Topic: Quite a surprise !

[Karl]

Have a read through this article, especially the bit about emails !

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/feb/28/clive-sinclair-interview-simon-garfield


.....I'm really quite stunned ! 

[MikeDX]

Tsk.. Naughty Karl. this was posted here only a couple of weeks back!

http://c5alive.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=1012.0

[techytype]

very interesting article but i vehmently disagree with quote

"The Sinclair ZX80 and ZX81 were successful in being cheap, but they failed at being useful or usable. Most buyers would have been better off saving up for something better, or waiting for the arrival of the Commodore 64 or indeed Sinclair's own Spectrum".

a brand new ZX81 and 16k RAM pack was my 1st computer, bought from Smiths Stationers in Wood Green.

realising well ahead of many in the electronic security 'game' it would eventually go this way, i needed to get into the tech.

so i many many hours typing in the program listings that abounded in magazines sold from news agents, then debugging them which meant breaking the program into chunks and really thinking in a strict straight line to get them to work.

sinclair basic and the training it enforced to ge a result has stood me in so well, i have over the years applied that thought discipline to my work and electronic designing, so to see the simple ZX81 disrespected so badly by the writer really annoys me and i'd bet others.

The C64 was my next computer, while a very good games machine but did not lend itself to the programmers or enthusiast's who could not write in machine code, ad why i'd beg to differ so angrily.

regs
Alan
//leaves stage left to take some Valium//

[Umpa]

Well I've just about had or used most of the 1980's - 1990's micro computers as they were known then, and to be honest I agree with the report.  I too spent most of my time typing in lines of code, and punching in hundreds and thousands of hex characters in to a small 30 line basic program in order to program  the machine in machine code.

The thing is we were (are) fond of it because it was our first machine, and we burned away hundreds of hours of our lives away on it, and enjoyed doing it!!!.  When the spectrum came out it really did blow the ZX81 away.  The ZX80 and the ZX81 were very similar, but the Spectrum was light years ahead, as was the C64 from the Spectrum as was the Amiga A1000 from the C64 (I know I am missing the Vic20 C16 etc) All the Amigas were just about the same (I had em all) A500 A500+ A1500 A2000 A3000 (yes a bit faster) the A1200 started to make some head way with the new graphic chip, and hard drive, but by then windows 3.0 was out and it was game over for Commodore. 

Don't forget  there were the MSX machines around the time of the C64 - Tandy's effort - Uk101 compukit (all were better than the ZX81) but some did come after it   but were ALL to expensive for the average man in the high St when you compare the price of the ZX81.

But back the the original statement, I don't think I did anything useful on any of the 8bit micro's if I'm honest, I wrote the odd crappy program, but mainly typed in other peoples. The C64 came with   basic and you could program in machine code, a friend of mine used it all the time, but like all the other 8 bit machine - it was games. Only when I had the Amiga did I realise the true potential of what the micro (now not so micro) could do and set up a printing business designing business cards on it eventually upgrading to a PC.

So there we have two chaps who were there at the time - doing our bit for the computers of the 80's, both with different memories of the time - lol

Neither of us is wrong I think...

[Karl]

Tsk.. Naughty Karl. this was posted here only a couple of weeks back!

http://c5alive.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=1012.0

..oddly enough I never picked up on the email bit 

No further news on the new electric car so far though 

[techytype]

Hi Unpha,

do you remember Heathkits computer? think it was before the the ZX80, had to either be built from a kit or you bought it ready tested.

i view it this way remember how early the ZX81 was introduced into the home computer market, like the C5 well ahead for rest on based on a low everyone can afford price.

if not for the ZX81 and it's Sinclair Basic simplicity, many of those not given to dive straight in to machine code including me, would never have gone further.

so imo stands historically proven to have been a great device, introducing the interested novice to early good practices in structured programming. required later not just for machine code strictures, but also in using spread sheets and data base's.

so yes, while i'd agree the Speccy, C20, C64 (i had the 128D version btw) Dragon 32 (still much loved by radio hams) and Amiga were far superior, they cost way more and much later to the maket.

i wonder would that many makes have come to market to cash in, without the ZX81 proving the ground and the strength of public appetite.

just why i'm so defensive of the humble ZX81, effectively i'd say what it taught me during many hours of debugging listings using logical approaches, later aided in my carrier direction being far more successful.

regs
alan

[Umpa]

Yes I agree with you - I did the same - on the same machine.  However someone coming in just 1 year later would be saying just the same but talking about the Spectrum (which was still mega cheap).  I look back and still get a good feeling inside thinking of me and my dad coding the clock program from the manual,  and saving it to  cassette tape that's nostalgia for ya !