NAME  

Kaypro 4

MANUFACTURER  

Kaypro

TYPE  

Transportable

ORIGIN  

U.S.A.

YEAR  

1984

END OF PRODUCTION 

1985

KEYBOARD  

Full-stroke keyboard with arrow keys and separated keypad

CPU  

Z80A

SPEED  

4 MHz

COPROCESSOR  

Motorola 6845 (video controller)

RAM  

64 KB

VRAM  

2 KB

ROM  

2 KB

TEXT MODES 

80 chars x 25 lines

GRAPHIC MODES 

Virtual 160 x 100 through graphical characters

COLORS  

Built-in 9'' monochrome monitor

SIZE / WEIGHT 

45 x 36 x 21 cm / 15kg

I/O PORTS 

2 serial ports, 1 parallel port, communication socket (built-in modem)

BUILT IN MEDIA 

two 5.25'' DS/DD half-height floppy drives (390 kb)

OS  

CP/M 2.2

POWER SUPPLY 

Built-in PSU

 

Kaypro 4

Kaypro IV

 This is the Kaypro IV released in 1984, usually referred as Kaypro IV '84, as opposed to the Kaypro IV released one year earlier, and referred as Kaypro IV '83.

The main differences between the Kaypro IV '84 and the Kaypro IV '83 are:
- a faster CPU, Zilog Z80A running at 4Mhz
- a real time clock which can be used by programs


- a better built-in monitor resulting in a very sharp display. The character matrix has also evolved from 5 x 7 on the Kaypro II and IV '83 to 8 x 16 pixels on the Kaypro IV '84
- the system has now rudimentary graphics through graphical characters resulting in a virtual 160 x 100 resolution
- characters can be displayed using two brightness levels and reverse attribute
- the new prompt is a blinking square
- like on modern keyboards, J and F keys are slightly different in shape from the other keys, so it's possible to spot them while staring at the screen
- there is a built-in modem (300 baud)
- the system now has two DS/DD half-height floppy drives (390 kb)

The system was bundled with WordStar, dBase II, MicroPlan, Microsoft Basic, S-Basic, SuperCalc, C-Basic and CP/M 2.2.

In 1984, in order to be compatible with IBM software, a special version was marketed with an Intel 8088 CPU in addition of the Z80A. It was called Kaypro IV Plus 88