The Multitech MPF-1

The MPF-1, or "Micro-professor" was introduced in 1981 for educational purposes by MultiTech Industrial Corp. This later became Acer. The current owner is Flite Electronics International. They contacted me and gracefully allowed making the materials available here, so I have no problem with replicating their statement here:
"Published by the kind permission of the intellectual property right owners Flite Electronics International".

There are several computers having "MPF-1" in the name:

MPF-1 (later called MPF-1A)
The original Z-80 machine with a 2 kByte monitor ROM and a six digit 7-segment display.
MPF-1B
Identical to the MPF-1A, but with the Tiny-Basic included. The original 2k Byte ROM was replaced by a 4k Byte ROM, which contained both the monitor and Basic
MPF-1P
A reissue of the 1B, but with a better keyboard and a 20 character 14-segment display.
MPF-1/65
A 6502 computer using an external video. More related to the MPF-II than the other 1s.
MPF-1/88
A 8088 computer using a 2 lines by 20 character LCD display. This one had a real case and a real size keyboard.
Board in book-type package MPF-1 in cover This is my MPF-1 in its package. There are some enhancements visible:
  • The board with wires on the right was made to test software and hardware extensions. Of course those never materialized.
  • In the extra RAM/EPROM socket is a battery backupped RAM board.
  • Above the voltage regulator is a small fan. The heatsink becomes uncomfortably hot without.
Printer PRT-MPF Microprofessor MPF-1B printer
Speech Module SSB-MPF Microprofessor MPF-1B speech processor The speech synthesis module is based on the Texas Instruments TMS5200NL chip.
Video-MPF-1 Microprofessor MPF-1B video card
character set of the VID-MPF-1B		 There are at least two versions of this board; the original with the EPROM at 0800h-0FFFh and RAM at 3000h-37FFh, and a newer version with EPROM at A000h-A7FFh and RAM at 4000h-47FFh. For the original version the monitor ROM on the MPF-1 was exchanged by a combined monitor (0000-07FFh) / VIDMON ROM (0800-0FFFh). But the later MPF-1B had a monitor / Tiny-Basic ROM. So the VIDMON ROM was relocated to A000h-A7FFh.

Useful routines for version 2.0:

  • A001h - ?
  • A004h - init 6845, clear screen, return from call
  • A007h - init 6845, clear screen, jump to 0000h
  • A00Ah - (JCRTCO) print character in C, interpret control codes
  • A00Dh - (JCRTOU) print character in C, print codes 00h-31h too
  • A010h - (JTEXCO) print 00h terminated string (start in IY)
  • A013h - (JTEX??) print 00h terminated string (start in IY) CR = LF
  • A016h - writes character set to screen
  • A019h - configure 6845 with register/data table in HL (FFh terminated)

The character set image is the result of the key sequence: [ADDR], A, 0, 0, 7, [GO], [ADDR], A, 0, 1, 6, [GO].

The 2.0 ROM has a deliberate routine to replace every printed [`afg by afhi^. Why is a mystery to me.

The manual for version 1.0 is at the Virtual library. A modified ROM is also available here fixing the character mangling.

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Last update: 2017-07-23