Was thumbing through the records Bob left me and found this, a flexi disc for the ZX81. Not seen one of these since the 80's... Such technology...
PS...I forgot to add that if anyone is a ZX81 person you are welcome to it, I used to have one 40 years ago but I have an emulator and rarely play it. I'd rather it went to a fan as it will only get lost here.. I also found another set of flexi disks hidden away, but they were er er were not what I expected, called Lovebirds Talk: Uncensored sex party...WTF Bob!!!! Seems it was from some magazine...And NO I have not listened to them..Was going to send them to his mate, also called bob with the 7inch singles as Bob wanted his records to go to him but I might just drop these in the dustbin, I think his wife Sue might get the hump with me...
Paul, I'd gladly take the ZX81 flexidisc(s) from you - I have one somewhere and what I aim to do is create a thread of me festering away this festive period with my trusty ZX81, growling gramophone player (you know, a bit like from the old HMV ads) - and a flexidisc or three - and see if we can't just get a few black and white wavy lines appearing AND...you never know...a working program after nearly 40 years of lying flat as a pancake gathering dust (no, I'm not talking about one of Sir Clive's squashed C5s!!) ABOVE: After more loading errors, Baz peers in to his ZX81 "data device" to see if any bits have got stuck..??!!
Wing me your addy again Andy and I'll get it sent..The sex one has gone in the bin so you won't get that by accident, any way, don't want Bev to find it and tune the frying pan on your forehead
Thanks very much, Paul. Aye, she thinks I'm perverted enough already hanging around in dark cupboards and alley ways with Orics... Hey, word on the street is that Baz's motley annual production of retro micro Christmas cards have arrived back from an underground printers and will soon be winging their sad way to you guys... standby your letter boxes. You have been warned - seal em quick!
While I have nostalgia for the days of owning and using my ZX81, the machine is just too primitive for me to enjoy using at all anymore, except for maybe a once-a-year play of 'The Thing/' My all-time favorite ZX81 game. I have dreams of owning another ZX81 "system" (which would have to be the Timex/Sinclair 1500 model with the Spectrum style case and keyboard, as it looks so cool in it's silver and gray colors and I always hated the tiny membrane keyboard of the ZX81/TS1000 and at least the Spectrum keyboard is a huge improvement over that. Though I'd have to use the Spectrum style keyboard along side, say, the 400 with it's membrane keyboard to decide which type I prefer between them. I'm not making a unqualified judgement of rubber "chicklet" style keyboard verses membrane keyboards,a s the size of the ZX81's keyboard seemed to be it's biggest detriment to me. I did own a 400 and a 1500 for a brief time in the mid 2000's, but not at the same time and I didn't use either one's keyboard enough to really remember their feel after all these years, but they do seem to be about the same size footprint and "keys." But when it comes down too it, the T/S 1500 would probably just end up on display in my glass case next to the Bally Arcade and Atari VCS machines. So I can't say I'd ever make use of your flexi disk either, I'm sure there's a true ZX81 hobbyist out there more deserving. I do get into having and trying this sort of media, however. I'm a big fan of having and using every kind of media for playing. recording, sending and receiving music, video and data. I'd love a flexi disc like that with an Atari 8-bit program on it. I could even use it as I already upgraded my 1010 recorder with Left and Right channel I/O, and could connect my turntable to the 1010 and load the flexi disc that way. I've already loaded wav file tape images that way that I burned on a CD-R and connected my portable walk-man CD player to the 1010. Of course I used the same basic technique with my phone and CD player before I did the I/O mod just by using a portable CD tape adapter cassette device inserted in the 1010 in place of a tape. I still have dreams/interest (whatever one would call it) in getting a reel-to-reel tape recorder and an old wire recorder and using them through the 1010 just for the fun and novelty of it. I'd use an old cylinder Graham-phone recorder just to load and save Atari software in a way nobody else has done before. Just for the sake of being the only one in the world to do something. But that comes from my general life philosophy of experiencing and doing as much as you can in life, but also always looking to do something the few or no one else in the history of the world has done. If I had the chance to do something like orbit the earth or set foot on the moon or Mars, stuff that has been done by so few in our time, and something man since time-immemorial has dreamed of, I'm willing to give my life for such experiences, not just chance my life, but actually still be willing to do it for the experience even if I knew without a doubt that I would die doing it, I still choose to do it for the chance of seeing the world and space from orbit, in person with my own eyes that so few men, ever, were able to do. If a worm-hole opened up in front of me, I'm the guy who would jump into it before it disappeared, damn the consequences and almost certain death, just for the chance to experience another time and/or place in the universe that no one else has, no matter how brief. So I go out of my way and am attracted to the unconventional way of doing things and experiencing things that most never would, just to do things in life that few others or no one else has, and have a truly rare and/or unique life and life experience.
Well, the version I owned was, of course, a version published my Timex for the American Timex/Sinclair 1000. I assumed it had been previously published by someone in the U.K. for the ZX81. Anyway, it's based off the movie by the same name, and you move your character through maze-like rooms avoiding The Thing while you do stuff that will eventually lead you to and allow you to use a helicopter to escape. An action-adventure game. I'll see if I can find an image, review or video of it...
I didn't realize that it was apparently so rare a game and possibly only released through Timex for the T/S 1000 market. I haven't had any luck finding a .P file for it yet, or any reviews,etc.
Does not look like it got dumped..Very unusual...That's why I asked, movie games (even bad ones) are something I love, and having owned a ZX80 and 81 and loving The Thing movie I'd have snapped it up if I had seen the Prism Advert. But I missed it and it didn't ring a bell as being in my tape images. Ah, american mag...That explains it...Looks like you are right, never marketed here...
Save yourself looking Matt, I used my searching kung fu and that game is just MIA, no reviews, pictures, nothing much about Prism Microproducts.. That parrot is dead....
If I only still had my old tape of it now... If I can't get that game, original or dumped image, then that was the only thing I'd probably use the 1500 for more than once, so I doubt I'll ever get another one. That games is really the only true nostalgia for the machine I have.
Sorry to hear Matt, thought you had it by the comment, hope you find it again. I'd only want to see it for movie reasons, I rarely ever use the emulator..
Matt, I take a lot of your criticisms onboard re. the ZX81/Timex TS1500 but once you plonk a decent add on keyboard on it and get the old classics out, a lot more fun can be had recreating those "long lost" halcyon days when we first got our mitts on our own micro... I'm gonna have to stop right here as I'm going all misty-eyed and my own onboard 1K is about to wobble and crash!! The Fuller is a decent alternative to what Matt rightly points out is a "tiny membrane keyboard".
I think we (Maplin) did a ZX81 keyboard, I KNOW we did a speccy one..Clunky AF..I installed a few, not a great KB but better than some..
A case and keyboard would certainly help, and even be preferable to the T/S 1500/Spectrum chicklet keyboard. But while the keyboard looks nice on that Fuller case, the case itself is but ugly and looks like it's missing or at least should have had some sort of trimming decal, or something on the raised area around the keyboard. It looks like one of those Russian hack/clones of western computers, like is often seen with Spectrum clones, but even worse...just butt-ugly styling, like most everything made with Russian style sensibilities, which means terrible and ugly looking. Before I bought my 130XE, I almost bought a keyboard & case for the ZX81 back in the day, I even called the company to make sure they were still around since Timex was long out of the computer business by then. They were, and I'd hoped for a "fire sale" or "liquidation" price on the keyboard and case, but no, they still want full original retail for it which was over $150 and very close to the price of an Atari 130XE, so I told the lady never mind and the rest is history. Anyway, that model of case and keyboard, from the picture in the ad in Timex Sinclair User magazine, it looked like a Vic-20/C64 style "bread-bin" but not quite as wide as the CBM machine cases. It looked cool though. Point being, if I went the route of a ZX81 with after market case and keyboard, it's got to have a bit of style to it at least. The 1500 has STYLE! I actually found a picture of the replacement keyboard & case sold in America for the T/S 1000. The company was Suntronics. I remembered as soon as I saw the picture with the name. Though I couldn't find a profile shot showing the similar shape to C64/VIC cases. Still a bit plain-jane, but I like it better than the Fuller case.
