Impressive that you found one with the rivets intact and all the original cables. My dad had one and showed it to me when I was but a wee lad, but I recognise that red stripe on the power cord anywhere. Sadly the machine got chucked out during a house move, something I'm sure he wouldn't have done if he realised how rare they'd become. Nice to see one in action again anyway.
At school I and a friend wrote a credible version of Scramble for the beast. Sadly we "ate" the stack during the game (If you know Forth you'll understand) so you had to reload from tape to start over. I have a massive itch to use forth to this day from this lovely little beast.
For some reason there was a demo on the tape which came with the Ace and did autoplay, but I never found out how it did it. However, there was a system variable which could be used for an address to redirect the output, so maybe it wrote to that when it was loaded and redirected when it started to output "OK".
I had the later version the 4000 with a better case, with hindsight i should of kept it is worth £1000's now :-(. I think it was ok, better than a zx81 though more of a tool to learn Forth on than anything else.
I tried my hand at forth at college back in the 80s. Could never get my head around reverse polish notation 100%. Putting the operator before the values to be calculated just felt wrong and unintuitive. I'm sure there must have been a reason to do it that way (less memory maybe?) but I really couldn't get on with it. I never used or even clapped eyes on an Ace, I used forth on a homemade z80 based computer one of the tutors had built himself.
I'm not sure why 2 people who had worked on the ZX81 and Spectrum would create a new computer that isn't as appealing. That doesn't make sense from a business or end user perspective. Perhaps they encountered engineering or investment issues that held them back and they just rushed out what they had hoping they'd raise enough income from sales to make a significantly better mark II. An interesting video, thank you.
They intended to make a budget-conscious computer that was inexpensive and reliable, but seperated itself from the ZX81 and Spectrum, all of which to be for either personal usage like a ZX Spectrum or for small start-up businesses who needs to crunch numbers fast and collect important data. The biggest flaw was the primary focus of the computer: the Forth programming language. It scared away any potential new buyers and turned off computer enthusiasts with the unfamiliar and complex language.
Impressive that you found one with the rivets intact and all the original cables. My dad had one and showed it to me when I was but a wee lad, but I recognise that red stripe on the power cord anywhere. Sadly the machine got chucked out during a house move, something I'm sure he wouldn't have done if he realised how rare they'd become. Nice to see one in action again anyway.
The wafer-thin vacuum formed enclosure and plastic rivets looks very similar to the ZX-80.
Yes, because it was a direct ripoff of the zx-80.
The case is much cheaper than the ZX81, you could never use a Jupiter Ace as a doorstop! But it does look really cool.
At school I and a friend wrote a credible version of Scramble for the beast. Sadly we "ate" the stack during the game (If you know Forth you'll understand) so you had to reload from tape to start over. I have a massive itch to use forth to this day from this lovely little beast.
Do you still have that game? Would be interesting to try it!
For some reason there was a demo on the tape which came with the Ace and did autoplay, but I never found out how it did it. However, there was a system variable which could be used for an address to redirect the output, so maybe it wrote to that when it was loaded and redirected when it started to output "OK".
Thanks - I was unaware of that. Sadly, I don't have any original tapes with my Ace
@@wrangleramiga896 no worries. I've often wondered how it worked. It's also odd that no other software I've come across does that.
Great Vid. Had seen these advertised in Popular Computing weekly in the early 80’s. Never seen one in the flesh nor seen one working. Thanks 👍🏻
Glad you enjoyed it
I've never even heard of this computer. Thanks for the informative video
Glad you liked it!
I saw one in London in 1982 - late October or early November. It felt anachronistic.
The rubber probably isn't conductive, but the blocks in side the keys are conductive graphite that shorts the PCB meshes.
Excellent stuff. I'd love to get one of these, but they're very rare and very expensive. Thanks for giving us the next best thing.
Glad you liked it!
I had the later version the 4000 with a better case, with hindsight i should of kept it is worth £1000's now :-(. I think it was ok, better than a zx81 though more of a tool to learn Forth on than anything else.
This computer falls into the category "What were they thinking"😂
Wow, only 5000 units sold.
I tried my hand at forth at college back in the 80s. Could never get my head around reverse polish notation 100%. Putting the operator before the values to be calculated just felt wrong and unintuitive. I'm sure there must have been a reason to do it that way (less memory maybe?) but I really couldn't get on with it. I never used or even clapped eyes on an Ace, I used forth on a homemade z80 based computer one of the tutors had built himself.
I'm not sure why 2 people who had worked on the ZX81 and Spectrum would create a new computer that isn't as appealing. That doesn't make sense from a business or end user perspective. Perhaps they encountered engineering or investment issues that held them back and they just rushed out what they had hoping they'd raise enough income from sales to make a significantly better mark II. An interesting video, thank you.
They intended to make a budget-conscious computer that was inexpensive and reliable, but seperated itself from the ZX81 and Spectrum, all of which to be for either personal usage like a ZX Spectrum or for small start-up businesses who needs to crunch numbers fast and collect important data. The biggest flaw was the primary focus of the computer: the Forth programming language. It scared away any potential new buyers and turned off computer enthusiasts with the unfamiliar and complex language.