This is your computer. It's my computer? No, it's your computer! etc.
Sorry it’s been a bit quiet recently. Work has most rudely started impacting my leisure time so it’s all been a bit hectic.
Anyway, I’ve been picking up a few (OK, a lot. OK too many) old computers on eBay over the past few months, and recently I picked up a real oddity. I bought your computer. At least that’s what it says on the box.
It’s all yours…
Spec-wise, other than the “Sound and Music” it seems to be roughly equivalent to a ZX80. I don’t remember ever seeing this in the UK even though it was supposedly sold there under the Lambda 8300 name. It certainly never appeared in any of the major retailers at the time. In fact, this machine was sold all over the world under different names including:
Futura 8300
DEF 3000
Marathon 32K
Tonel PC
Futura 8300
PC-81 Personal Computer
CAC-3 (winner!)
Polybrain P1128
Power 3000
But this one is unique. It’s yours (or it was, I just bought it).
Inside the box is an AC adapter, a manual, and the wonder that is Your Computer. Let’s take a peek:
It’s green.
Unlike some variants, Your Computer doesn’t even have a name on the top panel. It’s a small machine. Bigger than a ZX Spectrum, but not by much. Here’s a picture of it compared to a computer with standard-size keys.
I’ll be posting about the computer at the bottom at some point…
The keyboard is Spectrum-y, but the keys are a little narrower and have less rounded edges (can’t really say that a rubber key is sharp). Interestingly, the “space bar” doesn’t even get to be a slightly bigger key. It’s just a poor standard size key, probably being bullied incessantly by the much bigger Enter and Shift keys next to it.
Round the back, we’re in familiar territory, but Your Computer does include a monitor out and a joystick port, neither of which the ZX81 or Spectrum had. There’s a significant color difference between the main chassis and the back panel. I’m not sure if the colors were always different, or if it’s a result of yellowing.
Other than “Made in Hong Kong” and a “QC Passed” sticker, there’s no information on the bottom of the machine.
That’s pretty much it. I don’t buy these machines with any intent to use them and don’t have a monitor or TV that would work with this so I can’t say much about how it works. The instruction manual is a reasonable introduction to BASIC, and there are commands for things like music and character-based graphics, but I couldn’t find anything regarding “high resolution” graphics, so perhaps that would involve a bit of PEEKing and POKEing.
