Tangerine Computer Systems was a British
microcomputer
A microcomputer is a small, relatively inexpensive computer having a central processing unit (CPU) made out of a microprocessor. The computer also includes memory and input/output (I/O) circuitry together mounted on a printed circuit board (PC ...
company founded in 1979 by Dr. Paul Johnson, Mark Rainer and Nigel Penton Tilbury in
St. Ives,
Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East of England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and North ...
.
The very first product was the successful TAN1648 VDU kit which received much acclaim in the technical press.
The home computer market was beginning to move, albeit slowly, and it was essential to establish a presence. Development and expansion was imperative. It was decided that the latter two partners would relinquish their involvement in order to focus on their consultancy work.
Barry Muncaster became involved operationally and the company moved to new premises in
Ely Ely or ELY may refer to:
Places Ireland
* Éile, a medieval kingdom commonly anglicised Ely
* Ely Place, Dublin, a street
United Kingdom
* Ely, Cambridgeshire, a cathedral city in Cambridgeshire, England
** Ely Cathedral
Ely Cathedral, formal ...
,
Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East of England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and North ...
. The company was later renamed, and was known as Oric Products International.
Early years: Microtan 65
![Tangerine Microtan 65 In System Rack (white bg)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/Tangerine_Microtan_65_In_System_Rack_%28white_bg%29.jpg)
Tangerine produced one of the first
6502
The MOS Technology 6502 (typically pronounced "sixty-five-oh-two" or "six-five-oh-two") William Mensch and the moderator both pronounce the 6502 microprocessor as ''"sixty-five-oh-two"''. is an 8-bit microprocessor that was designed by a small te ...
-based kit computers, the
Microtan 65. It had a 3
U form factor, a small amount of
memory
Memory is the faculty of the mind by which data or information is encoded, stored, and retrieved when needed. It is the retention of information over time for the purpose of influencing future action. If past events could not be remembered, ...
(RAM), a video character generator and
UHF modulator for use with a
TV set, and a simple latch for entering
hex data from a keypad, and the computer was designed to be expandable. The manual came with a one-
kilobyte
The kilobyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information.
The International System of Units (SI) defines the prefix ''kilo'' as 1000 (103); per this definition, one kilobyte is 1000 bytes.International Standard IEC 80000-13 Quantiti ...
listing of
Conway's Game of Life
The Game of Life, also known simply as Life, is a cellular automaton devised by the British mathematician John Horton Conway in 1970. It is a zero-player game, meaning that its evolution is determined by its initial state, requiring no further ...
. An optional expansion board could be built with a
UART
A universal asynchronous receiver-transmitter (UART ) is a computer hardware device for asynchronous serial communication in which the data format and transmission speeds are configurable. It sends data bits one by one, from the least significan ...
, more memory and
BASIC
BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College ...
ROM
Rom, or ROM may refer to:
Biomechanics and medicine
* Risk of mortality, a medical classification to estimate the likelihood of death for a patient
* Rupture of membranes, a term used during pregnancy to describe a rupture of the amniotic sac
* R ...
s. Additional expansion boards became available later, offering more RAM, dedicated
serial and
parallel
Parallel is a geometric term of location which may refer to:
Computing
* Parallel algorithm
* Parallel computing
* Parallel metaheuristic
* Parallel (software), a UNIX utility for running programs in parallel
* Parallel Sysplex, a cluster of IBM ...
I/O boards, etc.
After the
Microtan 65, Tangerine planned to build a desktop machine and managed to get as far as selling the design for the Microtan 2 also known as Tangerine Tiger to
HH Electronics
HH Electronics is a British amplifier manufacturer, that was founded in 1968 by Mike Harrison, Malcolm Green and Graham Lowes in Harston near Cambridge, England, where its first solid state TPA and MA range of studio quality amplifiers were desig ...
, better known for building amplifiers. They released it as the HH Tiger, but it was not a commercial success.
Tantel
Several
Prestel
Prestel (abbrev. from press telephone), the brand name for the UK Post Office Telecommunications's Viewdata technology, was an interactive videotex system developed during the late 1970s and commercially launched in 1979. It achieved a maximu ...
machines were sold, under the general designation of ''Tantel'':
*AlphaTantel (1981) – Prestel adapter with a full keyboard and a phone connection jack. Connection to a TV was through a RF modulator, but there was also a RGB output. Built in modem was 1200 baud. It was possible to connect a tape recorder to save data and a printer.
*New Tantel Adaptor (1981) – Prestel adapter
*Tantel Data Adaptor (1984) – Data adaptor for use with the Prestel system, including a data tape recorder
1983 onwards: The Oric family
With the success of the
ZX Spectrum
The ZX Spectrum () is an 8-bit computing, 8-bit home computer that was developed by Sinclair Research. It was released in the United Kingdom on 23 April 1982, and became Britain's best-selling microcomputer.
Referred to during development as t ...
Tangerine's backers suggested a
home computer and Tangerine formed ''Oric Products International Ltd'' to develop and release the Oric-1 in 1983. A series of Oric computers (including the Atmos) followed through to 1987.
On 13 October 1983 the factory of Kenure Plastics in Berkshire, where the
Oric-1
Oric was the name used by UK-based Tangerine Computer Systems for a series of 6502-based home computers sold in the 1980s, primarily in Europe.
With the success of the ZX Spectrum from Sinclair Research, Tangerine's backers suggested a hom ...
was manufactured, burnt to the ground. The factory was rebuilt, minus a considerable stock of bits (including 15,000 old ROMs) that went to make up the Oric-1. In the meantime production was said to have restarted within 24 hours in a new factory. Just a day later, a neighbouring warehouse went up in flames. Police were said at the time to suspect that the arsonist got the wrong place first time round. It was about this time, too, that Tansoft moved to co-exist with Oric Research at the Techno Park, Cambridge.
About 160,000 Oric-1s were sold in the UK in 1983 with another 50,000 sold in France (where it was the top-selling machine that year). Although not the 350,000 predicted, it was enough for Oric International to be bought out by Edenspring and given £4m in funding. This enabled the release of the Oric Atmos, an improved successor to the Oric-1 which added a true keyboard and improved ROM.
Although the Atmos failed to turn around Oric's fortunes, in early 1985 they announced several forthcoming models, including an IBM-compatible and an MSX-compatible. On 1 February they demonstrated the
Oric Stratos/IQ164 at the Frankfurt Computer Show; on the 2nd however, Edenspring put Oric International into receivership with Tansoft, by then a company in its own right, following in May.
French company ''Eureka ''bought the remains of Oric and, after renaming itself, continued to produce the Stratos under that name, followed by the
Oric Telestrat in late 1986.
In December 1987 after announcing the Telestrat 2, Oric International went into receivership for the second and final time.
References
{{Reflist
Defunct computer companies of the United Kingdom
Defunct computer hardware companies
Computer companies disestablished in 1987
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