Sharp Wizard

The original OZ-7000 with a scientific calculator expansion IC Card installed
Developer	Sharp Corporation
Released	1989
Connectivity	Serial port IC Card slot

TheSharp Wizard series, introduced by theSharp Corporation in 1989, was among the firstelectronic organizers and a precursor topersonal digital assistants (PDAs). The debut model, theOZ-7000 (known as theIQ-7000 in Europe), combinedorganizer functions with an IC Card expansion system, allowing users to install software and memory cards. Over time, Sharp refined the series with larger displays, increased memory, and enhanced features, such as infrared communications port for wireless data transfer,touch-sensitive displays, andclamshell designs.

The OZ-7000 was about 6.3 inches (163 mm) tall, 3.7 inches (94 mm) wide closed, 7.25 inches (184 mm) open, and 0.85 inches (21.5 mm) thick closed, making it much larger than later PDAs. It featured a serial port (proprietary connector) to attach to aWindows PC orMacintosh or another OZ-7xxx/OZ-8xxx device, an optionalthermal printer port and acassette tape backup. The OZ-7000/IQ-7000 model featured 32kilobytes of internal memory and a 96 x 64 dot (8 lines x 16 characters or 4 lines x 12 characters) black and whiteLCD with controllable contrast but without a back light. A major advertised feature of the model was theIC Cards expansion slot for accessory cards developed by Sharp.

The expansion cards (IC Cards) were about the same size and shape ofPC Cards but predated thisstandard and were incompatible with the latter. The IC Cards were inserted in a slot behind a transparent plastic panel with an overlay touch-sensitive sensor organized in a 4x5 array of touch zones, thus allowing up to 20 "buttons" to be used for control of IC Cards functions. The selection of IC cards included memory expansion cards, a thesaurus dictionary, a Time and Expense Manager, an Investment Planner, a bilingual and 8-Language translators, an "Encyclopaedia of Wine" and even games like "Box Jockey" (aSokoban clone),^[1]Tetris,chess andbackgammon. A spreadsheet software card capable of handling 26 columns by 999 rows tables compatible withLotus 1-2-3 was available too.

The out-of-the-box functionality of theOZ-7000/IQ-7000 included a memo pad, a telephone pad, calendar and scheduling with alarms and repeating events, multi-time zone clocks, and a calculator, thus covering all the basic functions found in PDAs since. The keyboard was notQWERTY, although later models, starting with OZ/IQ-8000, changed the orientation of the screen and keyboard layout.

In 1991 Sharp released an enhanced version of IQ-7000 — theIQ-7200 with internal memory increased up to 64K.

TheOZ-8000 followed later in 1991, with a larger (240 x 64 dot) screen and 64K of internal, non-volatile memory. TheOZ-8200 was launched at the same time with 128K of internal non-volatile memory. Both models shared the same form factor. A custom fitted leather, padded carrying case was also available for both models. The devices opened in landscape rather than portrait orientation with the IC Cards slot position changed accordingly. The dimensions of theOZ-8000 andOZ-8200 were similar to theOZ-7000 at 162mm x 94mm x 21.5mm.

TheOZ-9600 andOZ-9600II were the last in this family of PDA in the Wizard line. These were larger at 180mm W x 105mm D x 25.4mm H (7-3/32" x 4-1/8" x 1"). TheOZ-9600II weighed 430g (0.95 lb) including batteries.

Later Wizard organizers were smaller, dispensing with the expansion slot and soon bore little resemblance to the originalOZ-7000.

In 1991 Sharp released also a series of IC cards allowing programming inBASIC for the OZ-7000, thus turning the organizer to more a PDA-like device. The same version of BASIC had been used in later Sharp PDAs, both Wizards and pocket computers such as theSharp PC-E500S. The line of devices utilizing touch-controlled IC cards had been concluded with theIQ-8500 model.

Starting with theOZ-8900 and, later, theOZ-9xxx series, Sharp moved to production of clam-shell design/touch-sensitive display devices. Newer Wizards had an integrated IR transmitter allowing data exchange with PCs or other OZ-9xxx devices. The innovative design had the main features of the initialZaurus line which continued this PDA family for Sharp. Due to new features,IC Cards for these devices were not backwards compatible with the OZ-7xxx series.

The later Sharp Wizards were something between an electronic databank and a PDA. They were small, lightweight devices with keyboards but no touch screen, running on a ZilogZ80.

Starting with theZQ-770, model numbers had the prefixes either ofOZ (for the USA market, where the prefix from the beginning was meant to be a pun onThe Wizard of Oz) orZQ (rest of the world) followed by a number, for instanceZQ-770, a non-US organizer with 3 MB memory, thus abandoning the IQ prefix used earlier.

• "The Wizard" (Seinfeld)

• Personal digital assistants
• Computer-related introductions in 1988
• Sharp Corporation computers
• Sokoban clones

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata