Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Y'know, other stuff, Sinclair related.
chinnyhill10
Drutt
Posts: 29
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 5:05 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by chinnyhill10 »

Ralf wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 9:59 am
Where is Commodore today? Where is Atari? Where is Amstrad?
Amstrad the only company that continued to produce electronics and Alan Sugar sold up at a time of his choosing (IIRC his 60th birthday) and eventually it was all merged into Sky. Today they are now a division of Sky working a few doors down from the old Amstrad HQ which is now a hotel.

Nobody lost their job, nobody went bust. Like it or not they were the last guys left standing.
User avatar
1024MAK
Bugaboo
Posts: 3104
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 2:52 pm
Location: Sunny Somerset in the U.K. in Europe

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by 1024MAK »

@chinnyhill10, so tell us who you know of that has managed at least three good inventions say within the last 50 years or so.

Mark
:!: Standby alert :!:
“There are four lights!”
Step up to red alert. Sir, are you absolutely sure? It does mean changing the bulb :dance
Looking forward to summer later in the year.
chinnyhill10
Drutt
Posts: 29
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 5:05 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by chinnyhill10 »

1024MAK wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 2:26 pm

Sinclair found itself in a situation where it had a huge amount of money tied up in stock piled up in warehouses, with not enough money coming in to pay the large bills that were becoming due. Before the slowdown, this had not been a problem, as cash from sales always meant that there was money in the bank. Acorn also found itself with similar problems. It had stockpiles of Electons it could not sell in any quantity, but got funding from (and eventually bought by) Olivetti.


So it was not just Clive Sinclair's other projects that took down the business. Part of it was that running a business that relied on expected future sales, that was partly seasonal, then a change in demand, was always going to be difficult.
Alot of emphasis is put on Sinclair and Acorn having warehouses full of computers at Xmas '85 . There's a very pertinent point in the Amstrad Story book where Dixons are trying to tap up Amstrad for cheap CPC's because they claim they knew Amstrad had lots of unsold stock.

In fact the Amstrad warehouse was empty because Sugar had made sure he wasn't reliant on the domestic market from day 1. In fact the biggest problem was France and Spain selling machines as fast as they could be got into the country. Dixons kept ringing and they were assuming Sugar was playing hard ball but he just had no stock.

So its not so much the state of the market but just being a bit crap at business that did for Sinclair and Acorn.
chinnyhill10
Drutt
Posts: 29
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 5:05 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by chinnyhill10 »

1024MAK wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 4:18 pm @chinnyhill10, so tell us who you know of that has managed at least three good inventions say within the last 50 years or so.

Mark
Sinclair is as much a person as a brand name. Apple seem to be doing nicely as are Dyson. Both are run by the same kind of 'visionaries' that Sinclair was (or at least Apple was until Jobs died).

And there is Musk of course. Depends on if he ends up in the same hole Sinclair did.
User avatar
1024MAK
Bugaboo
Posts: 3104
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 2:52 pm
Location: Sunny Somerset in the U.K. in Europe

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by 1024MAK »

Yes, I know Amstrad did alright and indeed prospered. It has to be said that Alan Suger was a far better business man than anyone else in the U.K. home computer market. And I like the CPC machines (well designed and nice to use). But this thread is about Sinclair. No one is saying that Amstrad were bad or anything like that. So can we move on from talking about Amstrad...

Mark
:!: Standby alert :!:
“There are four lights!”
Step up to red alert. Sir, are you absolutely sure? It does mean changing the bulb :dance
Looking forward to summer later in the year.
dfzx
Manic Miner
Posts: 673
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 6:55 pm
Location: New Forest, UK
Contact:

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by dfzx »

Despite the hatchet job some people are dishing out based on 20/20 hindsight, Sir Clive will always be a hero for me. He changed my life when I was 13 years old, and went on to change the world, in almost every way for the better. He's done so without doing a great deal of harm to anyone, and not many multimillionaire businessmen can claim that.

I met him once and shook his hand. Curmudgeonly old bugger he was, and I wouldn't rush to meet him again. Still an absolute legend though.
Derek Fountain, author of the ZX Spectrum C Programmer's Getting Started Guide and various open source games, hardware and other projects, including an IF1 and ZX Microdrive emulator.
chinnyhill10
Drutt
Posts: 29
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 5:05 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by chinnyhill10 »

1024MAK wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 4:30 pm So can we move on from talking about Amstrad...

Mark
It's inherently linked though because you have the one example of a company that made the right decisions, that made the right calls.

We can sit here pontificating but throughout this period all you have to do is look at 1 - Company X who later went under did Y. 2- Amstrad did Z. It's not rocket science really. Even the computer press at the time were remarking on it.

But I'll butt out now. Forums aren't my forte.
User avatar
PeteProdge
Bugaboo
Posts: 3521
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 9:03 am

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by PeteProdge »

chinnyhill10 wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 4:07 pm
PeteProdge wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 2:48 pm If Sir Clive Sinclair hadn't existed, would the British home computing scene in the 1980s be a straight-up fight between Commodore 64 and Amstrad CPC users? I'm sure it'd have been a bit more nuanced than that of course, but I do wonder if some of the 'second division' 8-bits would have had more visibility. MSX or Acorn maybe?
As you'll have seen from my coverage of PCN, the Speccy is pretty much top dog in the sales charts every week for the magazines entire run. Without it what would have happened?

Well the C64 would have probably have been top.
It's tough to say that though as the C64 had a much higher price-point. The C64 outdoes the Speccy on quite a few things, but the low price-point of the Spectrum is why it became top dog out of the 8-bits.

In a Sinclair-less universe, I dare say the Amstrad CPC would have leapfrogged the Commodore 64, albeit marginally. For third place? You brought up the Atari 8-bit range. I think that would be very closely followed by the MSX and the Acorn Electron.
chinnyhill10 wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 4:07 pmIt's hard on the heels of the 64 most weeks. Acorn? Well that depends on if they had still decided to release the Elk and if it hadn't be crushed by being late and the might of the Spectrum.
The Acorn Electron could have been a huge contender. Alas, even in the Sinclair-less world, I don't think it would have gone much further than the Dragon 32. Come to think of it, its commercial lifespan wasn't much more than the 16K Spectrum.
chinnyhill10 wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 4:07 pmAmstrad? They would have still have released the CPC.
Definitely. And the stack-it-high-pile-it-cheap ethos of Sir Alan would have made it the 'Spectrum' of the day. I dare say 60% of this forum would be Amstrad CPC users in those circumstances.
chinnyhill10 wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 4:07 pmYou may have seen the Dragon and Oric hanging on for longer. The cost reduced Atari 8 bits may have gained more traction as well.
Depending on the politics, yeah, the Atari computers could have punched above their weight.
chinnyhill10 wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 4:07 pmMSX, not sure. It was a mess of a launch with a load of consumer confusion around it. Never really gained traction.
I always see it as the fourth major 8-bit of the European home computer scene. There was stuff out for it into the late eighties, while yer Acorn and Atari 8-bits had no chances of seeing a new game released.
Reheated Pixels - a combination of retrogaming, comedy and factual musing, is here!
New video: Nine ZX Spectrum magazine controversies - How Crash, Your Sinclair and Sinclair User managed to offend the world!
User avatar
Rorthron
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1644
Joined: Sun Nov 12, 2017 10:35 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Rorthron »

chinnyhill10 wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 4:04 pmSinclair hitting on the computer revolution was foresight but it then bankrolled a load of daft projects.
I think [mention]chinnyhill10[/mention] summarises it well here. Sinclair Research was generally successful in democratising existing technologies. It was good at cutting corners and reducing costs, sometimes by using cheap components, sometimes by design decisions that reduced functionality by much less than they reduced cost. The ZX80, ZX81 and Spectrum were all cases of this. Sinclair Radionics' efforts in calculators (and even the digital watch) were also similar and generally successful.

Where Sinclair Research pretty much invariably came unstuck was in developing new technologies: Microdrives, CRTs, WSI, etc. They were all failures. I don't know if they consumed a lot of cash as [mention]chinnyhill10[/mention] suggests, but they must have consumed some resources that would have been better deployed on a new consumer computer (as [mention]1024MAK[/mention] has said).

When it came to "inventing", Sinclair Research was actually pretty hopeless. I think the main problem was eccentric technology choices (not just in hindsight; most were seen as baffling at time). But I also question whether Sinclair Research had the resources to pull these projects off, anyway. It wasn't quite as small as [mention]Ralf[/mention] suggested (Wikipedia suggests a 1985 headcount of 140, not 30), but his point about its small scale still stands. Even at the peak in 1985, it had roughly one tenth of Apple's revenue. (That said, if it were still one tenth of Apple's size today, it would be one of Europe's largest technology companies.)
Last edited by Rorthron on Sun Jun 24, 2018 4:01 am, edited 3 times in total.
User avatar
Rorthron
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1644
Joined: Sun Nov 12, 2017 10:35 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Rorthron »

And to reply to [mention]Alessandro[/mention]'s points:
Alessandro wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 9:48 am
Rorthron wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 7:06 am It's fair also to give Clive Sinclair credit; he clearly must have also been involved.
I think that's as generic a statement as, say, "Winston Churchill must have been involved in Britain's victory in World War II".
Yes, it was deliberately a generic statement. I was raising the question of what Clive Sinclair's involvement was. That is unknown to us. To have started the discussion with a specific presumption of his role would have been question begging.

Your assumption about Clive Sinclair 's role may well be correct, but we don't know. I am just conscious that at the time Clive Sinclair often seemed to be portrayed almost as the single-handed architect of the ZX81 and Spectrum. I think some of the credit should go to others. But you might be right that he deserves the lion's share.

Really, though, I don't think this is the main issue. The biggest criticisms of Clive Sinclair are not in the successes with the ZX80, ZX81 and Spectrum, but in the calamitous other projects I mentioned, and, as others have noted, financial management mistakes at Sinclair Research.
Alessandro wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 9:48 am I won't say the concept of wafer scale integration has entirely turned to dust, at least as far as data storage is concerned. In an interview published on Your Computer, November 1987, Sinclair predicted that solid state would dominate over conventional hard disks. 30 years and more later we are witnessing just that.
That has nothing to do with wafer-scale integration; it's down to NAND flash. Clive Sinclair did nothing to deliver that.

Also he may have made a prediction, but that isn't a huge contribution, especially as it was an obvious extrapolation of Moore's Law that has been made by very many people. I predict that one day there will be more EVs on the road than internal combustion engine vehicles, one day the majority of computing will be done in the cloud, one day quantum computing will be widespread. If any of those turn out to be true, I'm happy to come back to collect any applause/prizes/knighthoods. ;)
Alessandro wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 9:48 am Research as recent as 2016 has also revived the idea of WSI in the field of artificial intelligence.
Yes, 30 years on, still nothing has happened!
Alessandro wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 9:48 am The QL was meant to be a "consumer" computer in a certain sense, aimed at small enterprises and professionals.
I think this contradictory. Small enterprises and professionals are not the same as consumers. The QL was meant as a business computer, not a consumer one.

The QL is an interesting case. It falls between the two categories I mentioned in my last post: it democratised existing technologies and used new ones (Microdrives). It's also not clear to me if it just failed because of worse execution than the ZX computers, or because it was a business computer where expectations (eg for reliability, service and support) were higher than Sinclair was used to offering.

(Sorry if this sounds argumentative; I'm enjoying this discussion.)
User avatar
Alessandro
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1908
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 11:10 am
Location: Messina, Italy
Contact:

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Alessandro »

Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 3:55 am Also he may have made a prediction, but that isn't a huge contribution, especially as it was an obvious extrapolation of Moore's Law that has been made by very many people. I predict that one day there will be more EVs on the road than internal combustion engine vehicles, one day the majority of computing will be done in the cloud, one day quantum computing will be widespread. If any of those turn out to be true, I'm happy to come back to collect any applause/prizes/knighthoods. ;)
I don't think this is a fair comparison. Electric vehicles, cloud computing and quantum computers have been around for years by now, are available to the general public (yes, even quantum computers if we take the IBM Q Experience into account), and from what the trends seem to be nowadays, it can be predicted with a good margin of success that in about 10 years or even less they will be prevalent. Nothing of this could be said of solid state data storage in 1987. In addition to that, Sinclair received his knighthood for industrial merits (at least that's what the Italian press reported at the time), not for his reflections on the future.
Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 3:55 am Yes, 30 years on, still nothing has happened!
I would not dismiss a recent, well-documented research as "nothing". Moreover, Sinclair would not be the only one to have envisioned technological advancements unfeasible at the time they were imagined. Leonardo da Vinci designed machines that could not be made into real items with 15th century technology, and it took four or five centuries to do that. Even the 3-inches mini-TV was not so far-fetched as an idea as it might seem, considering that nowadays people watch videos and TV live broadcast on their cell phones, which screens are often not so much larger. Of course they have LCD/LED screens, but in 1978 LCD technology did not allow for such an employ, and it was not as clear as today that such smaller cathode ray tubes would not yield enough image quality to justify their cost to the final user. Pretty much the same could be said for the C5, although it was a much braver attempt at a new product than the mini-TV. A much simpler, down-to-earth electric bike would arguably have been a good deal more successful than it was.
Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 3:55 am I think this contradictory. Small enterprises and professionals are not the same as consumers. The QL was meant as a business computer, not a consumer one.
I believe you are mistakenly assuming an equivalence between "consumer goods" and "lower end of the market". In marketing science and socioeconomics, professionals and small entrepreneurs are consumers as well as everyone else. A consumer product is any product that an individual purchases on the market to satisfy a certain need. A QL and a Spectrum were consumer goods exactly in the same terms as, say, a Pentax 645Z and a Canon EOS 1300D are. They basically do the same things but are aimed at different segments of the market, i.e. consumers with different needs.

Apart from this, I also believe the whole picture remains unknown to us. At the cost of repeating myself, I'll say it again: my perception is that, with a lesser ego and a more cautious, gradual approach into researching new technologies, Sinclair would have produced more goods and establish a solid brand, avoiding the rapid downfall we all know about. Ultimately however, in the great game of globalized markets, he would have been swallowed by a bigger fish. He simply would have been unable to compete with the large corporations of today.
User avatar
Rorthron
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1644
Joined: Sun Nov 12, 2017 10:35 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Rorthron »

Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 am I don't think this is a fair comparison. Electric vehicles, cloud computing and quantum computers have been around for years by now... . Nothing of this could be said of solid state data storage in 1987.
I think it's an entirely fair comparison. Solid-state storage technologies have existed since the 1960s. Moore's Law was first formulated in 1965.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 amIn addition to that, Sinclair received his knighthood for industrial merits... not for his reflections on the future.
I know. I never suggested otherwise.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 amI would not dismiss a recent, well-documented research as "nothing".
You're right. It's not "nothing". But after 30 years, we have... a paper. It's a paltry return.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 amMoreover, Sinclair would not be the only one to have envisioned technological advancements unfeasible at the time they were imagined. Leonardo da Vinci designed machines that could not be made into real items with 15th century technology, and it took four or five centuries to do that.
He wasn't the first to speculate on these advances (or even close to the first), and he didn't contribute directly to their realisation. This isn't in my view a very good argument for his greatness. I actually think you are underselling his impact on the industry!
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 amI believe you are mistakenly assuming an equivalence between "consumer goods" and "low end of the market".
I really don't think I am. The distinction between consumer, SME, enterprise is subjective, but pretty well established in the technology industry. I believe the QL was generally portrayed as a "business" computer. See The Register's excellent article, which states, for example, it was originally intended for sale to ICL:

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.ther ... nclair_ql/
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 amApart from this, I also believe the whole picture remains unknown to us.
Agreed!
User avatar
Pegaz
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1209
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 1:44 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Pegaz »

Sinclair has his place in computer history, no doubt.
I dont know him personally and cant judge him as a person.
One thing is certain, I've always been a Spectrum fan, but that doesnt mean I have to be Klive Sinclair fan, too.
User avatar
Alessandro
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1908
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 11:10 am
Location: Messina, Italy
Contact:

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Alessandro »

Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 12:17 pm I think it's an entirely fair comparison. Solid-state storage technologies have existed since the 1960s. Moore's Law was first formulated in 1965.
I think not. Again, you are comparing technology available to today's average user to something that was maybe conceived, yet unavailable in 1987.
Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 12:17 pm I know. I never suggested otherwise.
To be honest your answer suggested otherwise to me ("If any of those turn out to be true" etc.).
Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 12:17 pm You're right. It's not "nothing". But after 30 years, we have... a paper. It's a paltry return.
Again, I wouldn't call a "paltry return" a single example of a general rise of interest in a technology, which could be (I guess it in my ignorance) much more at hand now than it was 30 years ago. But to quote Keynes, "in the long run we are all dead" :twisted:
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 am He wasn't the first to speculate on these advances (or even close to the first)
I am not stating Sinclair was a genius or a hero or anyhing like that, but the way you depict him, I get the impression that you make him look like a buffoon incapable of doing anything but exploiting other people's ideas and efforts and produce outlandish statements, which seems unfair (to put it mildly) to me.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 am , and he didn't contribute directly to their realisation.
The C5, mini-TV etc. didn't come out of thin air. He did contribute directly to them, at least unless you consider "direct" contribution putting pieces together. Yes they were either perceived too expensive for the consumer target they were aimed at (the mini-TV) or affected by design faults (the electric tricycle), but he was the driving force behind all of this. He didn't just sit on a couch watching technicians and designers do their work.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 am This isn't in my view a very good argument for his greatness. I actually think you are underselling his impact on the industry!
Again, I am not stating Sinclair was "great". And I am not underselling anything. I even remembered that he was knighted for industrial merits! If that's not a recognition of an impact, I don't know what else could it be.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 am I really don't think I am. The distinction between consumer, SME, enterprise is subjective, but pretty well established in the technology industry. I believe the QL was generally portrayed as a "business" computer.
What you call "subjective" is well established in socieconomics and marketing science. "Business", "consumer" etc. are labels meant to classify individuals according to their specific needs (real or not). Please have a look at this essay for a better insight on the meaning of "consumer goods". And everyone could walk into a shop and purchase a QL if they wanted to.
User avatar
Rorthron
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1644
Joined: Sun Nov 12, 2017 10:35 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Rorthron »

Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 1:08 pmAgain, you are comparing technology available to today's average user to something that was maybe conceived, yet unavailable in 1987.
I am afraid I don't understand your point here. What are you referring to?
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 1:08 pmI get the impression that you make him look like a buffoon incapable of doing anything but exploiting other people's ideas and efforts and produce outlandish statements, which seems unfair (to put it mildly) to me.
That is very clearly not at all what I have said. My statements have been anything but "outlandish", and your accusation is quite unreasonable and unnecessary.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 1:08 pmThe C5, mini-TV etc. didn't come out of thin air. He did contribute directly to them, at least unless you consider "direct" contribution putting pieces together. Yes they were either perceived too expensive for the consumer target they were aimed at (the mini-TV) or affected by design faults (the electric tricycle), but he was the driving force behind all of this. He didn't just sit on a couch watching technicians and designers do their work.
My statement was not about the C5, portable TV, etc. It was about SSDs, which Clive Sinclair did not directly contribute to.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 1:08 pmI even remembered that he was knighted for industrial merits! If that's not a recognition of an impact, I don't know what else could it be.
I really don't think knighthoods settle anything very much.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:14 am What you call "subjective" is well established in socieconomics and marketing science. "Business", "consumer" etc. are labels meant to classify individuals according to their specific needs (real or not). Please have a look at this essay for a better insight on the meaning of "consumer goods". And everyone could walk into a shop and purchase a QL if they wanted to.
What I am calling "subjective" is something that is subjective. You are quite wrong if you are saying such terms are objective.
User avatar
Alessandro
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1908
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 11:10 am
Location: Messina, Italy
Contact:

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Alessandro »

Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 1:31 pm am afraid I don't understand your point here. What are you referring to?
All right, I will try to explain myself better.

Electric cars have been available on the market for at least a decade, although only in the last few years.
Cloud computing has been widespreadly available since about the same time.
Quantum computing is still at an experimental level but it is publicly accessible, although in a limited way.

Now, let's take a time machine and go back to 1987.
Is solid state data storage an existing technology? Yes but still at an experimental stage.
Can I enter a shop and buy a solid state drive, or a PC equipped with such a device? No.
Is the IT industry actively promoting it? Very little, the marketable current technology is by and far the conventional hard disk with heads, cylinders etc.

Let's go back to the present time. What I didn't get was your comparison between the situation nowadays, when the technology you mentioned is not only already available to the public, but actively marketed (with the exception of quantum computers), and the time when Sinclair made those reflections, when solid state technology was nowhere near as accessible, neither anyone except Sinclair and maybe a few others (I suppose) would believe it would have been the way to go for the industry. Perhaps, were you trying to say Sinclair's reflections were so trivial anyone else could have made them? If that's the case, I don't think so.
Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 1:31 pm That is very clearly not at all what I have said. My statements have been anything but "outlandish", and your accusation is quite unreasonable and unnecessary.
I understand I did not express myself clearly. I didn't accuse you to produce outlandish statements, far from it! If I believed that, I would not have taken the time and patience to answer you. I was referring to how I perceived your unfair (in my opinion) portrait of Sinclair. I got the impression that you depicted Sinclair as a buffoon etc. who produced outlandish statements (again, not you). Freakin' language barrier... :x
(Probably I exaggerated in assuming you consider Sinclair like that anyway.)
Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 1:31 pm I really don't think knighthoods settle anything very much.
Again, it seems I was not clear enough. I just said that I am not downplaying Sinclair's contribute to the industry. Quite the opposite in fact, as I stated in my previous posts. The knighthood reference was only meant to emphasize this.
Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 1:31 pm What I am calling "subjective" is something that is subjective. You are quite wrong if you are saying such terms are objective.
It would be quite wrong to believe a classification operated in a certain field of knowledge (socioeconomics) on an objective basis (the fact that different groups of people have different needs) to be subjective. What I am trying to say is that, in purely socioeconomic terms, a product branded as "business" is a consumer good as well as another one branded as a "consumer" one. The technology behind them would be different, but to the marketing department it's just a matter of labeling products according to the primary marketing target.

What is subjective is the single individual's perception instead. The QL itself is an example of this. It was, at least to my knowledge, more successful among computing enthusiasts than businessmen, who were already looking at IBM or Macintosh systems for their needs despite the huge, and much stressed by advertising at the time, difference in price. Anyway, I reckon myself I am way off topic :geek:
User avatar
1024MAK
Bugaboo
Posts: 3104
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 2:52 pm
Location: Sunny Somerset in the U.K. in Europe

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by 1024MAK »

The QL was aimed at non-gaming computing in the home ("so called professional use"), in offices at home, and in small businesses. I think Sinclair would have hoped that some bigger businesses would have used it as well.

So yes, it clearly at least partly fits in as a consumer item. In the same way that people equipping home offices and small businesses go to retail outlets or online suppliers (that sell to the public) to buy their equipment and supplies.

Sinclair was not the first to go after this market, but the QL was the first (outside Japan) to use a Motorola 68k CPU in this market.

There are numerous reasons why the QL sales were not great. Basically it was not what the market wanted.
  • The microdrives on the QL were in fact far more reliable than on the ZX Spectrum. At the time that Clive came up with the idea (prior to the launch of the ZX Spectrum) they were a promising technology that could span the gap between (cheap) audio compact cassette tape and (expensive) floppy disk drives. But the cost of FDD had been and were still were falling by the time the of the planned QL launch date. So the portrayal of some of the poor performance of microdrives on ZX Spectrums meant that reviewers of the QL started off biased against microdrives.
  • The keyboard needed to be better for an everyday professional computer.
  • The video from the QL needed a special monitor.
  • Non-standard ports and connectors
So, to sum up, the QL may have sold a lot more if it had a single floppy drive built in (a 3" or 3.5" would have been ideal, but a 5.25" would have worked as well), had a much better keyboard, had a standard video output signal, had a standard RS232 port and a Centronics compatible printer port. The cartridge port should have been dropped. And why two joystick ports on a professional computer?

The OS and SuperBASIC are really good. Add a replacement keyboard and a FDD system and it's a great computer :D

Mark
:!: Standby alert :!:
“There are four lights!”
Step up to red alert. Sir, are you absolutely sure? It does mean changing the bulb :dance
Looking forward to summer later in the year.
User avatar
1024MAK
Bugaboo
Posts: 3104
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 2:52 pm
Location: Sunny Somerset in the U.K. in Europe

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by 1024MAK »

Prototype electric cars have been around for over 50 years... The problem was always the battery technology. In the U.K. the electric milk floats were so successful and so reliable that many are still in daily use.

Mark
:!: Standby alert :!:
“There are four lights!”
Step up to red alert. Sir, are you absolutely sure? It does mean changing the bulb :dance
Looking forward to summer later in the year.
User avatar
Rorthron
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1644
Joined: Sun Nov 12, 2017 10:35 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Rorthron »

Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 2:09 pmAll right, I will try to explain myself better.
I understand your point now. Personally, though, t
I think that your account portrays 1987 solid-state storage and 2018 quantum computing as in similar states. And even with respect to the other technologies, I think there were solutions available and an evident rate of improvement that could be extrapolated. But we should probably agree to disagree. I'm not sure this point makes a big difference to either of our views.
Alessandro wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 2:09 pmI didn't accuse you to produce outlandish statements, far from it!
I'm sorry I misunderstood you. Sorry also for accusing you of something you didn't do.
User avatar
Alessandro
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1908
Joined: Wed Nov 15, 2017 11:10 am
Location: Messina, Italy
Contact:

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Alessandro »

Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 2:47 pm I'm sorry I misunderstood you. Sorry also for accusing you of something you didn't do.
No problem, really. Unfortunately misunderstandings occur when one tries to express his/her own thoughts in his/her mother tongue, let alone when the same person, as in my case, is trying to do that in another language :lol:
User avatar
Ast A. Moore
Rick Dangerous
Posts: 2640
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 3:16 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Ast A. Moore »

1024MAK wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 2:36 pm the electric milk floats were so successful and so reliable that many are still in daily use.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54ddapgD1qM
Every man should plant a tree, build a house, and write a ZX Spectrum game.

Author of A Yankee in Iraq, a 50 fps shoot-’em-up—the first game to utilize the floating bus on the +2A/+3,
and zasm Z80 Assembler syntax highlighter.
User avatar
MonkZy
Manic Miner
Posts: 278
Joined: Thu Feb 08, 2018 1:01 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by MonkZy »

I loved my Spectrum, so for that he is a Hero. The C5 was a cool idea, there is still a fan base who ride around in the vehicles. Much like the 128K Toastrack , C5's fetch good money on eBay due to scarcity of good examples. The handheld TV's...OK they were a doozy.

For me, the biggest error he made was microdrives. A friend had a two drive setup, he got it as a hand-me-down from an uncle who had bought an 'Olivetti'. This thing would eat microdrive cartridges on the slightest movement. I had the extreme misfortune of moving his speccy by no more than 5mm, after a long period of loud whirring the decision was made to pull the 9V. Safe to say he never played 3D Ant Attack from microdrive again. As well as feeling incredibly guilty for not obeying the strict 'no movement' rule, I also came to the conclusion that Microdrives were a hopeless device to trust with your data. I guess he was convinced that people wanted cheap storage. The fact was, families like my own could not really afford microdrives anyway. The wealthier folk would have paid out for a better device, 5.25 inch floppies or some such. So really a lose, lose. I am not convinced that an interface1 with 5.25" floppies would have extended the life of the Sinclair range, but it would have been moving in a better direction.

For me the real Zero for Sir Clive is him picking up 10 grand or more from the ZX Vega+ coffers...not good.
User avatar
zxbruno
Manic Miner
Posts: 213
Joined: Sun Mar 04, 2018 6:13 am

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by zxbruno »

Without Sinclair computers, we would've been... C64 users! :shock:
User avatar
Pegaz
Dynamite Dan
Posts: 1209
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 1:44 pm

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by Pegaz »

No, we wouldnt. ;)
Again, we could choose between expensive US computers or some cheaper British model.
In that case, most likely, Electron or CPC machines would occupy Spectrum place.
User avatar
PaddyC13
Drutt
Posts: 20
Joined: Fri Mar 09, 2018 4:46 pm
Location: UK

Re: Clive Sinclair: hero or zero?

Post by PaddyC13 »

Rorthron wrote: Sun Jun 24, 2018 3:55 am The QL is an interesting case. It falls between the two categories I mentioned in my last post: it democratised existing technologies and used new ones (Microdrives). It's also not clear to me if it just failed because of worse execution than the ZX computers, or because it was a business computer where expectations (eg for reliability, service and support) were higher than Sinclair was used to offering.
Bit of both probably. The delivery/execution of the QL was terrible and meant the product was discredited even before it was readily available. Had the QL come to market properly finished then its history might have been very different. I had the pleasure of using the ICL OPD back in the day and this was an impressive piece of kit. The OPD was well made, reliable, had a proper keyboard/display and the Microdrives worked.

Paddy
Post Reply