Monthly Archive for September, 2007

April 23, 1982 would be a date remembered by many of the fans than the personal computer was probably Europe's most famous: the ZX Spectrum.

Developed in the UK by Sinclair Research, the ZX Spectrum was the 3rd model of the ZX series. The ZX Spectrum was the father of Sir Clive Marles Sinclair, English inventor that started its history in the 60 producing amplifiers and pocket calculators in the formats we now consider normal Sir Clive Sinclair in conjunction with Richard Altwasser (who designed the hardware) and Rick Dickinson (who designed the casing), created what would be considered the first low cost microcomputer.

With a processor 8-bit Z80A running at a staggering 3.5 MHz and 16Kb of RAM, 16K ZX Spectrum was the first computer to have the series ZX Spectrum name and was known internally as "Issue 1" seen little time after its launch have launched the Sinclair ZX Spectrum 48K model "Issue 2". Users of "Issue 1" had the opportunity to purchase the expansion of 32Kb, called RAMpack which was connected to the expansion port on the computer.

The media used for the ZX Spectrum was the audio cassette, which required a connection to a tape recorder and external models only later came to be included in the computer itself.

Due to the way it was done loading the data, the Spectrum sometimes required their users to be experts in the art of the screw The screw, existing recorders in height, was used to fine-tune the recording heads, which could decide whether the 15-minute loading a game would be (or not) a success.

There have been several attempts to change the process and replace the data carrier tape cartridge, known as ZX Microdrives, however, that the early success secured ZX Spectrum, besides the version of Basic coming in ROM (and the keys rubber ) Was precisely the distribution of the software on cassettes, which allowed a high level of piracy. Soon, the ZX Spectrum became one of the most successful computers in Europe. America had been licensed to Timex Corporation, and despite building an improved clone of the ZX Spectrum (though a bit inconsistent), the Timex never reached the same level of success for the land of Uncle Sam.

83 In the Spectrum had reached an undeniable level of fame, sold more than any computer built in the UK to date and had become a national icon. Margaret Thatcher offered a Spectrum personally to Japanese Prime Minister as a symbol of British technological prowess.
Other models followed the ZX Spectrum by Sinclair's hands, but getting the 128K Spectrum +2 and Spectrum were few who had the same success of the "Speccy" as it is affectionately called by fans.

Line Spectrum sold relatively well and was later bought by Amstrad, has developed several models specifically targeting the business market. Spectrum survived until 1992, when the 16-bit consoles from Nintendo and Sega began to gain ground in the European and American markets.

However, due to the simplicity of the hardware and operation of the Spectrum, several clones (legal and illegal) were and are still produced today, especially in countries such as China and Russia.

The Spectrum, Games and Portugal

It is said that in Portugal, include the fingers by the users of the ZX ever bought an original game. With 150 or 300 shells are obtained copies of games with photocopied covers in black and white which were often painted with markers and colored pencils at home, expected to carry the game (although some copies have quality from Spain were in color).

There were many stores that have begun to double games, were sold in stationery stores and even at trade shows, where often the business of pirated cassette ruined the experience. There are several reports of those who bought a game on Thursday and when he was trying to play, led to the beautiful melodies of José Cid.

A cassette recording for 3 hours gave a good collection of games and entire collections were made with less than 5 stories (+ / -25 €). In Portugal, the games were not protected by copyright law and the proliferation of pirated games has increased in short sales of the Spectrum at 200%.

The first Spectrums to enter our market by distributors were Spanish but quickly began to be imported from the UK and sold in appliance stores. Little or no publicity was given to the Spectrum, with only the last word for those who had one or knew someone who had. It was cute, little, had some rubber keys and even gave to "teach the kids to do math," not to mention the games we could play.

The first game I played in the Spectrum was Chuckie Egg, which should probably be one of the most popular games for the platform. Many were the afternoons after school at a friend's house to play Chuckie Egg. At the time the staff was limited to playing only one game due to the time it took to load the games at the Spectrum. However, competition and the desire to see the "frames" (levels) were following the real "fun factor".

Later they began to appear the magazines devoted to computer games, mostly Spanish journals that brought the "pokes, tips and maps. The most famous was probably the Micromania Portugal, the Spanish magazine in A3 size (in height) which featured listings of code to copy and then burn, many hours were lost just to have a game. Only later did the magazines began to include tapes of games and programs. Abroad, there was even television and radio programs that broadcast games and programs on audio cassettes to record and upload on your computer.

In Spectrum born great titles that formed the basis of what is today the industry of video games. It is some of those titles that I will speak here in future posts.