80s tech... retro geeks come here please. You know you want to.ZX81, Spectrums, BBC, Acorns, Commodores, Those stupid video games etc. etc.

[hub2dee]

Fillyjonk won a Nobel Prize for writing a computer game for her Spectrum.

Let us all reminisce.

I never touched games after this period. I still don't understand the attraction of console games. They bore me. I can play on a playstation for all of about 60 seconds before I die and think 'thi isn't for me' LOL.

What about modem speeds then, geeks ?

I remember 300 dial up and old bulletin boards, and also Prestel. Was that 1200/75 baud split rate on a Miracle 2000 the utter b0ll0x modem of the day LOL.

I used to chat with a girl called Julie in Ireland IIRC ! (It was probably a bloke called Trevor in Dartford ).

I used to spend hours writing programs for the Spectrum - with graphics and music!

We had a ZX80, then a ZX81, and then a Spectrum! We were at the cutting edge of technology in the Roisin household then.

I used to love my spectrum, played manic minor, daly thomson, chuckie egg, mrs mop etc...

Most games are available to play here - just click on the game - if it has a 48 multi coloured icon next to it you can play it online.

Good god. I remember prestel. I don't really go back much farther than that.

I used to use the internet before it was the web, and just a text interface. Not quite arpanet but close :-) (ooh look, I just went all retro! None of those new fangled colourful smilies for me)

And I remember Windows when it was still a battle between PC-DOS and MS-DOS.

The 360K 5.25" floppies (we once had an interesting support conundrum when a customers backups were all failing.

We checked the equipment, checked the floppies, checked his shoes/their carpets for static, you name it, we checked it.

Backups still failed, with replacement drives/disks/shoes. Much head scratching ensued - the cause? He was storing his 5.25" floppies on the side of his filing cabinet with magnets )

Hi guys - can I just pop in here and say if anyone has any old computers and games that they want shot of - DH has started a new hobby of collecting them. He may well be very interested in buying them off your hands.
Please let us know thanks.

polite bump

Dh used to get games he designed for hi S PSectrum published way back years ago- such future promise
I had a Amstrad CPC 464, but Mum and Dad refused to acknowledge I needed any peripherals or software so a HUGE waste of money.

Someone mentioned paperboy!

I remember platying that. I was shite at it.

I also remeber doing that thing where you could programme the computer to say "You are a knob" or similar about a million times all over the screen

I was alos great at Oh Mummy! and Disco Dan

had a zx81 with a memory pack on the back and a keyboard built over the keyboard!

used to type in games and then have them wiped out when the power was unplugged -

great fun.

Also loved doing those typewriter pictures!!

happy days

now on mumsnet loads - still at the screen & typing

Message withdrawn

My Dad had a TRS-80. I bet no-one else had a TRS-80. When I came home from school and he said he'd bought a computer I was expecting a room full of huge metal boxes with flashing lights a la 'Space 1999'. I had no idea a "computer" could be a keyboard and a screen and a (great big) box. There weren't many games for it but there was one where you could trade in the South China Seas on ships with spices and bolts of silk, getting attacked by pirates. The ships looked like this = and the pirates looked like this X. I loved it.

We did have a Spectrum later and I remember Manic Miner and Atic Atac...am I dreaming that the games were on cassettes with a cassette player connected to the Spectrum with a lead - it made a noise like "weeeeeeeeewhooooooooowaaaaaaahurrrrrrrrrrrrr" as the game was loading.

Also had a Texas Instruments computer - TI994A (how can I remember these things?) but TI went bust and then you couldn't get any more games for it. It had speech synthesiser so you could make it 'talk' though.

Lol @ BASIC programming - I never got much further than
10 PRINT My brother is a twit
20 GOTO 10

though my Dad was a complete geek and wrote loads of programmes. You used to get programmes in magazines - and spend hours typing them out and they never worked..."Unknown Syntax Error"...grrrr.

Dh still had his ZX81 and piles of games til quite recently - he bought an Amiga too, when he got his first proper job

TRS-80...oooh, takes me back

Oh I had an acorn electron too!
I remember my Dad teaching me how to write programmes on it and we did one like animal/vegetable/mineral!Took us about a year

We had a bbc model b - used to play Elite and Chucky Egg. Also a ratehr odd game with no graphics at all, just words. "It is dark, there is a castle infront of you and a forest behind you......." You had to type in commands and try and fight your way past the man eating spider in the castle to get something.

Then we got a commadore 64, happy days of having to wait 45mins for a game to load.

Another Acorn Electron owner. Many hours spent playing Chuckie Egg, Gisbourne's Castle (Robin Hood type game), Starship Command, Hopper and Snapper (pacman). Happy days.

Oooo we had an Acorn too.Chuckie Egg was great.Also remember a game called Evil Weevils.
And loading them all up on a scratchy old cassette player that squeaked and wailed when you turned the volume up and took about 5 minutes each time lol.

Did any Electron owners have the collection of games that you got on one tape? A right pain to fast forward through the tape to find the beginning of the game you wanted. And having to type LOAD "". And the Electron had all the words (like LOAD and SAVE) on the front of the keys on the keyboard.
Am I sad to remember all this?!