My machine collection

The  Atom to  Z88 collection of home (and some other) computers

I have been collecting home micros for a little while now and my collection is aimed at the 1980-1990 era ie. when home computers were unrelated to IBM PC clones. I was a very keen follower of the home computer market but at the time I could not afford many of them. Now I intend to collect all which I came in contact with. By the way, none are for sale, although swaps (UK only) may be considered.

To contact me, my current eMail address can be found here. Please note that this address may change to avoid spam.

If you are electronically competent and fancy building your own machine from components you can buy easily then please visit my Build your own ZX80/ZX81, Build your own Jupiter Ace or Build your own UK101 pages !

ZX80

The "original" membrane keyboard computer. This was one of the first computer kits which actually came with a case - most of the previous ones eg. the UK101 were of an open-board design. BTW. the BASIC on this machine was much faster than the ZX81, even in Fast mode. This was due to integer-only arithmetic. The characteristic flicker on the display rendered it of little use for games, although I DO have one real-time game (space invaders) which handled the screen on a regular basis to maintain output.
Click here if you want to build it yourself

What I've got:
Manual
Also my home-made version.
Some games, including a flicker-free space invaders game!
16K ZX80 RAM pack (2 PCB version)
I purchased this for: £20

ZX81 (x6)

The follow-up to the ZX80 which had flicker-free graphics. This resulted in many games being written for it, although keeping your fingers on the keys while watching the graphics on the screen was virtually impossible!
Click here if you want to build it yourself

What I've got:
2 in original boxes
2 D'KTronics UDG boards
3 Sinclair 16K RAM packs
1 Memotech 16K RAM pack
Joystick
1 in a Fuller keyboard
ZX Printer with paper
Game tapes
Manuals (3)
Also my home-made version.
I purchased this for: One £15, rest for £40 total

MK. 14

The first "Sinclair" (actually, Science of Cambridge) computer. A single board computer of open construction with an LED display and a Hex keypad.

What I've got:
Data sheets
Circuits
Updated ROM set
Spare CPU

I purchased this for: £20

Mattel Aquarius

What I've got:
Manual
I purchased this for: £4

Hewlett Packard HP 71B

What I've got:
Light Wand
I purchased this for: £8

Memotech MTX512

What I've got:
Fully boxed, perfect condition with manual, psu etc.
I purchased this for: £8

This is another open-board computer (ie supplied without a case). Uses a 6502 CPU at 1MHz.
The original display was only 16 lines but this (and most others) has been modified to increase the display to 48x32. When I had this, it wasn't working... re-springing the chip sockets and a re-blow of the BASIC ROM got it working perfectly again. The original BASIC was on four 2K ROMS but I re-blew it on an 8K ROM. The board was designed to be ready to take the 8K EPROM when it came out. The SAVE/LOAD routine must be the most primitive I have seen - all it does is redirects I/O from/to the cassette or serial port (similar to *SPOOL and *EXEC on the BBC micro).

What I've got:
Manuals
Tapes
Cegmon-jas monitor ROM
Basic 1 ROM
Basic 4 ROM (not working)

I purchased this for: £5

Acorn Atom (x2)

The machine before the BBC... This machine came with only 2K as standard, but the machines I have are fully internally expanded to 12K (6K program RAM, 6K screen RAM).
After searching for this machine, I managed to gain 3! Thanks to all.
The unusual thing about this machine was the display - the vertical sync was 60Hz ! I see no logical reason for producing a British machine using a non-British output frequency. As a result, the vertical hold on the television needs to be adjusted to produce a stable display. The display chip used is the same as the Dragon 32, which produced a 50Hz display - anyone know the reason behind this?

What I've got:
Manual
Circuit diagram
Game tapes
Floating point ROM
Program Power Toolkit ROM

I purchased this for: £5 each.

Jupiter Ace

Not an original, but one I built recently from schematics on a piece of Veroboard.
Click here if you want to build it yourself

What I've got:
Just the home-built machine.

I purchased this for: £ Free - built from spare parts up the attic! 

TI99/4A (x2)

I always liked this machine as it seemed to have a "professional" feel to it. The main problem with this micro was the BASIC was very slow compared to the competition.

What I've got:
Fully boxed
Cassette deck
Tapes
I purchased this for: £8, £5

Epson HX-20 (x2)

Nice little portable with a built-in printer and cassette deck. It runs Microsoft BASIC and has an impressive battery life of 50 Hours!

What I've got:
Silver finish HX-20
Cream finish HX-20
Manuals
Carrying case
16K Expansion unit
I purchased this for: £free (silver) ,£5 (cream)

Enterprise 64

What I've got:
Fully boxed unit, manuals etc.

I purchased this for: £swap for Acorn Atom

VIC20 (x3)

VIC20 (x3)

Many hours spent writing games on this machine... I remember knocking up a quick game in a shop. When an assistant saw me he grabbed a cassette and saved it off so he could play it later! This computer had two problems - 3.5K or RAM as standard and the 20 column display resulting in one line of BASIC taking about 4 lines on the screen.

What I've got:
Manuals
Cartridges
2 Cassette decks
I purchased this for: 1 £5, 1 £1.50

Dragon 32 (x2)

This was my first ever computer. Although the advertisements claim a "professional" keyboard, the keyboard handler was very poor which resulted in characters typed not appearing on the screen. The green screen is unforgettable. The BASIC was from Microsoft and was one of the fastest available at the time.

What I've got:
Fully boxed
Several cassettes
Joystick
I purchased this for: £140 (bought when new) , £2

Dragon 64

The successor to the Dragon 32. This machine had a nicer feel keyboard - a bit more springy and less clunky than its predecessor.

What I've got:
Fully boxed
Several cassettes, disks and cartridges
Disk drive
OS/9, Basic, Pascal disks
Joystick
I purchased this for: £20

Sharp MZ-700 (x2)

I have two machines, the one shown in the picture above and also one with a built-in cassette deck (MZ-721). A text-only machine which loaded BASIC from cassette.

What I've got:
Manual
Cassettes
Cassette deck
I purchased this for: £10 for MZ-700, £14 for MZ-711

BBC B (x2)

My second and most favorite computer of all time! My other hobby is electronics and this had sufficient expansion ports to keep me happy for a long time. The BASIC was one of the best available with an in-line assembler.

What I've got:
Manuals
Disk drives
Many disks & cassettes
Video digitiser
Joystick
Sideways RAM and ROMs
Shadow RAM
Z80 second processor + CP/M disks and applications.
I purchased this for: £400 (bought when new) , £3

BBC Master 128

What I've got:
Manuals
Disk drives
30MB Winchester Hard Disk
Many disks & cassettes
Joysticks
ROMs
I purchased this for: £free

Acorn Electron (x3)

A nice little BBC-compatible (apart from Teletext Mode 7) computer from Acorn.

What I've got:
Manual
Joysticks
Games
Interface 1
I purchased this for: £7, £1, £3

Spectrum (x6)

The computer which caused the home computer market to boom. I have always liked this one even though many people criticised the keyboard. To create such a powerful machine (at the time) for the price and size was really impressive.

What I've got:
16K versions
48K versions
Many games
Joystick interfaces
Joystick
Microdrives
Interface 1
I purchased this for: 1 £free, 1 £6, 1 £5

Spectrum+

The follow-on to the spectrum to address the keyboard-critics. Personally, I prefer the original as this newer designed keyboard used to stick a bit.

What I've got:
Joystick interface
Joystick
I purchased this for: £4
 

Spectrum128

I purchased this for: £3
 

Spectrum +2

Spectrum +2

A much improved keyboard with 128K of RAM allowing RAM-disks. The internal tape drive I found to be very reliable.

What I've got:
Manual
Games
Joystick
Light gun
I purchased this for: £15

Spectrum +3

The same as the +2 with a 3" disk drive in place of the cassette drive.

What I've got:
Manual
Games
Joystick
Light gun
I purchased this for: £5

QL

An small 68000-based machine (actually the 68008) with quite an impressive specification for the time.

What I've got:
Several tape cartridges
I purchased this for: £10

Z88
A wonderful portable computer hosting a suite of applications and BBC Basic. The keyboard, although rubber, is really pleasant to use.

What I've got:
128K Ram, 128K EPROM, Manual, boxed
I purchased this for: £ free - Thanks Matt!

Commodore 64

Follow-up to the VIC20 which had a much improved display of 40 columns.

What I've got:
Cassette decks
Joystick
Many cassettes and disks
1541 Disk drive
1520 Colour printer/plotter (fully boxed)
Music keyboard
I purchased this for: £20

Commodore 64c

Same as the C64 but in a different case.

What I've got:
Cassette deck
I purchased this for: £4

Commodore SX-64

A luggable C64 with a built-in disk drive and monitor. This weighs a ton and the handle is ribbed which cuts into your hand if you carry it too much. Still, it's handy if you want to play games in the lounge while the main TV is in use.

I purchased this for: £5

Commodore Plus/4 (x2)

A non-C64 compatible computer which never took off. It had 4 built-in programs (hence the name).

What I've got:
Fully boxed
Joysticks
Cassette drive
Many games
Manuals
I purchased this for: £4 and £3

Commodore C16

A cut-down version of the Plus/4 which never took off.

What I've got:
Joysticks
Cassette drive
I purchased this for: £3

Toshiba MSX (x3)

One attempt at producing a standard platform which allowed many manufacturers to produce the same computer (like the PC technology we have now). This was a very nice machine with a very pleasant keyboard on it. However, the MSX technology spec was too limiting so was superceded by other machines.

What I've got:
Fully boxed (no manual)
Many game tapes
Matching Cassette deck
I purchased this for: £12, £3, £2

Sony Hit-Bit

Another computer in the MSX range.
 

I purchased this for: £3.50

CPC464

I never really used these much when they came out as the only ones I saw had the green-screen monitor. However, powering it up on a colour TV I am quite impressed by the capabilities of this machine. The BASIC is more advanced than many of the other micros.

What I've got:
Manual
Green screen monitor
Colour monitor
TV Modulator
External disk drive
Amstrad technical manuals
Many game tapes
I purchased this for: £8 , Colour monitor £8

CPC464+

Newer version of the CPC464, in a cream case

What I've got:
Colour monitor

I purchased this for: £15 with monitor

CPC6128

A 3" disk version of the "4xx" series.

What I've got:
Manual
CP/M and application disks
I purchased this for: £10 , including colour monitor

Atari ST520

The one I have is one of the original design - it didn't have an internal disk drive. Later ones had built-in drives.

What I've got:
Disk drive
Fully boxed (no manual)
I purchased this for: £5

Atari ST520FM

Like the ST520 but with built-in power supply and floppy disk drive.

I purchased this for: £12

Atari 400 (x2)

Nice graphics but one of the worst keyboards of all time. I remember wanting an Atari computer at the time but I couldn't afford the 800 and didn't like the keyboard on the 400. In the end I bought a Dragon 32!

What I've got:
Fully boxed
Several cartridges
I purchased this for: £5 and £6

 Atari 600XL (x2)

What I've got:
Manuals
Games
I purchased this for: both for £6

Atari 800XL (x2)

One of my favorites - an excellently constructed machine with a very good keyboard.

What I've got:
Manuals
Games
1050 Disk drive
1010 Cassette deck
XC12 Cassette deck
I purchased this for: £5

Atari XE Games System.

A console version of the 65XE which has the same features as the computer but has a seperate keyboard attached by a short length of cable. Boots up with Missile Command (or BASIC if the keyboard is connected) if no cartridge is inserted.

What I've got:
Keyboard
Games
Light Gun
I purchased this for: £6

Atari 130XE

Later model in the Atari 8-bit range, compatible with previous models.

What I've got:
Games
XC12 Cassette deck
I purchased this for: £3
 

Commodore Amiga 500 (x2) When I bought this, it was a toss-up between this and the Atari ST as both seemed to have such similar capabilities. I have both Workbench 1.3 and 2.0 installed, selectable by a switch at the back.

What I've got:
Fully boxed
GVP Hard disk drive
Sound digitisers
Video digitiser
External floppy disk drive
I purchased this for: £400 (bought when new), £5 with a large box of games

Commodore Amiga 600

The smaller newer version of the Amiga 500.

What I've got:
PSU, mouse

Puchase price: £3

Apple Mac Plus

OK, not really a home computer but it is one of the few business machines which were of interest.

I purchased this for: £15

Commodore PET (CBM 3032)

This is the other business machine which was of interest to me. This was in a rather poor state when purchased - the case was filthy, the pins on the ICs were corroded and the sockets they were in were corroded it would not work. I desoldered the sockets, cleaned up the chips and soldered them back in and the machine now works perfectly! (a total of 2 hours work). A little scrub with some household cleaner soon got the machine looking like new.

What I've got:
Manuals
Cassette deck
Game tape
I purchased this for: £3

Epson QX-16

(This was not really a home computer but was a bit unusual in that it can run both CPM and MS-DOS as it has TWO processors in it!)
10MB hard disk drive

What I've got:
Manuals
Various disks
I purchased this for: Free

Oric 1 (x2)

A nice little machine with an awful keyboard - maybe it was just me, but I found getting my fingers on the keys difficult and ended up with sore fingers as I kept on hitting the gap between them! The Atmos improved this dramatically.

What I've got:
Manual
Several games
I purchased this for: £1 and £1.50

Oric Atmos

A newer version of the Oric 1 with a (slightly) bug-fixed ROM. This has a far nicer keyboard. Inside the machine, the PCB is identical to the Oric 1 (in fact, it has Oric 1 printed on it!).

What I've got:
Several games
I purchased this for: £4

Virtually all the above micros which cost less than £10 were purchased at car boot sales. None of them required major work to get them working "as good as new". Most only needed a clean up.

Grant.