs, no high memory.
 
A plus memory expansion would be simple enough to make. The back plates would be simple as well. I just haven't found a source for the really high male .1" stacking connectors on the Plus memory board. That's the only card I'm aware of that lets you add additional cards on top of that. Does anyone have a source for them?

Also the Tech Ref describes the Tandy custom DMA controller as a 8237A but with some additional glue logic. Does anyone have a source on what that logic might be specifically?
 
geoffm3 said:
That's pretty cool! I had no idea third party PLUS cards existed.
Click to expand...
I've a 3rd-party memory card in my 1000HX, and a 1st-party memory card in my 1000EX.

I prefer the 3rd-party card for one simple reason - it just has a 62-pin header sticking up there with no "mount" for the plus connector, so I can use a 64-pin housing (utilizing only 62 pins, of course) for a home-made Plus cable. Since 62-pin stock is pretty much impossible to find these days (at least in my several hours of looking a few months back). My 1st-party Tandy memory card has a 62-pin mount, so it would need modification to take my home-spun cable - and I didn't want to modify it, as that would ruin its value to a collector if and when I ever decide to unload it.
 
So long as you fill the box completely (make the flaps a little hard to close!), use dense foam (I get it from TV or monitor boxes, even from air-conditioning boxes if I can find them), lots of bubble wrap, and give yourself several inches around all 8 sides, monitors will usually arrive in good condition.

I've shipped several over the years, even coast-to-coast, and never had an issue, despite rough handling by the shipper.
 
Also remember that the 1000EX is one of the models which "borrows" video RAM from the main system RAM, so if you have 640K installed, the most that will ever be available to you is actually 624K, because 16K is reserved for the video. And if you use one of the special Tandy graphics modes (320x200 in 16 colors or 640x200 in 4 colors), the amount of memory reserved for video increases to 32K, bringing the total accessible amount down to 608K.
 
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