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Ibm XtThe IBM XT, somewhat more formally known as the PC XT or PC/XT, was IBM's successor to the original IBM PC. It was released on March 8, 1983, and was one of the first computers to come standard with a hard drive. It was based on the XT bus architecture, which was somewhat of a stepping-stone between the original PC's 8-bit ISA bus and the 16-bit ISA that would follow in the IBM AT. The system was largely intended for business users, and a corresponding XT/3270 featuring 3270 terminal emulation was released later in October 1983. The XT originally came with 128 kB of memory, a 360 kB double-sided 5 1/4" full-height floppy disk drive, and a 10 MB hard drive, a serial port, eight 8-bit ISA expansion slots, and Intel 8088 microprocessor (with a socket for an 8087 math coprocessor). The eight slots were an increase over the five in the IBM PC, although three were taken up by the floppy drive adapter, the hard drive adapter, and the serial card. Later models came with 256 kB of memory standard, and eventually models with 640 kB and a 20 MB hard drive were sold. The XT originally came only in a standard configuration with the hard disk. It was not until 1985 that a model without the hard drive became available. Other models came with two half-height floppy drives as well as the hard drive. In 1986, the XT 286 with a 6 MHz Intel 80286 processor was introduced. This system actually turned out to be faster than the ATs of the time using 8 MHz 286 processors due to the fact that it had zero wait state RAM that could move data more quickly. Like the original PC, the XT came with a BASIC interpereter in ROM. Since this interpereter was meant to be used with a cassette drive (which wasn't offered on the XT), the only ways to access it were by disconnecting all of the disk drives, or using the BASICA program, incuded on a floppy disk, which added extensions for using the disk drives. XT
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