By Tim Ferguson, 18 April 2008 10:30
NEWS
The Sinclair ZX Spectrum has been crowned the most popular first home computer, beating off competition from other classics such as the Amiga and BBC Micro.
Almost a third (31 per cent) of the more than 900 respondents in the silicon.com poll said the Spectrum - an eight-bit computer launched in the UK in 1982 - was the computer they cut their teeth on at home.
A-Zs
1. Security from A-Z
2. Biometrics from A-Z
3. Broadband from A-Z
4. Wireless from A-Z
5. Green IT from A-Z
In comparison the Spectrum's big rivals of the day, the BBC Micro and Commodore 64, could only muster 15 per cent and 14 per cent of the vote respectively.
Another classic, the IBM PC got 10 per cent of the vote, and was joined by the Amstrad CPC 464 (eight per cent) and Apple II (seven per cent) in the popularity stakes.
Bringing up the rear were the Dragon 32 (five per cent) and Acorn Electron with just three per cent of the vote.
In the battle of early 1990s gaming machines the Atari ST won out with four per cent of the vote compared to the Commodore Amiga's two per cent.
Comments
There are 19 comments. Join the discussion
1. Richard
No option for the earlier ZX80/ZX81, or for the Lynx "Camputer" - which had good facilities for the once popular Forth language but lost its bid for adoption as the BBC's computer?
I have both in the loft.
Later, many schools used the excellent Acorn RiscOS ARM based computers - until demented "expert" parents forced the move to DOS & Windows based PCs;
In the mistaken belief that schools needed to use "office type" PCs rather than teach the principles of IT & computing.
2. Mark Kobayashi-Hillary
Strange to see the old C64 faring so badly though. Back in the day it had the polyphonic SID chip, the VIC chip that could simultaneously handle 8 sprites (more if you started using raster interrupts) and the 6502 variant (6510) processor was a lot faster than the Z80... Back to black - Poke 53280,0...
3. Dave Roberts
You missed a classic by not adding the NewBrain to you list.
4. Nigel Goodey
..which undelines a fundamental problem with the poll!
my first pc was a sinclair zx81, but my first 'main' pc was a VIC20, which took me through 4 years to my o'levels, before being replaced by a C64 and an AppleII+ (actually called a Europlus).
Ah..... that VIC20 was superb - many a day spent programming in hex or tweaking the ADSR settings to try to simulate speech (we managed 'grunts'!)
I still have the 1515 printer too (cost more than the VIC!), which had to be propped on a book because the carriage-return spring was too weak, even when tightened with cotton!
ahhh - the memories...
nig.
5. anonymous
I've still got my spectrum in a box in the attic! I just remember having to get the volume absolutely right for the games to load!
6. Steven Abrams
I would have liked to complete your survey of "what was your first home computer", but it only lists computers from the early to mid 80s, ignoring the fact that home computing actually started in the late 70s, with computers such as the Nascom, which sold over 20,000 units, the Commodore PET and the Tandy TRS80, which were also popular and also sold in good quantities
7. Dick Vinegar
Note that most of these lovely little machines were British.
As were most of the early mainframes, back in the '60s.
Where are today's British innovators? Emasculated by so-called "Computer Science" Departments; that's where.
8. Roy Corneloues
While my first computer was a C64 - which I was actually writing business software on back in the early eighties for my fathers business using sequential file formats and a 5.25" floppy drive. It was the only way I could convince my dad to get me one!!!
The first computer I was introduced to by my maths teacher at school was a Video Genie - which was his "home Computer" - Does that count?
We even wrote a space invaders game on that!!!
It had a built in cassette tape drive - including VU meters!!!
From an after school computer club (in a jusic practice room) - we ended up kitting the whole school out with BBC Model B's with a Research Machines 380Z with twin 8" floppys as the server.
Took O level computer studies the first year it came out whilst in the 6th form in 1985 and passed (of course) ;-)
9. Babbly Fish
My old spectrum sits in a small display frame to remind me of how simple computers used to be to use and how easy it was to do almost anything with it that was required....(within its limitations)
Ok now we have much more powerful machines and they do so much.....I'm not complaining mind, but I reckon the new ones cause me more stress...
Anyway - back to my horse and cart to go down't mine....
10. George Reywer
What about the Acorn Atom?
I built mine from a kit which cost £299 (and came with plastic bags of components and a bare circuit board and required many hours of soldering). Memory was 12Kb of which 6Kb was dedicated to graphics so had 5Kb of user memory.
I added some mass storage to mine by buying the official Acorn 5.25" floppy drive which was single sided-single density with a capacity of 92Kb, and cost over £400!
11. anonymous
Spectrum - my third home computer, bought so that the younger members of the family could play games in colour! Expanded TRS-80 and Acorn System1 were the first two.
12. Martyn Davies
Jupiter ACE! My friend had a Science of Cambridge MK14 that he let me programme, but first one I bought was the Jupiter ACE. BASIC is for wimps.
13. Jon
And for those of you who need a quick fix Cyclone, Elite, Jet Set Willy or how just want to write some BASIC code for a change here's a great place for lunchtimes:
http://www.zxspectrum.net/
Enjoy.
14. Phil Hodgson
Anyone remember the Nascom? £197 and you had to assemble it yourself. 2k of RAM - luxury! Mine's still in the loft - it still worked last time I plugged it in.
15. Karen Challinor
I still have a Commodore Amiga A500 with a memory extension module plus a monitor. It still works despite being 30-odd years old.
The basic spec beat the PCs of the day hands down and included a fully multitasking GUI OS.
A company I worked for used an A2000 for a SCADA system running a package called Dexterity as I remember.
If Commodore hadn't been quite so paranoid about people opening the case and let people keep their warranty if they added cards to its machines the company might have sold enough to stay in business.
16. Tom Cheesewright
Am I the only one to miss the Amstrad CPC6128? I can still hum the theme tune to Tombstone (the only game we could find for it) and remember how to get in to the secret passage behind the barrels...
Just me then...?
17. Ray Derkacz
The ZX80 was my first computer. Received it in kit form in early 1980 and, incredibly, worked first time when I built it.
Still got it (plus a 64K memmory add on) in a drawer - must get it out again.
18. Alan Smith
The Amiga A500 Computer was an early 1980s machine not 1990s as stated in your results. The ST and Amiga were well on there way out by then. Although the ZX Spectrum was my first computer it was not till I bought an Amiga A500 that the serious work began, Video, DTP and, oh yes, some cracking games - Guru Meditation and al that
19. anonymous
Compukit UK101 anyone?