Took home two Tandy CoCo 2s

I spent $80 to buy an untested CoCo 2 that was advertised as "Vintage Radio Shack Tandy TRS-80 64K Color Computer 2 Video Game Console"

The photos given:





Granted, I knew very little about the Tandy CoCo computers, but always wanted one. When I went to pick it up, he had two Tandy CoCo 2s and one Tandy CoCo 1 computers. None of the three had been tested. He told me take both CoCo 2s home and test to see if they work. One looked to be in clean and in good shape. The other looked filthy as he had not even tried to clean it up to sell. Which ever I chose, bring back the other.

I got both home and cleaned both externally including the keyboards.

I also looked at the exact model numbers and serial numbers as they can tell alot about the computer.



I could see there was a slight difference in both of the models, but was not sure what that meant for these two computers. The keyboard color looked slightly different, but other than that, they looked very much identical. So I plugged in the model that was 26-3026. That was the one that was filthy. I was welcomed with a green screen and an OK, but nothing else. I turned it on again, and this time I see it is running Extended Color BASIC 1.1. So I do some simple tests.

I'm surprised to see that memory states 24K RAM. I also verify all the keys work.
I plug in the other CoCo2 in and get absolutely nothing on the screen. Like there is not video signal output at all.


So I look up what the Model Numbers mean.

This is when I realize the working computer has been upgraded with more RAM and the Extended BASIC ROM.  So  I wrote him on what I found and set the good one up in the game room.