Basically, the PB-300 was a PB-100 with more RAM and a built-in
thermal printer. To our knowledge, Casio was the only company who
designed real pocket size computers with integrated printers.
Of course, the PB-300 was substantially larger than its elder brother, therefore the keyboard could be laid out more generously, with a real space bar and an additional key for paper feed.
Due to the different physical dimensions, the main PCB had a different layout.
However, the logic circuits were identical to the PB-100, with an additional
HD61914 RAM chip. No further RAM expansion was made available.
As printers needed much more energy than the computer components, a 4 x 1.2V NiCad battery pack had to be integrated, which needed to be charged with an external power adaptor. The necessary printer and battery charging circuits were built onto a second PCB.
The printer used thermal paper of 39 mm width and was able to print 20 characters per line, making printed listings a little bit more legible than on the 12-character display.
To sum up, the PB-300 was a really cute machine. Imagine taking it with you in 1983 and impressing your friends by printing business cards when needed.
The PB-300 was also sold in Europe under the name Olympia OP-644.
Thanks to Roman von Wartburg (retrocomputing.ch) for information and pictures.
Please consider donating your old computer / videogame system to Old-Computers.com or one of our partners from anywhere in the world (Europe, America, Asia, etc.).
I want a Casio PB-300. My uncle had one and I broke it as a kid. I want to surprise him! I can pay about $50 or so. Write to me at 4dylansmart at Google dot com
Saturday 16th March 2013
Dylan (USA)
i have two for sale, one turns on, one doesnt
Sunday 23rd September 2012
freddy (us)
I would like to buy a Casio PB-300 so I can sit at home and remember the early days. Anybody have one I can buy?
Tuesday 18th September 2012
Carl (United States)
NAME
PB-300
MANUFACTURER
Casio
TYPE
Pocket
ORIGIN
Japan
YEAR
1983
BUILT IN LANGUAGE
BASIC interpreter
KEYBOARD
QWERTY calculator type 54 keys with numeric keypad
CPU
HD61913 CMOS VLSI
SPEED
455 kHz, ceramic resonator used as system clock
RAM
2 KB (1568 bytes for BASIC)
ROM
12 KB
TEXT MODES
1 line x 12 chars plus a 4 digit seven segment display part
GRAPHIC MODES
None
COLORS
Monochrome LCD
SOUND
None
SIZE / WEIGHT
173 (W) x 90 (D) x 20 (H) mm / 258 g (with batteries)
I/O PORTS
12-pin expansion port for cassette interface
POWER SUPPLY
2 x CR-2032 lithium batteries Integrated NiCd batteries for printer. External charger CHA-1 (4.8V/4.1W)
