Back in March 2017, I bought a TRS-80 Model 3 on eBay.

When I received it, I did some cursory testing. It would boot to the BASIC ROM (by holding down the Break key as you reset it).

But it wouldn’t boot from disk, either from the supplied TRS-80 boot disks, nor my Video Genie boot disks. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the fault was in the disks or the drive.

There was also some curious information about its identity.

After my recent purchase of a Video Genie II, I also had a little look around other vintage computers on eBay.

I’d always fancied a TRS-80, being the grown-up brother of our Video Genie, and having a superb design aesthetic (a 1970s view of the future).