why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

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MrPixel
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why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by MrPixel »

the TS1000 had only 1k of ram, up to 16k maximum and i can't figure out why they would sell such a misleading product for 100 dollars. "Now the power is within your reach" went the advertisements. but that "Power" was only available with the expansion. you would've had a better chance with the zx81(despite it's slow refresh speed, i prefer it, if only for simplicity's sake)

what were they thinking? :lol:

here's the ad:
https://images.search.yahoo.com/search/ ... tion=click
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Einar Saukas
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Einar Saukas »

They were thinking that a lot can be done in 1K of RAM!

https://spectrumcomputing.co.uk/index.p ... machine=19
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Kweepa »

The ZX81 also only had 1k, because:
(a) RAM was expensive
(b) Sir Clive was cheap
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by MrPixel »

Kweepa wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 2:09 am The ZX81 also only had 1k, because:
(a) RAM was expensive
(b) Sir Clive was cheap
what could you possibly do with 1k of ram? i understand sir clive's reasoning but that doesn't excuse starving it of memory.
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by 1024MAK »

MrPixel wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 12:26 am the TS1000 had only 1k of ram, up to 16k maximum
Wrong! :!:

The TS1000 had 2k bytes of RAM as standard. Third party expansions could take the usable amount of RAM up to 56k bytes :D

Are you the same Mr Pixel as the member with the same name on Atari-Forum?

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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by 1024MAK »

MrPixel wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 3:58 am
Kweepa wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 2:09 am The ZX81 also only had 1k, because:
(a) RAM was expensive
(b) Sir Clive was cheap
what could you possibly do with 1k of ram? i understand sir clive's reasoning but that doesn't excuse starving it of memory.
There are chess programs that run on a standard ZX81 with 1k bytes of RAM ;)

Many BASIC programs were written that worked in 1k bytes of RAM ;)

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Juan F. Ramirez
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Juan F. Ramirez »

1K can be enough for marvellous things like the Artic's 1K ZX Chess. I've always been impressed by this game. According to the link, " It was the smallest implementation of chess on any computer until its record was broken in January 2015 by the PC-compatible BootChess"
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by PeterJ »

37 years ago when the ZX81 was released, the price point of £49.99 for the kit was amazing. It was a huge step up from the ZX80 and at a lower price point.

It was the first mass market affordable computer (especially for the UK market). It also forced tighter coding with the limited space until you could afford the 16K RAM pack. I typed in that 1K chess program from Your Computer magazine and loved it!

Just as another example of changes in technology prices, when I worked as a computer technician in the early 90s we were buying 1MB chips for our Opus PCs and they were £35 each, now you can get 32GB SanDisk USB or MicroSDs for £12 on Amazon. PCs then had 4MB as standard and ran DOS or Windows 3.1. You are unlikely to see even the cheapest laptops now with less than 4GB. Things move on.
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Einar Saukas »

Juan F. Ramirez wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 6:51 am 1K can be enough for marvellous things like the Artic's 1K ZX Chess. I've always been impressed by this game. According to the link, " It was the smallest implementation of chess on any computer until its record was broken in January 2015 by the PC-compatible BootChess"
Wikipedia is wrong:

https://www.worldofspectrum.org/forums/ ... ent_845641
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Nomad »

I would imagine some of the computer chess machines would have had a code base smaller than 1k, odds are it would have implemented the full rule set also (people being far more critical of a dedicated chess computer not implementing the complete rule set properly vs a micro-computer).

Under the hood these things were z80 or 6502 for the most part.

I will need to dig up the quote but it came from a 80s computer chess book paraphrasing .. 'as long as the author implements the rules of chess, it does not matter how useless a game it is, its still technically chess under the trade description act..'

legal weenies - would the micro computer chess games fail a trade description case assuming they didn't actually implement the rules properly?
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by beanz »

When I got my ZX81 I was at the time in High School and had taken Computer studies as one of my 4th/5th year options.

We were writing short 5-15 line basic programs etc for homework so the 1k was plenty enough for me to do that on..yes I actually did use it for homework.
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Juan F. Ramirez »

Einar Saukas wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 11:21 am
Juan F. Ramirez wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 6:51 am
Wikipedia is wrong:
What a erm, surprise! :mrgreen:
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by MrPixel »

Juan F. Ramirez wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 6:51 am 1K can be enough for marvellous things like the Artic's 1K ZX Chess. I've always been impressed by this game. According to the link, " It was the smallest implementation of chess on any computer until its record was broken in January 2015 by the PC-compatible BootChess"
so you're telling me, that 1k can support the whole basic program, the checksum and any other needs for said program, all on 1k ram? gotta love british engineering. that;s why i respect europe in some ways, innovation. the PAL games are actually somewhat impressive. less so for the nes and later (of which, we apologize, the developers were unnaturally stupid in this regard)
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Bizzley »

MrPixel wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 6:18 pmthat;s why i respect europe in some ways, innovation. the PAL games are actually somewhat impressive. less so for the nes and later (of which, we apologize, the developers were unnaturally stupid in this regard)
Just to clarify something, were the "unnaturally stupid" developers you refer to those who wrote the games or those who built the console hardware the games had to run on? You write from what seems a personal perspective - "we apologize" - which part of the development procedure were you involved in, software or hardware?
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by AndyC »

Well the NES had to store actual graphics data and such, where's the ZX81 was just using the built in character set. Storing all that additional content is as likely (if not more so) to bloat the overall storage requirements than pure code. The fact that most ZX81 was also written in tokenized BASIC rather than raw assembly probably helped too.
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by MrPixel »

Bizzley wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 6:41 pm
MrPixel wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 6:18 pmthat;s why i respect europe in some ways, innovation. the PAL games are actually somewhat impressive. less so for the nes and later (of which, we apologize, the developers were unnaturally stupid in this regard)
Just to clarify something, were the "unnaturally stupid" developers you refer to those who wrote the games or those who built the console hardware the games had to run on? You write from what seems a personal perspective - "we apologize" - which part of the development procedure were you involved in, software or hardware?
i'm not. i'm saying it from a U.S gamers perspective. you guys got the shitty ports and hack jobs (not that we didn't). that's why i apologized. i should've clarified that. and i played some PAL games through emulation. i understand the differences between Europe and the U.S.A but were they really that slow over on your side of the pond, or is it just my imagination?

Sonic 1 for example. though i did test both versions of super mario in nestopia and the PAL version is slower. is this the case in europe?
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Sokurah »

How old are you, [mention]MrPixel[/mention]?

It seems to me like you "weren't there" at the dawn of micro computers. 1K RAM were just the norm back then.
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by MrPixel »

of course i wasn't there. i was born in '93. my first PC was a windows 95 computer that my grandmother (rest her soul) had when i was younger. from there, i got to see the 98, vista, 7 and now 10. so yes, i was not there at the dawn of micro computers. what a silly response
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Kweepa »

Why did Ford sell the Model T with only 20 horsepower?
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Nomad »

https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazin ... 7/mode/1up

This magazine is from the period, take a look at how much a micro computer would cost, in the USA. In the UK despite the exchange rate due to shady business practices and shipping the cost would have in all likely hood just had the currency symbol changed. :lol:

Even the cheapest machines here would have cost the same as a second hand car, the more capable machines would have cost the same as a new car or more...

Even the S-100 bus cards - just the cards cost more - far more than a zx-81 would.

To have a machine enter the market that cost less than an expansion card for a typical micro-computer was mind blowing. Why he did it - to get market share, get PR, destroy the margin of competitors who were also entering the market.
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Sokurah »

MrPixel wrote: Sat Apr 14, 2018 12:48 am of course i wasn't there. i was born in '93. so yes, i was not there at the dawn of micro computers. what a silly response
No, my response wasn't silly. And how on Earth could I know when you were born before I asked?
As you didn't understand "why the zx81 is so slow" or "why sell computers with only 1K RAM" I just wanted to know if the reason was that you just didn't grow up with technology having those limitations, but being born in '93 explains precisely why you ask those questions. Which is okay. I just wanted to know where the questions came from.
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by ZXDunny »

PSST! Nobody tell him how much RAM the Atari VCS (2600) had!
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by MrPixel »

Sokurah wrote: Sat Apr 14, 2018 9:56 am
MrPixel wrote: Sat Apr 14, 2018 12:48 am of course i wasn't there. i was born in '93. so yes, i was not there at the dawn of micro computers. what a silly response
No, my response wasn't silly. And how on Earth could I know when you were born before I asked?
As you didn't understand "why the zx81 is so slow" or "why sell computers with only 1K RAM" I just wanted to know if the reason was that you just didn't grow up with technology having those limitations, but being born in '93 explains precisely why you ask those questions. Which is okay. I just wanted to know where the questions came from.
it's my fault for overreacting. sorry. and yes, the vcs had about 4k, expandable to 8 with bank switching
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by ZXDunny »

MrPixel wrote: Sat Apr 14, 2018 5:13 pm it's my fault for overreacting. sorry. and yes, the vcs had about 4k, expandable to 8 with bank switching
That's not the original 2600. That had 128 bytes of RAM.
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Re: why sell a computer with only 1k of ram?

Post by Nomad »

Senor Pixel, you are thinking of the ROM cartridge.

2,4,8,16k

Look at the Combat cartridge.

http://www.atariage.com/2600/archives/c ... index.html

As Dunny says the 2600 had a tiny amount of RAM.

There is an excellent book about the 2600...

https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/racing-beam

I think you will enjoy it if you don't already own a copy.
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