Telemetrix Plc’s Westward Technology Ltd subsidiary has moved into the low-end stand-alone graphics market with the launch of the 80386-based Personal Graphics Ser-ies. The new line consists of three 20 monitors, displays which incorporate the monitors, and 80386-based AT-alikes fitted with the displays. The PGM-2010 features 1,024 by 784 resolution with a 48KHz refresh rate and like the 1,280 by 1,024 resolution 64KHz PGM-2012-A and PGM-2012-B of-fers Tektronix 4107 and 4115, and DEC VT220 emulation and optional buffered video facilities. Four and eight graphics planes giving 64 and 256 colours respectively are available. Combined with a plug-in graphics accelerator module built around a Texas In-struments TMS320X0 chip set, the monitors become displays able to upgrade standard Personals to graphics station quality. The AT-alikes, which are sourced from a major British manufacturer and from the Far East, are the 16MHz 80386-based PGS 3X with 2Mb RAM and 40Mb hard disk, and the 80286-based PGS 2X with 1Mb RAM and 20Mb hard disk. Each in-cludes 1.2Mb 5.25 floppy drive, serial and parallel ports, 102-key-board, and MS-DOS 3.2 or 3.3. A 20MHz 3X should be available soon and future plans include support for Xenix. Current options for the PGSes include a maths co-processor, RAM extended to 16Mb, 3.5 floppy drives, a tape streamer, and higher capacity hard disks. TCP/IP and DECnet pro-tocols for network communications are also available. The monitors list for UKP2,000 to UKP3,500, the displays for UKP3,000 to UKP5,000 and the PGSes for UKP7,000 to UKP12,000. The Personal Graphics Series represents something of a departure for Westward, which up to now has specialised on high resolution displays for engineers working on mainframes and minis. As well as the company’s traditional base, the new products may be off-ered to dealers concentrating on CAD/CAM and Desktop Publishing. Telemetrix deputy chairman Roger Crumpton is predicting monthly sales next year of 50 to 100 PGSes and 100 to 200 monitors. Even taking his minimum figures, that should mean additional revenue in excess of UKP550,000 per month, or equivalent to half Telemetrix’s current turnover. But Crumpton is not getting carried away by the prospects. He describes forecasts for breakeven this year and modest profit next as sensible.