ZX Vega+ Discussion

For experts to discuss very technical stuff and newbies to ask why the Spectrum they bought off ebay doesn't work.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by PeterJ »

I won't ever be able to see anything bad about Sir Clive! As for the Vega+ it sadly caused a huge amount of damage and long term hurt to the community.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by chinnyhill10 »

PeteProdge wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 11:56 am

I never backed it because there were always cheaper alternatives to the ZX Vega+, and if you've watched ChinnyVision, there's one of a cheap Android gaming tablet that doesn't just emulate the Spectrum, it does just about every system you could expect from the emulation scene these days.
And that's basically it. People assume you need a state of the art iPhone or Samsung to do this stuff when a cheap tablet from 2013 works just fine. Decent screen, ran everything I threw at it. And that was what, 50 quid? In fact second hand (and mine is currently on Ebay) even less!

Or if you want to throw your money around, for as little as 100 you can have something quite nice indeed that runs a new version of Android.

It's all nuts. A product that is only selling on the Sinclair name. It's kind of fun when you find a Megadrive handheld for 10 quid. Bit crap but works. But for the kind of money they wanted for a single format device and on a format that is well emulated on everything from the Amiga to the iPhone X, nah!
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by chinnyhill10 »

PeteProdge wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 1:24 pm
PaddyC13 wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 12:27 pm I have to say I am surprised that Sir Clive has not stepped in sooner (or his son on his behalf).
To be quite blunt, Sir Clive Sinclair is not the hero of retrogaming that some make him out to be. He's really stubborn, HATES the fact that Spectrum was used for gaming and well, let's be honest, decided the future of motoring was in some tiny plastic cart powered by a washing machine motor that left you nose-level with a lorry's exhaust pipe.
He seems to get a free pass over the QL which saw hardware promised that didn't exist, bugged hardware and delay after delay. Oh and the money was taken up front and promises made about delivery dates that were broken again and again. Sound familiar?

Sinclair and others doing this heavily influenced Alan Sugar's policy of not announcing products until they physically existed. Amstrad product launches from the 464 onwards had demo machines air freighted in from the production line (i.e ahead of the boat) for the people attending to use.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by Spud »

PROSM wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 1:36 pm That isn't to say that Sir Clive wasn't a good inventor, just that some of his ideas weren't thought out very well.
I would imagine for most inventors: for every decent invention there is a bunch of arse that came before it and likely after it.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by chinnyhill10 »

PeterJ wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 3:03 pm I won't ever be able to see anything bad about Sir Clive!
And this is why RCL made sure he was on-board. The friendly uncle image. Not the man who used to promise stuff that didn't exist and caused his company to go bust by spending all the profits on projects that went nowhere.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by PeterJ »

chinnyhill10 wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 3:22 pm
PeterJ wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 3:03 pm I won't ever be able to see anything bad about Sir Clive!
And this is why RCL made sure he was on-board. The friendly uncle image. Not the man who used to promise stuff that didn't exist and caused his company to go bust by spending all the profits on projects that went nowhere.
You are right, but I don't think the Spectrum would have existed without him. He is great at invention but not business!
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by PeteProdge »

PeterJ wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 3:31 pm
chinnyhill10 wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 3:22 pm And this is why RCL made sure he was on-board. The friendly uncle image. Not the man who used to promise stuff that didn't exist and caused his company to go bust by spending all the profits on projects that went nowhere.
You are right, but I don't think the Spectrum would have existed without him. He is great at invention but not business!
Imagine where he'd be if he just shrugged his prejudices and realised that the Spectrum was first and foremost a games machine. If he embraced all that, invested more into it (like Alan Sugar did when he got his mitts on the Sinclair range), he'd could swim in a reservoir of notes and coins like Scrooge McDuck.

But no, an electric cart with a top speed of 15mph is what he thought the public wanted.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by PeterJ »

[mention]PeteProdge[/mention], as mentioned above great at invention, not so good at business. I think that taking risks with new products is great, and sadly missing today. The world is full of people who made bad business decisions, but without some of these you would not have innovation that the UK used to be famed for. So I'm summary, I do partially agree with you, but not completely. That is fine!
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by hikoki »

C'mon.. think of self-driving C5 bikes on your cycle lane networks.. wouldn't it be jawesome? Obviously Sinclair AI algos should be fist be improved to prevent your jaw from bumping into other C5 and regular bicycles
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by 1024MAK »

If you are going to judge Clive Sinclair and Alan Sugar, keep in mind that both of them were not exactly known for quality products before they got into the computer business.

And keep in mind why the ZX80, ZX81 and the ZX Spectrum were successful, it was being able to come up with a design that was cheaper than the competition. And hence got a huge chunk of the new U.K. home computer market. But Sinclair always was only interested in his new ideas. If the ZX80 had not been successful, he would have given up with computers at that point. His computers were just another product.

As the home computer market took off, Sugar then saw a market he could make money from. Hence entered the home computer market some years after the ZX Spectrum had been launched (some of the delay being the development time of what became the CPC464). He took advantage of his skills, that is getting his products produced overseas at low cost and finding a team that could design and produce a computer that was at least as good as, and in many ways, better than the ZX Spectrum, but which had the 'feel' of the Acorn BBC Micro. Plus he sold it as a bundle, and in the U.K. at least, most people love a bargain bundle :D

But I don't think any of this is relevant to the Vega+ or Retro Computers. Clive Sinclair is not going to save the day. As a shareholder, you are mostly interested in getting your investment back. How you manage that with Retro Computers, I don't know. And I don't think anyone else does either. Hence this will drag on for some time yet.

I have a nasty feeling there is still a lot of the story that we still don't know. When the original team split up, is when I feared the worse, but hoped that the new team could pull a rabbit out of the hat. I'm not that surprised that they haven't.

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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by chinnyhill10 »

PeteProdge wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 4:40 pm
Imagine where he'd be if he just shrugged his prejudices and realised that the Spectrum was first and foremost a games machine. If he embraced all that, invested more into it (like Alan Sugar did when he got his mitts on the Sinclair range), he'd could swim in a reservoir of notes and coins like Scrooge McDuck.

But no, an electric cart with a top speed of 15mph is what he thought the public wanted.
One of the most telling things was that when Amstrad were casting their eye over all the computer projects Sinclair had in development, they said "no thanks" to the lot and offloaded the QL rights. There was nothing market viable there which is the real tragedy. The next generation of Spectrum should have been on the shelves for Xmas '85 but Clive was more interested in the C5 and Water Scale Integration and the Speccy was just a distraction that was bankrolling the entire circus.

All they had to do was sell and develop the Spectrum and not throw too much away on risky projects. It's nuts really.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by chinnyhill10 »

1024MAK wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 7:37 pm

As the home computer market took off, Sugar then saw a market he could make money from. Hence entered the home computer market some years after the ZX Spectrum had been launched

I have a nasty feeling there is still a lot of the story that we still don't know. When the original team split up, is when I feared the worse, but hoped that the new team could pull a rabbit out of the hat. I'm not that surprised that they haven't.

Mark

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The CPC was in gestation for a while. It was early '83 that the first abortive attempt at the CPC went into development. It eventually came to market 2 years after the Spectrum had launched in '84. And it was a competitive market as well. Over 20 different competing home computers on the market at the time. People lost fortunes, companies went bust. Very few companies walked away from the '82 to '85 period unscathed although ironically Sinclair's wounds were self inflicted.

But ironically this period *is* relevant to the Vega. Scan through the pages of Personal Computer News and you will find story after story of missed deadlines, promises not kept, vapourware, fallings out, financial disasters and high drama. In fact things were so bad that when the Amstrad DMP1 printer is launched PCN comment that Amstrad were unusual in delivering the product that they said they would, at the price they said they would and on time!

It's actually the full early 80's computer experience complete with the 'pre-orders' that Clive encouraged in that famous QL launch where he had no machines.

And yeah there is gonna be a book on the Vega fiasco and somehow I don't think anyone will be cast in a good light.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by PeterJ »

The QL did turn up though. I have a rather nice example sitting in it's original box next to me. Innovation is a risk, and that's probably why he played poker in later life, but I for one am pleased he took those risks.

I too look forward to the full Vega+ honest story, but I gave up on getting my £100 back, a long, long time ago. When I think of how long the trolls have spent on social media moaning about things under their false names I feel quite sad and sorry for them. Get outside and enjoy life! Spend it with friends and people and things you care about. It isn't long until life is over.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by Seven.FFF »

Levy was at it in the 80s too. The Register article on the mismanaged development and launch of the Elan Enterprise is a great read.

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/10/2 ... years_old/
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by chinnyhill10 »

PeterJ wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 10:03 pm The QL did turn up though. I have a rather nice example sitting in it's original box next to me. Innovation is a risk, and that's probably why he played poker in later life, but I for one am pleased he took those risks.
Yes it did but look at the mess. Delays, broken promises, dongles on the back to fix the ROM, micro drives getting warm and becoming unreliable. A nice boxed example is one thing, having laid out the equivalent of nearly a grand back in the day for a late broken computer may have felt quite different.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by chinnyhill10 »

Seven.FFF wrote: Thu Jun 21, 2018 10:07 pm Levy was at it in the 80s too. The Register article on the mismanaged development and launch of the Elan Enterprise is a great read.

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/10/2 ... years_old/
I'd forgotten the link to the Enterprise. A product so late it missed the boat totally. In fact so delayed it was in development before the 464, press launched the same month as the 464 (Amstrad had finished units, Enterprise didn't) and by the time it hit the shelves the CPC 664 was out and the 6128 was a couple of months away!

It's a lovely computer and it was produced and very collectable now. You have to wonder how much money was lost on it all.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by PeterJ »

At least something turned up eventually unlike the original topic of the thread!

Apart from membranes, 35 Years later mine are still working!

The Enterprise was indeed a lovely machine, just too late.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by Ralf »

I didn't knew about Levy's involvement with Enterprise machine.

Enterprise was technically a good machine, yet it turned out to be a commercial failure. Maker your own conclusions but for me it speaks about business skills of guys in charge. And now the history repeats.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by PeterJ »

Ralf wrote: Fri Jun 22, 2018 10:22 am I didn't knew about Levy's involvement with Enterprise machine.

Enterprise was technically a good machine, yet it turned out to be a commercial failure. Maker your own conclusions but for me it speaks about business skills of guys in charge. And now the history repeats.
It arrived at a similar time to the 16Bit machines, so was just too late. Sad. The Sam had similar issues
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by Ralf »

It arrived at a similar time to the 16Bit machines, so was just too late. Sad. The Sam had similar issues
If I remember correctly:

Sam Coupe was released at 1990 when it was much too late for 8 bit machine.

Enterprise was released in 1985. At the same time as Spectrum 128. At this time 16 bits machine just only appeared, they were very expensive and nobody knew how to write programs for them so the existing software was often crap. And Enterprise at moments could display graphics with quality compared to let's say Amiga so it would be a serious competition for existing 8 bits.

As I read the problem with Enterprise was lack of software and lack of interest from retailers (which probably came form lack of software ;) )
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by 1024MAK »

The dongle on the first QL machines may well have been a publicity stunt really. The real problem was that Clive wanted an advanced OS and an advanced BASIC in ROM and have a ROM cartridge slot. All in a 64K byte memory area. Once the design of the custom chips had been finalised, the size of this memory area was fixed.

But the development of the OS and BASIC did not go the way Sinclair expected. So Sinclair arranged for another OS to be developed. Because the combined size of the OS and BASIC was greater than intended, it did not fit in the 32K byte space that had been planned to be used. The first QLs were supplied with two 16K byte ROMs on the main board, with one 16K byte ROM in the dongle. A total of 48K bytes of ROM.

Sinclair could have fitted two 32k byte EPROM chips in the QL. On the issue 5 boards there are two sockets that can take a variety of different ROMs/EPROMs, but both have to be same type. Later a modification was done so that a 32K EPROM and a 16K EPROM could be fitted. The final ROMs were mask programmed ROM chips, one 32K bytes in size and one 16K bytes in size.

The intended memory map was this:

Code: Select all

FFFFF
      Reserved - expansion I/O
C0000
      Reserved - add on RAM
40000
      Main RAM (96K bytes)
28000
      Screen RAM (32K bytes)
20000
      I/O devices
18000
     Reserved (I/O devices)
10000
      ROM cartridge slot (32K bytes)
08000
      ROM (system ROM containing OS and SuperBASIC) (32K bytes)
00000 
This is how it ended up:-

Code: Select all

FFFFF
      Reserved - expansion I/O
C0000
      Reserved - add on RAM
40000
      Main RAM (96K bytes)
28000
      Screen RAM (32K bytes)
20000
      I/O devices
18000
      Reserved (I/O devices)
10000
      ROM cartridge slot (16K bytes)
0C000
      ROM (system ROM containing OS and SuperBASIC) (48K bytes)
00000 
The cartridge slot at only 16K bytes capacity was of no practical use as a way of software distribution. So in reality, it was a waste of time. Was used for some "toolkit" software and some hardware interfaces though. I don't think it being its original intended size of 32K bytes would have made any difference.

I don't have an early version of the QL. They are rare, as Sinclair either replaced the whole machine or the PCBs after the owners returned the first QLs (Sinclair had a general recall for all the first QLs).

Anyway, a while ago, someone in the Retro community got hold of an early QL complete with dongle. They were expecting no end of problems when they powered it up. But to their surprise, it worked. They could load and run software off the microdrives. The machine was usable. See this QL Forum post.

You are right though that it was very common in the fledgling home computer industry for products to be late to market. In fact, this was not limited to the home computer industry, but was the typical way that a lot of small businesses operated.

That's why consumer TV programmes always advised viewers to be careful when ordering from mail order companies.

So the Vega+ / Retro computers is no different to any other company that has failed it's customers. That's not unique to the computer boom in the early 1980's in my opinion.

Sinclair may have got in trouble for late delivery of machines. But their customers did get a working machine eventually.

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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by chinnyhill10 »

PeterJ wrote: Fri Jun 22, 2018 10:30 am
Ralf wrote: Fri Jun 22, 2018 10:22 am I didn't knew about Levy's involvement with Enterprise machine.

Enterprise was technically a good machine, yet it turned out to be a commercial failure. Maker your own conclusions but for me it speaks about business skills of guys in charge. And now the history repeats.
It arrived at a similar time to the 16Bit machines, so was just too late. Sad. The Sam had similar issues
The 16 bits had next to no impact in 1985. Yes the ST and Amiga were announced and technically speaking out there towards the end of the year but they were pretty much made of unobtainium as far as the end users were concerned. Expensive, niche and no software support. It's only '88/89 that they start to have much bearing on things with the price drops and the retail packs with games.

Nobody is sitting around in '85 going "I won't get an Enterprise as I'll get an ST instead". The Enterprise failed because it was late, overpriced and consumers and retailers had been burnt by multiple new systems failing. Amstrad already had established links with major retailers and a brandname so had no trouble getting their units on shelves and then getting the punters to trust them. Enterprise, by their own admission, struggled.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by PeterJ »

[mention]chinnyhill10[/mention], It was just too late, the market was already saturated by then. It went the same way as many of the other machines of the time. Spectrums, CPCs and C64s ruled the roost. Nothing was going to change that. It was late in terms of the 8bit machines, and whilst it may have not had a big impact (agree with you), I think it was part of the issue with new more powerful machines being discussed.

I still wish I purchased a load before they were shipped abroad, I could have retired on the profits!
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by PeterJ »

Sir Clive is no longer a director of RCL. Poor health has been given as the reason.
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Re: ZX Vega+ Discussion

Post by Mike Davies »

PeterJ wrote: Sat Jun 23, 2018 1:29 pm Sir Clive is no longer a director of RCL. Poor health has been given as the reason.
There's some misdirection going on in RCL's statement.

Sir Clive never was a Director or Shareholder of RCL. The Companies House records show that it's Sinclair Research Ltd as the Shareholder (https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/comp ... 5/officers), which Sir Clive controls. However, the duties as Director and Shareholder fell to a representative nominated by Sinclair Research. That person was Lady Angie Sinclair (Angie Bowness), she signed the Shareholders Agreement in November 2014 as the nominated representative in both capacities.

What I'm a little fuzzy about is that Lady Sinclair resigned the SRL Directorship of RCL in early 2017 (I can't remember what the source is for that), before the acrimonious/public divorce apparently initiated by Sir Clive while he was hospitalised (as reported by the Daily Mail in April 2017). Perhaps that resignation was rescinded by another representative of SRL thereafter, and that's why the Companies House records weren't updated.

As far as I can tell Sir Clive has not been involved in RCL, except to receive a £10k payment, and to weigh in that RCL have no interest/scope in Commodore 64 retro devices.
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