The (Upsetting) Fall of Sinclair Research | Doing So Much Right But Not Enough | History in the Dark

[@nickroberts6026]

We had one of the first Spectrums. Yes, the keyboards were rubbish for typing, but they were hotkeys with BASIC commands on which made programming easy. And that was the strength of the machine - affordable, easy to use, great games for the time, and an introduction to coding. Used cassette recorders for storage, and a TV as a monitor. Lots of people learned to code within the limitations of 16KB, which was a great discipline at the time. And although I didnt end up as a coder, I did end up doing several jobs that involved specifying end user requirements to coders, and the insight I got from the Spectrum was invaluable. To fully understand the cultural importance of Sir Clive, you have to understand what Britain was like at the time, and it was incredibly gray. Traditional industry was collapsing, and this strange man with his odd ideas was so refreshing and made us proud to be British. The Spectrum was the right product from the right man at the right time.

[@leftgrrl]

One key entry also made programs more compact as the Spectrum stored a whole keyword like RANDOMISE in one byte rather than 9

[@jasejj]

Sinclair did have a couple of notable successes after the core business went to Amstrad. He founded Cambridge Computers, and made the Z88 which you have a picture of there. This was fairly successful as a portable machine and was popular for quite a number of years with journalists and the like. Cambridge also made a range of satellite television receivers in the 1990s which sold under numerous brand names. These were also quite well received and had a 10% market share in the UK for a while, although they did not survive the move to digital TV in the late 1990s.

[@Rambam1776]

My father had the Timex Sinclair t1000. First thing I ever learned any programming on. Those membranes were a grotesque pain in the ass

[@aerotube7291]

Great days. We had a tandy coco and then a Sinclair ql. Many happy memories of discovery

[@andrewthorpe3219]

Downunder the Spectrum was known about (thanks to UK gaming magazines) but almost impossible to find. I remember seeing a TV add ONCE for the ZX Spectrum, and it was with a bundle for a Pay-TV and TV package. Australia was pretty much exclusively Commodore territory. Other systems such as Trash-80s, Apple II and Mac (the Apple II cost MORE than an Amiga), the Atari ST was only sold through music shops because of the in-built MIDI ports, and some other minor systems were known but hardly anyone had them. Thanks to emulation, we can play the classics.

[@Dave_Sisson]

Well I had a Spectrum, although it was hard to find shops selling software and games in Melbourne and they were pricey compared to Commodore stuff.

[@sagarzazumikel]

Well, in Spain, the ZX Spectrum was a VERY popular computer due to its size and pricing. Many Spanish game developers started doing their games for the Spectrum. You can go to any thrift store or flea market to find lots of spectrum tapes and carts around. It was THE starter for gaming culture in Spain.

[@RailPreserver2K]

Something that I think would be interesting to cover is the life death and Resurgence of the typewriter. I say this because I've always found them fascinating and have been beyond Overjoyed that they're coming back with a vengeance in recent years

[@phoenix211245]

I highly doubt that a mechanical typewriter will stay anything but dead as it had for the past few decades. Maybe if we get a complete civilization crash and regression to older tech. No resurgence of the typewriter is happening, what you are talking about is artists using an old item to scam people to believe it adds value to their work. Anyone doing actual WORK will NEVER use a typewriter again.

[@alexhajnal107]

Have two Hermes Baby manual typewriters (one with a French and one with an English keyboard). Still use them occasionally.

[@FlashyVic]

A few years ago there was a great BBC drama about the Clive Sinclair and Chris Curry rivalry called Micro Men few. It starred Martin 'Bilbo Baggins' Freeman as Chris Curry and Alexander Armstrong as Sinclair.

[@alexhajnal107]

Do you mean Martin "Watson" Freeman? (From the stellar _Sherlock_ series)

[@FlashyVic]

@alexhajnal107 Or even Martin 'Tim from The Office' Freeman.

[@alexhajnal107]

Fun fact: Sophie Wilson (designer of Acorn's ARM CPU architecture) has a cameo appearance as the pub's landlady.

[@dazhigh9208]

Micro man was a great story of the spectrum and acorn

[@stephenhill4492]

You can see the hilarious ending of Microsoft Men on KZbin, showing Clive Sinclair in a C5 being overtaken by lorries with the logos of Microsoft and HP on them.

[@mikeyhuntsman568]

Big D, Darkness. Love your videos, no matter the topic. Your style and humor makes them quite enjoyable. Keep up the good work.

[@mankind8088]

His commentary is epic

[@Tornado1994]

@@mankind8088 Like Silent Rob, Darkness is a YT OG. I've followed him since he was a 17 year old HS Kid joining KZbin as an Angry Game Reviewer/Sonic SEGA Game Channel Right off the Heels of IG,SpoonyOne and Silent Rob in mid 2007. Yes, he's been on YT THAT long.

[@Tornado1994]

17 glorious years on YT. I remember subscribing to his Channel only several months after creating this handle WAY back in 2007!

[@alexhajnal107]

00:26 I absolutely *love* the angular black mid '80s/early '90s aesthetic of the QL. Reminds me a lot of the NeXTstation.

[@grahamariss2111]

Sinclair had a long term manufacturing partnership Timex who had a factory in Scotland, they made the calculators, micro TVs (you missed those) and computers for Sinclair's various companies so they were natural partners for the US market.

[@collegeman1988]

In early 1982 when I was 14, I remember seeing these Timex Sinclair mini computers for sale in a store at a local mall in metro Denver. Compared to other computers, they were relatively inexpensive, but they really didn’t do much in comparison to other computers. Throughout the 1980s, computers were regarded as being nothing more than a toy or a novelty item that few people owned, but more and more students were using them in schools as the decade went on.

[@alexhajnal107]

10:48 _"the [ZX80's] screen had a habit of blanking out"_ That's because the output to the TV modulator was bit-banged by the CPU. When a keypress interrupt triggered, the CPU would service it but that meant that no screen output would occur for the duration of the interrupt handler. That's the reason that screen output was interrupted (no pun intended) on every keypress (i.e. the screen blanking wasn't a random, intermittent occurrence).

[@z3r0_35]

You have to wonder how Sinclair Research would have fared if they'd leaned more into the gaming side of things instead of trying to compete in the business PC market. I think they could have carved out a niche for themselves making gaming PC/console hybrids for a while longer. Who knows, maybe they'd still be making things in that sphere today?

[@bocahdongo7769]

We talked about Claire Sinclair The person who willingly giving his middle finger to anyone in his way

[@ManoOne-Music-Production]

Wait that was fast!! I haven’t watched yet but I JUST watched your C5 video. Sinclair’s life going back to his start is quite fascinating. On a related note: Sega CD next? 😉 Maybe Atari, Commodore / Amiga (including how they pushed their CD32 etc)… so many things to possibly cover…

[@WesMoast]

The Ti-99 also loaded games from tapes. When you loaded one it sounded EXACTLY like a dial up modem

[@alexhajnal107]

The headers were much simpler though and data flow was strictly uni-directional. Obligatory reference to the excellent _The sound of the dialup, pictured_ from Oona Räisänen (windytan).

[@howebrad4601]

My ti99 used cartridges

[@TheMoastWorst]

@@howebrad4601 So did mine (I remember Parsec specifically) but many games like the role playing games (Mystery Fun House is the only one that comes to mind currently) were loased by casette tape.

[@alexhajnal107]

04:42 and 05:05: Conserving battery power was the reason that the display was button-activated. Question for any of y'all: Does anyone have a datasheet for one of these early red 7-segment displays? If not, does anyone know the forward voltage and recommended (milli)amperage per segment?

[@KH990j]

Are you going to do a video on Commodore? They were the first, I believe to come out with a PC. They could have been one of the reason Americans didn't take to the Sinclairs.

[@alexhajnal107]

04:22 The main reason that the bottom fell out of the calculator market was that most (all?) manufacturers were using calculator chipsets from the likes of TI. Once TI, etc. entered the retail calculator market the 3rd party manufacturers could no longer compete on price. (The up-and-coming Japanese manufacturers didn't help matters either.)

[@aerotube7291]

He had a real thing for design. A true british ecentric.. thank you, the doc micromen is a great dramatisation of the era. Gidday from NZ

[@JorgeRTrevino]

How are you bringing such glorious videos to us in such a prolific manner?! I salute you, sir!

[@chewydewok]

Sinclair is a good example that just because you're good inventor doesn't make you a good business man.

[@jacksonmahr8915]

Clive Sinclair had some weird black spots in his thinking - not being able to imagine the problem with a 10 day battery change is just weird. He was amazed by his own "genius" I think.

[@nopamineLevel100]

But the keyboard was adorable 😍

[@aaronbasham6554]

Owning a ZX Spectrum and several other computers of the era, I will say part of the problem in retrospect is that you were getting what you paid for from the spectrum. Like, it works, and its not a bad machine for the price, but that doesn't matter much when competitors make stuff like the C64 and Amstrad CPC

[@jasonhearn9110]

I would like to know how you manage to put out so much high-quality content so fast. Seriously, I love it, but please don't burn yourself out.

[@alexhajnal107]

[repost as it's apropos] re the QL: There's no way you'll get decent performance out of a 68008. The 68000 was already hobbled by a 16-bit bus (the architecture is strongly 32-bit) and the '008 shrunk that down to 8 bits. Sure it made the boards cheaper to design and produce but pretty much cut performance in half. [The 68k does have a pretty generous 8 data + 8 (7+SP) address registers to work with but there's still only so much one can do before having to hit main memory. Regardless, you'll get hit with a 50% penalty just fetching instructions.]

[@WesMoast]

Could you cover Texas Instruments at some point? We had a Ti-99 computer in 1983 and we thought it was the coolest thing in the world

[@alexhajnal107]

Is that the one that had to jump through two layers of indirection on each memory access? Edit: The architecture is rather more _interesting_ than that. The "Architecture" section of the WP article summarizes it. Basically the design was hampered by taking a chip designed for a 16-bit bus and attaching it to an 8-bit one. This is the same thing that hobbled the 68008 used in the QL.

[@Commanderziff]

It is rather facinating, seeing the technology wars that raged before I was even born. (Well, the ZX Spectrum came out a few months before I was born.). And all over tech that feel like glorified calculators compared to today.

[@andrewbowen4544]

Will Amstrad be next Darkness

[@robertwilloughby8050]

And after that the MSX group of computers.

[@derekthelehighvalleyfoamer4427]

How about Coleco?

[@elementthegamer743]

i’d like an episode on commodore too!

[@melasnexperience]

Something about the "farting robot" sound capabilities of the Spectrum warms my heart.

[@EthanCollier01]

Darkness, thanks for making your videos so informational and funny too! Also thanks for using your own voice and not that STUPID Ai, monotoned “text to voice” that other channels do!

[@funkyfoodster]

My first computer was a 48k zx spectrum, i was eleven. I spent so many hours playing that magical little machine.

[@stevebaldwin2635]

In 1985 i bought a t1000 for like $30 with the expansion memory. But when you went to use it the expansion module would loose contact and crash. I gave up and put it away.

[@snoopytoetag9556]

@@stevebaldwin2635 this was exactly my experience too

[@michelleshaw337]

The QL unfortunately took a wonderful processor and hobbled it with an 8 bit data bus, meaning it never stood a chance of matching its competitors’ performance. Then there were oddball choices like the microdrives.

[@windingtwilight]

Say what you will, that intro music was sick as hell

[@BoBnotThat1]

Don't give us crap for not having things shipped not working. Tesla? 😂

[@dazhigh9208]

Hi great video, really well done and you've done your research also you were very kind to Clive.( The original man in a shed ). Id recommend the tv show Micro men as it tells the story of Sinclair really well and very funny. Alas the digital watch was also sold as a kit. ( Ive never heard of anyone making it actually work lol ) As a child growing up in the 80's you either had a speccy, c64 or a amstrad. All were great and better than nothing. And all tape drives at least at first. It was a shame he sold to Alan sugar. Again great video and as a 80's kid in the UK I have to agree with you 110% Cheers dude many thanks from me and my Dog Max

[@dazhigh9208]

Again I must say you did Clive Sinclair's story really well and you were very respectful and kind to him. The original English man in a Shed. Well done Darkness a very well earned thumbs up 👍👍👍👍

[@chalkywhite9807]

These videos are great ....super interesting and educational....you have and amazing talent!!!!!

[@ERGLupin]

I mean, youve done Sinclair Research. Now you are legally obligated to do Amstrad

[@jaspal666]

Commodore had the US market with the Vic and 64. Rough market to crack.

[@ILLWILL999]

And now we get to listen

[@carlossaraiva8213]

The ZX Spectrum was extremely popular in Portugal too.

[@jon-paulfilkins7820]

If you think about it, the only home computer company of the era still around and in the computer hardware business is Apple. The Ghost of Acorn continues in the ARM CPU but they only design and license that. All the others, they at best continue as Legacy brands licensing out the IP they have left.

[@alexhajnal107]

A slew of the Japanese manufacturers are. _cf._ WP's list of implementers of the MSX platform

[@jon-paulfilkins7820]

@@alexhajnal107 Fair enough but for them, it rarely was more than a side hustle as they were already established electronics manufacturers. I can only really think of Texas Instruments being a non Japanese equivalent to that and they left the market relatively early.

[@alexhajnal107]

@@jon-paulfilkins7820 Fair point. Another interesting case is HP. They were selling desktop computers (e.g. the HP-85) throughout the era but targeted them at scientists and engineers.

[@happyjack71]

My very 1st computer was a Timex Sinclair 1000. I loved it!

[@mjookie]

My dad knew Clive Sinclair very well, he could never understand how someone so brilliant could also be so stupid at the same time, he literally never saw the problems patently obvious to lesser mortals - ie the people he wanted to sell to. Of course these days that’s all fairly well understood. He basically shouldn’t have been allowed anywhere near the actual businesses just kept in a back room inventing stuff. He’d probably have been much happier too..

[@howebrad4601]

As an American teen in the 80s i remember the timez sinclair. Didnt take it seriously as what does timex know about computers. I had a texas instruments ti99, but really wanted an apple IIe, but couldn't afford one.

[@jon-paulfilkins7820]

Back then it seemed like magic! Who remembers working a part time after school job/paper round to buy a colour computer, only to plug it into a hand me down black and white portable TV! Yes the C64 was twice the machine of the Spectrum, it was also twice the price (and then some).

[@2dogsmowing]

It's been weird seeing videos, not about trains from you. 😂 My watch I've had for over 2 years and still have the original battery.

[@alexhajnal107]

The Sinclair watches date from before the invention of CMOS semiconductors and (reflective) LCD displays; both are quite low-power compared to TTL and LEDs. (I suspect the battery tech wasn't that great either.)

[@alexhajnal107]

Obligatory reference to _Micro Men._ [repost as it's apropos]

[@pcs9518]

Funny how electric bikes and folding bikes are fairly popular items nowadays just a bit ahead of his time

[@HistoryintheDark]

The A-bike was actually well-liked, but copycat products flooded the market and made it not sell as well as it could have.

[@b33zNet]

Great stuff! Thanks. Amstrad would be a cool one as well.

[@DrTopGun]

You did it!!! Excellent!!! Thank you for the Sinclair documentary, buddy. I always wondered about this company. Freakin' awesome!! 😁🤜🤛💪🖖

[@Jumbling-f2d]

Nice channel, good stuff 👍.

[@AlexEvans1]

How could you talk about the continued interest in the ZX Spectrum and the machines that came from that and not talk about (or even mention) the ZX Spectrum Next?

[@alexhajnal107]

00:12 Wonder whether that was actual CGI or hand-drawn _ersatz_ CGI as in _2001._

[@TheProfessional99]

Brilliant video- thanks 🙏🏻 ❤

[@therealhatchet]

Dude you are spitting these videos out!

[@leftgrrl]

The original 'rubber key' Spectrum's keyboard was perhaps more of an asset than its given credit for. The mass market appeal came from kids for whom a big chunky keyboard like that of the BBC Micro was less well sized for their hands. The irony of the QL in a video that starts by focusing on Sir Clive Sinclair was that all the bits Clive made the decisions about were disasters - his obsession with microdrive tapes and mini monitors at weird scan rates, or launching before it was ready because he wanted to steal a march on the overpriced Apple Mac. The bits others were responsible for - the OS, CLI or sleek design - were the bits Clive was kept away from. While it was iconoclastically incompatible with CP/M or DOS, the UK was not quite IBM-fixated in 1984 in the way you would imagine from the US perspective. Shame about the poor grasp of communism and socialism at 6:30. Practically what was going on was neither of those and closer to the tax breaks handed out to businesses all over the US these days, just with a bit more care on where the money went.

[@retrogametech1626]

Why all the kits did they not have laborers to finish building there products???

[@I.b.shifty]

for computer hobbyists. Lots of people liked to make there own gear or use parts to create hybrid systems. Would also be cheaper for the company and the tail end buyers having the end product in kit form

[@alexhajnal107]

I've bought a fair amount of hardware in kit form. Various reasons: I love soldering, it's easy to modify, sometimes it's cheaper (the latter being big deal back in the day). [ Aside: I love through-hole soldering for relaxation but overwhelmingly prefer surface-mount parts for my own hand-soldered homebrew designs (I never design for through-hole if I can avoid it). ]

[@JenniferinIllinois]

Unleash the unspeakable power of the Spectrum!!!!! Bleep bleep 🤣🤣🤣

[@dakinayantv3245]

The teddy bears were so cute.🐻

[@THE_TOOTH77]

I don't recall what brand I had, we had computer similar to that. One that used cassettes to play games.

[@alexhajnal107]

Pretty much all of the low-end systems used cassette tapes. Floppy drives were very expensive, ca. 400 [1980s] USD or so for a single unit. C64 ones were even pricier IIRC as they were essentially an entire separate similarly-specced computer (with CPU and RAM but _sans_ display).

[@naradaian]

Ah what a tale …a bit like de Lorean although Clive was not a criminal…. You missed out his forays into hifi electronics…. There maybe not a single working example anywhere innthe known universe….i bought one but returned it twice before gettina refund….looked great …almost Apple level..

[@ChrisTopher-cy8ph]

ZX80,81 and Amstrad sold Alot in Australia

[@BoBnotThat1]

My first computers. 48 and the 128k, my mate had the ZX81. 😂

[@26col]

I loved my ZX Spectrum.

[@csxtrainfan319]

Death from cancer is one of the worst

[@dazhigh9208]

Ok some people will get mad but hear me out, The Spekky was today's playstation and the C64 was the Xbox. It's the same school ground banter

[@retrogametech1626]

I am buying the spectrum cause I own every one of there classic pcs in mini and even a c64 maxi

[@carlossaraiva8213]

Does it make me a nerd that i recognizex all the ZX Spectrum games that were shown in this video? 😅😅😅

[@HistoryintheDark]

It makes you a man of culture.

[@BoBnotThat1]

Have you ever tried playing games on any of these. The 81, you're a dot! Tapes as well Beeee bep beeeeee burrrrrrwwe😂

[@alexhajnal107]

SC/MP = SKAM-p' (like the word scamp) Zilog = ZEYE-log (long i)

[@Cooe.]

The ZX Spectrum was more accidental success than anything else. 🤷 The hardware is actually largely crap. It could basically only have been successful in the d0gsh!t economy of Britain in the 1980's. It sold well because it was cheap, not because it was good. Compared to the Commodore 64 it was multiple GENERATIONS behind in capability.

[@Tornado1994]

ZX Spectrum was VERY Underpowered for its time, and even WEAKER than the Atari 800(Which the 5200 Pamela was based off of). Its Success in the UK was BAD for home consoles. NES and Master System completely undersold because of ZX Spectrum.

[@cliffordcrimson7124]

This is a cool video but the reddit voice is grating

[@JohnNathanShopper]

Yip yip yip yip yip

[@retrogametech1626]

Did the cousin loving cause there downfall

[@joeomalley1969]

So that's where Apple got the inspiration for their butterfly keyboard from Interesting that he was bailed out by a Labour Government Socialism for me but not for thee

[@nickpalance3622]

At least there is no “slash”. Yet. I’m only about halfway through… 17-18 minutes. But I gotta say .. “time-EX” and not “TIME-ex”?? (Where you place the stresses). You’re killing me!!! 😂

[@alexhajnal107]

I let that one pass. Close enough and he has been making an obvious effort to improve his pronunciations as of late.

[@retrogametech1626]

Thank god we got real computers in the USA

[@nickpalance3622]

The PET ! The VIC-20 ! The C16 ! The TI-99/4 (no ‘A’) (make sure you pronounce the “slash” !! .. and I guess the “dash” too?) The Timex … uh nevermind The Apple /// The Apple Lisa (not MK 2) The TRaSh-80 (the OG 1977 version) ! The PC Jr !

[@alexhajnal107]

@@nickpalance3622 USA! USA! [I can't hear you!] USA! USA!

[@leftgrrl]

Yeah but not until 1993 ;)

[@alexhajnal107]

@@leftgrrl _"real computers in the USA"_ … _"not until 1993"_ What did you have in mind?

[@TheMelorino]

why are you yelling?

[@carlossaraiva8213]

It's his style, ok?