The Z80 computer was published on italian Nuova Elettronica magazine starting from number 68 of October 1979.

It was a project made by Micro Design in Genoa (Italy) that took many magazine numbers, until August 1985, and that started with a very simple configuration with a hexadecimal keyboard and 8 displays, to finish with a full configuration with alphanumeric keyboard, monitor and floppy disks.

Everything can be assembled into a beautiful light blue metallic case with integrated monitor, floppy and keyboard, or into a black rack case published lately, with separated monitor, floppy and keyboard.

The computer is made of different cards that plug in a proprietary bus card. Every card has a different function, for example there is a card for CPU, one (or more) for RAM, one for floppy interface, one for video interface, and so on.

During time, publishing of different cards lead to the fact that it wasn't possible to use all together, creating different configurations of the same machine depending on cards plugged in the bus (in this site, into add-ons section, it's explained what changes to do to use all cards at the same time).

For example it was possible to have a minimal configuration made by:

• CPU card
• hexadecimal keyboard interface
• hexadecimal keyboard and display
• operative system on Eprom (firmware)

A more powerful configuration can contain:

• CPU card
• video interface
• alphanumeric keyboard
• one or more 8 Kbytes RAM expansions, or one 32 KBytes RAM expansion
• tape interface
• printer interface
• operative system with 5.5 KBytes basic on tape

An even more powerful configuration can contain:

• CPU card
• video graphic and printer interface
• alphanumeric keyboard
• 32 KBytes RAM expansion
• 16 KBytes RAM expansion
• floppy disk interface
• maximum four 5"1/4 floppy drives
• high resolution monitor
• NE-DOS operative system with basic on floppy.

These are only three of the numerous possible configurations: it was possible to combine cards almost in any manner, and other cards were available also, like for example a hard-disk interface with CP/M compatible operative system.

At software level, the computer was sold with different basic versions, depending on used configurations.

In details it was available:

• a simple monitor on eprom to be used with hexadecimal keyboard and display
• a 5.5 KBytes basic on tape, that had the particularity to have the commands both in italian and in english
• a 16 KBytes basic on eprom card
• a 5.5 KBytes basic on floppy, that was the same basic available on tape
• a basic (version 1.0) on floppy with DOS (named NE-DOS) version 1.0 (this floppy is missing: if you have any information please email me)
• a more speedy basic (version 2.1) on floppy with NE-DOS version 1.5
• an even more powerful basic (version G.1.0), always on floppy and with NE-DOS version G.1, to be used with the video graphic interface
• a CP/M compatible operative system (named SONE), to be used also with a hard-disk.

There was also an editor/assembler/disassembler, and probably also other third-party languages (if you have any information please email me).

After some tests I made, I discovered that the NE-DOS operative system is surely a derivate of NEWDOS used by Tandy TRS-80.

Infact, even if the hardware is slightly different, the operative system uses the same file system, the same commands, the same ram mapping and the same system routines.

Probably, even if on the magazine it was never told, they simply got NEWDOS and changed it to make it compatible to different input/output peripherals (keyboard, video and floppy drives).

Also I have detailed informations that the tape basic is also a derivate from TRS-80 basic.

Into different sections of this site you will find alot of informations related to this computer, divided by category.

By reading different sections it's theoretically possible to build a complete computer. Keep in mind anyway that the kit is out of stock from many time, so you need to acquire all components and, more difficult, redraw and build printed circuits.

Into hardware section you will find detailed descriptions of every cards

Into software section you will find all system floppy and eprom images, and also images of some floppy containing programs made by me

Into configurations section you will find many possible computer configurations, and all informations needed to correctly configure all cards

Into articles section you will find all magazine articles in .pdf format related to the computer

Into add-ons section you will find schematics about a few cards designed by me, and informations about how to patch the system to use more hardware and software configurations at the same time

Into schematics section you will find a list of all computer schematics with the components lists

Into printed circuit boards section you will find the gerber files to make printed circuit boards replicas

Lastly, into datasheets section you will find the datasheets of main components used in the computer.

Into the site for every card you will find some codes like "LX.nnn": these codes are the original Nuova Elettronica kit codes.