British Telecommunications Plc has launched an MS-DOS version of the word processing program developed by Logica for its defunct VTS2200 word processor at UKP300, UKP500 including IBM keyboard overlay, and is offering it on the IBM Personalikes it buys OEM from Zenith Data Systems. The system is called MerlinWord 5000, and is the successor to the Nexos 2200 version of the Logica machine that was sold by the late unlamented National Enterprise Board company. Telecom has acquired exclusive worldwide rights to the software, which comes in Z80, 8088 and 8086 versions. Telecom is pushing MerlinWord as part of its new T-Net 1000 local area networking group of products, based on Novell’s Netware local area networking software (CI No 623). The system will accept documents from other systems, including MicroPro’s WordStar, and supports two-way exchange of documents with the previous generation MerlinWord 4000, Logica 2200/2300 and ICL 8800 systems. The 8088-2-based M5150 XT-alike with 768Kb, two floppies and colour screen is UKP2,390, the M5150 with 20Mb hard disk, one floppy and colour monitor is UKP2,990, and the 80286-based M5200 with 1Mb CPU, 1.2Mb floppy, 40Mb Winchester and colour is UKP5,010.
