Was the official name Model 3 or Model III?

written by Matthew Reed

Model III was the official name, although 3 and III were and are used interchangeably by many people.

The Model I, II, and III were the only three TRS-80 computers to be identified with Roman numerals in the Radio Shack catalogs. Although some pre-release information identified the “Model IV,” the Radio Shack catalogs always used “Model 4.” All future computer models used ordinary numbers.

Presumably, the ever increasing model numbers put a stop to the Roman numeral notation. Thankfully, this spared us the Model II/XII/XVI/VM (2/12/16/6000) business computers and the Model C/CII/CC/DC (100/102/200/600) portables.

Categories: FAQ

Comments

David Sutherland says:

I’ve often wondered this!

Why do people still say “Model 1” then? I guess I should start using “Model I”

Model III makes sense… and I’ve thought about the question several times… III vs. 3.

John_L says:

Actually, the “Model I” wasn’t named with a Roman numeral. The Model II was the first. The “Model I” was technically just the “TRS-80 Microcomputer”. After the Model II came out, people started to refer to the TRS-80 as the “Model I”, even Radio Shack eventually was referring to it as the Model I, and parts were identified as such as well. (i.e. Model I printer cable). However, Officially the computer itself was always just the TRS-80 Microcomputer.