I absolutely love retro computers, but the downside is keeping them running, as it can be quite difficult with 40 year old equipment, this is why I love emulation, yes that does have it's downsides but it's a good option for playing all your old games etc.
So in 2024, retro games limited announced the Spectrum, a remake of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum 48k, which also runs the 128k games too, bonus.
The speccy was my first ever computer, and if I've worked it out, it was 40 years ago when we got the computer, I can still remember the smell of the computer as we opened the box, tuning in the tv for a fuzzy white screen, until you saw the "(C) 1982 Sinclair Research" writing along the bottom of the screen, those were the days.
The first game I ever loaded on any computer was this, Lunar Jetman by Ultimate Play The Game, now known as Rare. Connection to the tv is so much simpler using the spectrum, HDMI, no tuning in or anything.
The spectrum does come with 48 built in games, although I have seen there are more which you can unlock by doing certain tasks, something I haven't got around to doing as yet.
As for the specs of what runs the machine, rather than a Z80 as the original speccy was, this is now using an All Winner arm chip, but a am unaware of memory specs etc as they haven't been released at the time of writing.
I was in two minds as to whether I bought this system but I went into Smyths toys, just to see if they had one on display for me to have a look at, they didn't, but I saw this boxed one on a shelf in the office behind the tills, I asked if they had any in stock and this was the only one, it had a sticker on it stating something to do with promotion, I couldn't read it correctly as I was fairly far away from it. However I bit the bullet and bought the machine, I was so happy when I saw the serial number, as it's a model from the first 1000 made, serial 00000549. Definitely one of the earlier models.
Back in the day we used to buy computer magazines these were released on a monthly basis and had reviews of the latest upcoming games and utilities, I used to back my school books with the full page advertisements of the games, there were some fantastic artwork on there. The spectrum comes with a version of Crash magazine, a mag I started reading when I got bored with Your Sinclair and Sinclair User.
The original speccy also came with a thick binded manual, with full instructions of how to program the computer, the artwork on the original manual is very reminiscent to the artwork on the new manual, sadly the new on is very thin with only a small amount of information in there, nothing to do with programming basic though.
As I mentioned this is the best so far when it comes to these machines, I do own other retro games ltd machines, for example I have the C64 mini, the C64 & Amiga Mini. As I grew up I owned all these machines at some point, I supported the C64 from their original indiegogo campaign, BUT for some reason, I like the spectrum the best, it doesn't have the colours of the c64 or the sound of it either, so why is it the best?
Maybe it's because it was my first computer so it holds that special part of my heart, I love the quirkyness of the graphics, no it can't do colours like the C64, but the graphics look good, more detail, less blocky, I don't know, it just has that x-factor that I think the other machines kind of lack for some reason.
I really do love this machine!
I had a spectrum next, which I sold due to financial difficulty at the time, it was a gorgeous looking machine, and ran all the spectrum games, but again, I like this one so much better.
If you love old machines, then certainly check one of these out.
All the best :-)
