Sinclair ZX Spectrum 48k
You have here the all-time best selling computer in Great Britain.
The ZX Spectrum was so popular and made such an impact that Clive Sinclair
was knighted largely because of it. The ZX Spectrum was the follow-on to
the popular ZX-81. It still used the Z-80 cpu and kept the single-key
command entry of it's predecessor, but added a redesigned case with an
internal 16k of RAM, expandable to 48k. Unfortunately, it's keyboard
wasn't much improved over the ZX-81, it having small rubber chicklet keys
that didn't make for easy touch-typing. An improved version later fixed
this somewhat. Shortly after the Spectrum's introduction, the 16k model
was discontinued and the 48k version became the mainstay, it being the most
common of all Spectrum models, and the one a great many programmers in the UK
started out working with. The machine was also quite well known for it's
excellent games. Like the ZX-81, Timex released it's own slightly redesigned
version of the Spectrum in North America, dubbed the Timex-Sinclair 2048 and
2068. Unlike in the UK though, the machine didn't catch on, largely due to
the inavailability of software for it. Unfortunately, the changes Timex
made to the Spectrum's ROM made the 2048/2068 quite incompatible with the
UK Spectrum's. There were also a large number of Spectrum 'clones', both
authorized and unauthorized, produced in various countries, including Russia.
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