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- #SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR MANUAL#
- #SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR FULL#
- #SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR PORTABLE#
- #SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR SOFTWARE#
- #SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR PC#
#SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR PC#
There are a few PC ZX81 emulators out there but none come even close to matching the realism of Carlo Delhez's excellent XTender2 - now in Beta testing. So even if you have an all-singing, all-dancing Pentium II300Mhz multimedia computer, you could still learn a thing or two from the old SinclairZX81! So why not try out some of the emulators or programs available here. When I was starting out on computers, this was a great philosophy to follow and today I would say that everything I know about them goes back to this excellent advice from Steven Vickers in that book!
#SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR MANUAL#
The ZX81 is an excellent machine to learn about the basics of computers on and the principles learnt can still be applied to current computing in the90's!Ībove all, the ZX81 was a computer you could experiment with and try things out on! The paragraph from the ZX81 manual quoted at the start of this page is my favourite from any computer manual I have ever read, as it encourages you to not take things for granted and to figure things out for yourself. These are the things that make this machine stand out from the rest and to this day you can still buy ZX81 kits on the Net and build for yourself this most rewarding little computer. I think that it is this power over the machine and the ZX81'sinherently simple but extremely clever design that made it so attractive.Īlthough technically, its successor, the ZX Spectrum was far more advanced, featuring colour displays and sound, to me it just wasn't as exciting a machine because you couldn't take direct control of the tv picture generation for example!
#SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR FULL#
After that you could progress to programming the machine in Z80 assembler, if you fancied, that gave you full control over the machine at every level! Well, it was a lot of people's first computer and had an excellent manual that introduced you to its BASIC programming language.
#SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR PORTABLE#
Indeed, Wilf Rigter continues to develop designs for a portable ZX81 for the 90's complete with LCD screen etc. People such as Wilf Rigter, Kevin Baker, Kai Fischer, Peter Liebert-Adelt and The German ZX-Team are still very much active!!! In addition, here at the end of the 90's, many ZX81 enthusiasts are using the Internet to stay in touch, help each other out and to share their ideas and projects. were available from enterprising companies. Back in the 80's, I kept in contact with a great guy and clever programmer, (Fred Nachbaur) who actually had a disk drive interface for his ZX81! Devices such as High Res colour graphics boards, sound cards, SCRAM memory boards, replacement keyboards etc. Over the years many hardware experts have come up with interesting add-on projects for the ZX81.
#SINCLAIR ZX81 EMULATOR SOFTWARE#
Programs were stored on tape through the cassette interface operating at a slightly slow 300Baud and a special thermal ZX printer was also available.Ĭlever software was later written to LOAD and SAVE from tape at vastly increased speeds and to print out on the ZX Printer in High Res. A 16K memory expansion pack that connected directly onto the expansion bus (prone to wobble) was available that boosted its capacity for serious applications. The ZX81 was sold retail and as a DIY kit back in 1981 and thousands of them were sold at the time. I often wonder if he ever knew about what was achieved with his machine in later years? Sir Clive himself once said that High Res was impossible. There was no graphic chip the CPU had to do the job! This was actually a major plus point for clever programmers, as it gave them total control over how the TV display was generated.
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The chips consisted of a Z80 A CPU (clocked at 3.5Mhz), an 8KBASIC ROM, 1KB RAM and the ULA. In the UK, it was the first sub £100.00 computer - cheaper than its predecessor and more powerful to boot! Other things like the cheap membrane keyboard used also kept costs down. This ULA was responsible for the ZX81's low chip count. Sinclair was able to make huge manufacturing savings by the inclusion of a custom Ferranti ULA or "glue chip" that connected the other components together in a way that made them do more than they otherwise would. The ZX81 was the successor to the ZX80 and one of the cheapest home computers. In case you are reading this and thinking to yourself, "what on earth is a ZX81", either because you never heard of it or were not born at the time, then read on.Īnother question often asked is, "why the fascination with that old computer?".