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Good morning and welcome back to the ValorosoIT channel, the channel dedicated to retrocomputers and vintage electronics. Today I am at Varese Retrocomputing 2023 together with three people famous for their Spectrum and Sinclair computers, right? So: Eugenio Ciceri, Davide Barlotti and Mario Prato. Now each of the three gives us their presentation.
Two Italian clones of the ZX Spectrum which are the Chrome 3 (this is the third version of the all-Italian clone). So they took the original ZX Spectrum and copied it. Yes. In reality it was made with modern logic, so no longer 80s stuff, but today's stuff. The components inside are modern. The components inside are modern and reproduces the same functions as the Spectrum, adding new functions such as a faster CPU and more memory. This card, for example, is a sound card used to listen to sampled music like the Amiga. This instead is a new board that is used to connect a floppy disk to the Spectrum, using four different interfaces that were famous at the time. These are the Italian clones, let's say. These are two clones of the Spectrum.
This is another clone, but of Russian derivation. In Russia they used Spectrum clones a lot. But who made the box? No, no, this is all made in house in Italy. It's all made in Italy, let's say, the pattern and everything else is Russian. But, let's say, it was done during covid, during the lockdown. You did it. Yes, clearly using the components we had at home, as the Russians did at the time. So this is a clone with 512KB of RAM and all the various expansions that the Russians used: the real-time clock, the overclocked CPU and the mouse.
This one, however, is not a Spectrum. This is a project that came out in an Australian magazine in '79. It could be built at home and it was a small computer, let's say, to learn to program, to develop games in a very, let's say, low level way. And I took, you know, the original design and redid it and built it. In short, do you enjoy… Yes, here it's all self-construction, let's say. You built all the Spectrums yourself. Compliments!
Eugenio now talks to us for a moment about the history of the Spectrum, but not by talking, let's say, by actually making you see things, coming from antiquity to modernity. Yes, then obviously there aren't all the Spectrum models here or in any case from Sinclair, but there are those that in my opinion are the most significant, especially to get to the last one. And I'll explain why.
Let's say this is one of the predecessors of the others: the ZX81 was a black and white model with 2KB of RAM, 8KB of ROM, in short, very basic, which in any case was, already at that time for fans, let's say, for nerds, very coveted. Even if they accuse me of not having Sinclairs in my collection, but I have them, the Sinclairs in my collection. I have them. You never show them, you skip them! No, it's not that I skip them, it's that they have keyboards that don't work, because they have membranes that struggle to work.
Check this one out about bringing Spectrum into the 21st century. If you touch this keyboard here, you will feel that there are micro switches underneath. Yes… Because you replaced the membrane with switches. The membrane can already be replaced with newer and more resistant membranes, but if desired there are also micro switch membranes, which also give a different touch, a different sensation. However, returning to us, the ZX81 was precisely the black and white predecessor for a select few. Let's say that the Sinclair market was then made with the 48K model, which was originally 16KB, the Issue One, was only available with 16K of RAM and you could do few things with it. Issue One was expandable only with a daughterboard that could be placed inside the case and became 48K.
The versions following Issue One, therefore from Issue Two, could also be sold for 16K or 48K. Those who bought it at 16K could then expand it later using a kit, but even in this case you had to open the case, go and put the memory chips and everything inside the case. This is to say that in any case they weren't computers that you bought, you just used them, they were really for geeks. I mean, we had to work on it for a little while. You could also use them as they were, especially if you got the 48K version, but it had limitations compared to computers of the time, such as the Commodore 64, which was its biggest rival. Let's say this one cost a little less. Yes, this one cost a little less, but it doesn't have a dedicated graphics chip, it doesn't have a dedicated audio chip, etc. These limitations, which meant that it didn't have hardware sprites, etc., meant that the developers of the time, including myself, had to unleash their imagination to obtain graphic effects of a certain level. You had to cover with software what the hardware didn't do.
Exactly, so both with regards to the graphics, which as we can see here, had a big limitation called color clash which is, practically, as you can see, the sprite characters that pass over a colored background take on the colour, or vice versa if they are the ones who are colored they dirty the background with their colour. This color clash is actually a feature, for some reason, much loved, even if very hated by programmers and users of Spectrum, because it has its own characteristic, let's say. So, to be able to obtain such smooth results, you still needed to have a certain mastery and programming ability. Oh yes, indeed, I imagine. The same for the sound: the sound of these gadgets here is only one bit and has a small speaker inside, so very minimal. But, here too, the software engineers managed to obtain multi-tonal sounds, even on three voices, etc., without having the aid of an audio chip, so let's say it was an excellent training ground for programmers.
The subsequent versions that came out from Sinclair are this, which is the Spectrum 128K which, compared to the 48K, has the possibility of switching different banks of 16KB ROM each, up to a total of 128K. Plus, one of the banks of additional RAM acts as a second screen, so switching them very quickly could give you smoother animation effects. You shot one RAM bank and the other then he sent them to the monitor. The famous double buffer, but without the need to transfer data from one side to the other with the Z80. You were switching hardware from one screen to another. So the double buffer was facilitated by that. We got into the technical stuff. And then you say I'm not talking about Spectrum... I'm talking about it, but oh well! It seems logical, eh, an expert is needed between the two. I'm not, so... This is the latest arrival, not from the Sinclair house, because Sinclair died immediately after making the flagship model, let's say, the 128K, because Uncle Clive had other projects in his head, where he - many say - squandered his money to make that sort of electric motorcycle that was ahead of its time, because if he had made it today he would have been enormously lucky. It was really early, even in those days. He was too early and so it didn't go well for him. Let's say, that failure took away Sinclair's ability to continue down the path of personal computers, which it had effectively fallen out of love with. That is, he had moved on to something else. He had sold, among other things, the rights to the Spectrum ROM to Amstrad, etc. So Amstrad then moved on with other Spectrum models, which however no longer had that same appeal, because it was no longer Sinclair. Sometimes luck makes the name. That's right, even the name.
This is the modern one. It was created by a group of enthusiasts. In 2016-2017 they started, they had a board, let's say an FPGA which is basically a board where you can simulate the hardware of different machines and they decided to dedicate more effort to simulating a Spectrum, then adding steroids to it until it practically became an Amiga. Because then, as we will see, the graphics of this Spectrum have both the part, as we can see given that it is the same one that runs over there, the same graphics of the Spectrum with the added possibility of obtaining 256 color graphics, both as regards the Sprites and as regards a second video layer which we will then see better in a demo that I will run.
But basically, why did I bring these four machines and not for example the ZX80, which is the predecessor of the ZX81? Which is nice too, if you want. That's nice too, but these four cars in particular were all designed by the same designer, who is Richard Dickinson, of which, if you pay attention, you see that they are practically... you can see that it's the same hand that designed them. In particular, this is because Richard Dickinson was among the group of enthusiasts who had asked for funding for this project on Kickstarter. And in fact I have to say that I bought it perhaps more for the keyboard than for the card inside. Although it is still a very nice car. In fact, it's nice, even the shape and it's very reminiscent of the Spectrum. Exact. It will also have modern interfaces, I imagine because here I see that video is connected via VGA. Yes, it has VGA inside, it also has HDMI, it has several more interfaces than the Spectrum. This is precisely to bring it into the third millennium. To make it modern. That's right, it has an integrated SD card reader, although I took it out to save its original, let's say. Since I fiddle with it a lot to avoid ruining it. Avoid the various cycles.
So this is exactly what I was saying, poor Richard Dickinson died during the Kickstarter, during the crowdfunding, but unfortunately he couldn't see his machine built and distributed. They're making a second version, Kickstarter 2 which is a little more beefed up, but I won't go into details right now. Will you take it? I already ordered it, because obviously the Kickstarter has been closed for a long time. So you are already in line to receive it. I'm already queuing to receive it, as with the first version, the second also had some problems, but they're serious people and so I'm practically sure they'll arrive. Let's say this is already in itself the third millennium. Now I wanted to show how this machine, which is still ZX Next, ZX Spectrum Next, still has characteristics that lead it, let's say, to be totally different from what the original Spectrum is and to resemble more what the Amiga was in the 90s.
In fact, now, this demo that I uploaded, which I didn't make, has, let's say, these characteristics. In fact, here already this classic movement made with Copper, Amiga friends will recognize it and let's say that as this demo progresses we will reach a point where we will also get colored Copper lines and even the Amiga Boing Ball that runs on this demo. This is precisely to show how this, despite being a Spectrum, is called Next also for this reason, because it still has hardware that simulates that of the Spectrum, but which also allows you to have Amiga-type graphics. I have to say that the fact of having games or demos that are only in Amiga mode makes me lose a little bit, let's say... Yes, it's not really a Spectrum, it's no longer a Spectrum. In fact, for that reason I prefer, as I did in my previous demo, to show the interaction between the graphics of the ULA of the Spectrum, therefore the original one and the new one of the Next hardware, because having it, let's say, for this reason intrigues me more. Clearly the graphic results are much better in this purely Amiga mode, let's call it that improperly.
However, even without reaching the Next, the Spectrums of the 80s still entered in a certain sense and continue to live in the third millennium thanks to interfaces made by enthusiasts that allow, for example, this is a divIDE, practically an IDE interface, to which IDE devices can in turn be connected. In this case it is a MiniSD reader.
Ok, so modern vintage computer accessories.
Exactly. They can be connected to the BUS. Now, I don't turn this on, but it allows you to load games, etc. Exact.
This is one, it's not brand new, and a successor to this interface is the one that, among other things, created and designed by Mario Prato that we saw before.
Yes, the first presentation of the Spectrum clones. Exact.
It looks like this at startup, there is a file system inside that allows you to load files from the SD memory. I load a demo, let's say classic Spectrum, I load it obviously in a short time and then now, this one starts slowly, but it has already been loaded, it has already been loaded and it is already playing.
Exact. So let's say this, by the way, is called DivMMC 2022, so this is also a brand new object.
This is to say that they won't be immortal anyway, but thanks to enthusiasts like us, we keep them alive as much as possible. And in short, they are not tube-driven, that is, they still live. You can load games, they connect to modern computers, to televisions if you want. Yes, there are indeed some changes. So I took out the composite video output. But here, for example, I made a change so that there is no longer the RF output that went to the television antenna, but here too there is a video output for non-modern monitors, but now everyone has it.
Here to return to the ZX Spectrum Next, as you can see it is indistinguishable from an Amiga. They even used, as I was saying, Boing Balls that rotate and spin. And let's not forget that this is 8-bit, while the Amiga was 16-bit. So we say, what more do we want? A thousand thanks! Forget about it!
Let's continue with the Sinclairs, what good things can you show us? This is an interesting experiment.
Sorry if I interrupted you. This is an interesting experiment!
I'll show you a simple ZX Spectrum 48K that he used practically, here is a setup from the time: an additional disk interface for the 3.5 floppy disk, in which a Centronix printer is also connected.
So this interface is connected to the Sinclair which then goes to the printer and also to the disk. And also on the floppy disk. Furthermore, compared to this configuration which is quite standard for the time, i.e. with all the components available at the time, a dedicated interface for video acquisition has been added. Plus, there's a monochrome monitor. And here the choice was also made to both have something of the time, but also because the acquisition is monochromatic. Therefore, the system allows you to acquire both a single frame and some sequence of frames, and here we can test acquiring a frame, saving it on floppy disk and printing it.
Ok, then I acquire myself. Okay. So here, to the capture card, a camera is connected via a composite video connection. A simple black and white camera. I see myself in the monitor. And now. Now it is capturing in real time, and we can decide to freeze a frame.
Wait while I say hello, where is… here. Here, and now we have stored this frame, which let's say, is in the video memory in quotes, in the RAM of the computer. Now there is a menu where you can… You have to start again. Yes, say hello again. Let's say hello again, okay. Then there is a menu where you can select the command.
Ok, let's go and save it with a Save, we'll call it Amedeo... Amedeo2, because we've already done one before. We've already done it before, but you can't say... this is new. Now the image is saved to the floppy disk. Yes. And now you can make a copy. Shall we do a print? I try. No! It's a copy, it's not a print: it's a copy on paper. It's a paper copy! They used to call it that. Ok, so I'll try to put the microphone near the printer, see if we can do ASMR.
If we don't succeed, it's because there's too much mess, eh. Let's try. Okay. So now, with the copy command, we start printing.
Obviously this is a proportionate printer for this object, which by the way was supplied together with this interface. It doesn't have great speed: at the time there were also faster printers. But it is, let's say, a printer that is well suited to the value of the overall system. It is one-way, needle-based.
Thanks so much, then! It was a pleasure. HI!