This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Java Buzz
by Alan Williamson.
Original Post: Computer Innocence from 1982 - ZX Spectrum and others
Feed Title: Technical @ alan.blog-city.com
Feed URL: http://www.ibm.com/us/en/
Feed Description: (Technical) the rants of a java developer trapped in the body of a java developer!
We all have our stories as to why we are in computing and what it was that caught our initial attention. For me, I am a proud child of the Sinclair era with both the ZX81 and the ZX Spectrum being the instruments of my destruction. We were talking this morning of various machines and this link was passed to me of an old advert for the ZX Spectrum. Bearing in mind that this was published to an unwitting 1982 audience, it proves comical reading.
Features touted as a must-have include:
Massive RAM - 16K or 48K
Sound - BEEP command with variable pitch and duration
High Speed LOAD and SAVE - 16k in 100seconds
Full colour - 8 colours plus flashing and brightness
Full size moving-key keyboard; with repeat on each key
and my favourite must have feature is:
ASCII character set - with upper and lower characters
Such innocence. Then where the days eh? Days where you could write in whatever case you wanted. The freedom for expression never knew such unlimited bounds!
I mock. But at the time it was cutting edge stuff and for 125 GBP. That was a lot of money back then, and whats interesting is, these machines are still fetching near that on eBAY!
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