The Merlin Tonto (OPD)

The Merlin Tonto is a British Telecom badge version of the ICL OPD (One Per Desk) there was also an Australian version called the Copmuterphone. This machine is an adaptation of the Sinclair QL, as you can see from the picture the machine had a built in phone which  could have up to 2 line and the computer could answer the phone and play a predefined message made up from over a 150 words stored in ROM, however there was no facility to record incoming messages.

Like the QL the machine was built around the 6800 and used the QL ULA's and an improved version of the Microdrive that stored up to 128K of data this was achieved by storing data at a different density.     Although this machine was based on the Sinclair QL it was not compatible as there were various alterations such as the Microdrive and a simplified version of Super BASIC as well as the screen size being smaller. The four original software packages from the QL Abacus, Archive, Easel and Quill  were supplied on ROM.

This machine was intended as an executives machine, it was designed to be simple to use and utilised menu driven software.   As the computer could answer the phone the unit was designed to run 24-7 for up to 5 years however the display would power down automatically and power up when a key was pressed or there was an incoming call.