I bought a Spectrum on eBay. Cost me around £17, so money well spent. A few games and a joystick came with it. Part of my reasoning is that I wanted one to measure up for Lego modelling purposes. A LDD screen grab can be seen here: http://hairydalek.posterous.com/more-le ... -computers

Anyway, I hooked said Spectrum up to the TV, and it works, but the picture is very washy. This is because it’s using the tuner and that’s a bit rubbish. So I found some instructions for modding the machine so that it will work using AV connectors instead. In fact, a pretty easy mod to do. Basically tapping a wire in to the video modulator, and returning it to the grounded modulator. The hardest part was buzzing out a hole in the case to accommodate the new plug.

So, here is a photo of the new socket with a plug in it. You can’t see the hole I buzzed into the case.

http://www.worldofpaul.com/images/index ... se_mod.jpg <- huge version

And the output? Not bad on my big Samsung HD TV.

http://www.worldofpaul.com/images/index ... screen.jpg <- huge version

Not bad considering the picture is being upscaled!

But HORROR - they keyboard would not work when it was reassembled. Why? Well, connecting the keyboard to the circuit board is a really rubbish plastic ribbon cable which cracked then I took the machine apart (note: Acorn used superior ribbon cables because they were the best at computers in this country). I was careful (instructions I had read had warned me), but it had cracked where there was the most pressure on the cable and movement had just caused it to break. Thankfully, the break was not too far from the end that poked into the plug on the circuit board, so snipping the cable just above the break and poking it back in to the socket did the job.

So, one 48K issue 2 Sinclair ZX Spectrum brought back to life and ready for the next 30 years!

I can also load and save programs using my iPad. I’m working on the iPhone (the iPhone does not support Apple’s USB phone connector). You can’t just plug the Spectrum in and record. It needs some kind of circuitry to control the signal. I can use a Griffin audio in out USB adapter on the iPad, and I can save using that. Normal playback from the iPhone/iPad works for loading, it’s just saving that’s a bit of a pain. Still, you can and don’t need a cassette recorder.

Irony: a programme of a few K on the Spectrum weighs in at 2MB when saved as an audio file on my Mac! Want my first Spectrum program in 30 years? Try this: It’s not spectacular, is almost 3MB to download but was my test for saving and loading.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/613685/Colours.wav

I am feeling pleased with myself today.

Wow! You are my god! Okay, not literally but dude, mega-impressed.

I've always loved my Spectrum ever since I was a kid. It was my first experience of computers and its black shiny pastic case seemed to fit well with the hi-tech world of Knight Rider. Unfortunately, dopey cousin did something to it and it's never worked since so I've had both the 48K and 128K stuck in storage. Everything else works - joysticks, microdrives, Interface 1, Kempston interface thingy, multitude of cassettes etc.

My plan would be to have both machines up and running, with one installed in the car.

Did you use any enthusiast websites to help out?

Nice work. But you could have put the case and keyboard through a wash by the looks of the grime.

I'll give the case a scrub. I know it needs it.

The instructions for the mod to get it to work nicely on my TV is here:
http://hotchk155.blogspot.com/2011/05/a ... ctrum.html

He's using a camera lead for his mod. In just put in a standard AV socket from Maplin.

There are others which involve more rummaging around inside the modulator itself and desoldering and resoldering stuff. The problem here is that is kills the TV out socket. The one above should give you both.

The are shed loads of Spectrum sites, and you can spares on eBay too.1

If anyone wants mine to play with, they can have it for nothing. Of course, downside is it doesn't work - just gives a screen full of flashing characters.

I think that's what happened to one of mine.

You'd have to pry mine from my cold dead hands. No idea if it works or not though, it's been in the garage for ten years and not switched on in twenty. Hard to say whether I love my spectrum, my teddy or my parents more!

A friend just got his 128K one out. We had a challenge - could we get our respective machines working on a modern TV today. His has been garage bound for about the same length of time as yours. Bring it inside, let it acclimatise to room temperature and switch it on.

There's a fair likelihood I reckon. After all, they're entirely 'solid state' devices, no disk drives or the like. I suppose there's a chance some wiring may have perished in the period or they've had water ingress or something, but if they've been stored reasonably well I can't think of a reason why they obviously wouldn't work...

Jon

Reminded me of this gem: http://www2.b3ta.com/heyhey16k/

Zx81/Spectrum/Atari ST (with 1Mb upgrade - boy does that case bulge) - the ST with both high-res (green) and colour (bloody awful res) monitors. I'm sure if I looked hard enough I could find original boxes as well, certainly all the cables. Degas Elite - now that was a drawing package...........

Al

It's in its box with the original polystyrene, so I believe it should work. However I daren't try it in case it doesn't! It should also work with my telly as well as I'm still CRT.

This thread is timely as I spent most of Friday on my spectrum emulator trying to work out how to enter pokes as I finally want to complete fantasy world dizzy. Three lives is not enough for me.

Ps, I'm seriously worried about my lcii as my pipes burst all over it a couple of weeks ago. Still original boxes though and the water was pouring for only a couple of minutes tops. Again, too worried to check.

One more thing, I can't even remember why, but I had my spectrum fixed once. You wouldn't even begin to get a computer fixed nowadays. It's always, "you need a new logic board". Yeah well, I can replace that myself and a new computer would be cheaper.

For those who are interested, you can pad and save from an iPhone!

What you need is one of those AV cables from a video camera kit. At one end will be 3 phono plugs - red, white and yellow. At the other end will be a standard 2.5mm jack - with 3 dividing lines on the pin, much like the iPhone head phone jack.

You need to hook up these to your Spectrum. You will need adapters for the phono plugs to get them to fit in the Spectrum Ear and Mic sockets. The RED AV jack goes into the Mic socket. The white and yellow ones go into the Ear. Ideally, you will need to connect both white and yellow plugs to the Ear socket on the computer. It seems that with the white connected you can record and with the yellow connected you can load. I expect that this is something to do with a circuit being completed somewhere, and what you actually need is an adapter to let you connect both at the same time. Anyway, if you have the wrong one connected when you save, you’ll just get a recording of the room, not the save bleeps and noises.

On my iPhone I have an app called Retro Recorder - this has a nice retro tape player look to it, and you can share the library with your computer over wi-fi, and get .wav files from it. I have not tried this, but I am guessing that you will be able to use this to record Speccy tapes from an old skool tape deck. I expect you could also fill a corner of your MP3 player with Spectrum tapes and load from that (and possibly apply this logic to other 8-bit machines).

That’s enough Sinclair based larks for today!