My Computing History - Part 6

Part 6 - a FREE Sinclair ZX Spectrum 16k and ZX Spectrum 48+

So this seems like a really odd thing to get one's hands on in the mid to late 90s? So how come I acquired a load of Spectrum gear so late on?

So how come I got a ZX Spectrum in the late 90s?

I was nattering to one of my uncles one day, we were nattering about computers and talking about tech. I was saying how I didn't really like a lot of the newer games and I'd started getting in to emulators to play old classics, yeah, as a teenager, the seeds were sewn in my love of retro, even back then.

Anyway, I got telling him that I'd found this awesome emulator for MS-DOS/Windows 9x called "Warajevo", and one of the tools included was called Z80COMP which would compile a .Z80 snapshot file in to a self-executing .EXE file to run standalone on a DOS PC.

He was proper interested in the idea, and when I mentioned about how it is possible to hook a tape deck up to the PC, record the game in to a WAV file and then convert it to a TZX file, all with the tools that were available for free online, that was when he gave me a massive black bag overflowing with stuff - there was a 16k rubber keyed spectrum, a RAM pack, joystick interface, manuals and a Spectrum 48+

The idea was I convert some of the games and give him the .EXE files, which I think I only managed to get a couple done because most of the tapes were not stored well and didn't work,. but the computers themselves were fine.

But, from this moment onwards, I gained a new found love for the Speccy, and my journey in to retro had begun.

So what games did you get with it?

I can't really remember a lot of them tbh, it was such a long time ago, but I do remember getting the Horizons tape and maybe Sinclair Chess? The rest of the games were mostly text adventures and text based strategy games, they weren't my sort of thing, but it was interesting to see as my own experience of a Spectrum before was playing at other friends houses, never having owned my own.

What did you do with it?

Well, having access to an emulator on the PC, and having internet access at this point, I downloaded a lot of tape images (TAP and TZX) and some Z80 snapshots, I experimented and found the games I liked, then converted them to WAV, recorded them to tape and played them on the real hardware. Because most of the games I was interested in were 48k games, the 48+ got more usage, but the 16k machine was a "nice to have"

So what do you think to the Spectrum?

I've actually already done a retrospective of the Spectrum, check it out here:

• Spectrum 48k 

Conclusion

So I'm going to leave it here, especially as I've already done a page about the Spectrum and revisiting it in 2026. Everything I wrote there I feel is pretty much the same now as it was back in the late 90s and also in the 80s when the system was new.

Probably the only exception to this is that I was experiencing the Spectrum for the first time back then, so it was more exciting than it is now.