Sinclair ZX80 questions

[Rob O'Donnell]

At 14:51 20/08/2006, Tim Shoppa wrote:


>I did a google search and looked on Wikipedia but some of the details
>there do NOT match my memory. They say there were only 50,000 ZX80's sold
>and this seems to be a ridiculously low number for a mass-market
>machine sold through many different channels. They say that the Sinclair
>brand was only in the UK and this does not match my experience of having
>bought one in the US (or the
>ads in 1980 Radio-Electronics). But this was 26 years ago, so my memory
>isn't exactly sharp either!

Are you sure you are thinking of the ZX80 - flat and white with a 
hump at the back - and not the ZX81 (squarer, black)?

The ZX81 (and then the ZX Spectrum) was indeed mass-market, sold here 
by major high street chains and definitely under the Timex brand in 
the US.  My only experience of seeing the ZX80 was in a few magazine 
adverts as purely a mail-order kit, but with built ones 
available...  The ZX81 was only a year later.

I bought and built the ZX81 kit, and only later inherited the ZX80 I 
still have.  I really wish I'd not got rid of the '81 now - I had 
several, in the end, with loads of accessories, and I swapped it all 
for something so inconsequential that I can't even remember what it was, now..

Rob