Sinclair made computers which a kid like me, not from a rich family, could afford. Yeah the computers were of cheap quality with a crappy keyboard - but he changed home computers from being a plaything for the rich to be available to everybody. A lot of clever design went into making them as cheap as possible.
Hero worship because he brought computers to the masses. The cost cutting was the point - there were already computers that cost the same as a nice TV, this was a computer a kid could get for Christmas. For many of us that oppertunity was the start of a lifelong passion.
This isn't the time and place for polite shallow mutterings either. We're not at the funeral here, or barging in on the bereaved. If we're going to have a discussion thread about his legacy, it should be a fair one.
Yeah it is. The guy had a rabid cult following much like Musk does today. He had many financial victims with poorly engineered products.
He made a very valuable contribution to the industry however.
People have rose tinted glasses about it but the reality was products not turning up, not shipping, not working and a sour taste for many against technology.
He even bought faulty RAM in which was discarded for the Spectrums and sold the ones that booted.
The only reason it worked out for a lot of people is we have pretty strong consumer protection laws here!
He brought faulty RAM that had errors just in a single half and then he used just the other (correct) half - nothing wrong with that.
Such cost cutting made it affordable to a large number of people - had it costed a couple of time more it could be a hard sell for my Eastern European parents. Fortunately, that didn't happen and now, 40 years later, I have a nice career and I'm still enjoying dealing with computers just as when I was a kid with ZX Spectrum.
Actually that’s not strictly true. Test methodology was “see if it worked and ship”. Many many of the computers were returned and replaced immediately. And a lot of the new ones you got were the broken ones which were sent back and the chips replaced. I’ve seen a new one which still didn’t work which had been reworked at least once and sold as new again.
My father had a nice business for a few years doing adhoc repairs and then started his own PC import business in the end with the cash he earned fixing people’s stuff. That was a world of difference.
Agree with your comments about affordability. As you say about Eastern Europe, even the clones were more expensive I understand.
It's not that unique in the computer business. I used to build PCs for a shop during the 90s internet craze. When we got a box of Quantum Bigfoot HDDs we'd be lucky if half of them worked. Someone who cared about quality wouldn't put that crap in a computer. But it was cheap. The soundcards we sold were so cheap they were cut diagonally to save on PCB material.
Though this shop just did it for profit margin. Sinclair did it to make computers available to the masses.
Yes, it's very common. Even companies like Intel sometimes test a CPU at umpteen GHz, then retest the ones that fail at umpteen/2 GHz and sell them at a lower price if they work reliably at the lower speed.
Yes and no. The 48k was a bit of a disaster to start with. Lots of failures, bugs galore, a full recall due to power supply shock hazard. Not to mention the horrible keyboard.
When you look at the microscopic view of owning one computer from him that worked it does somewhat rose tint the overall view of things which was not good.
these are extremely minor issues when you look at the bigger picture - you could argue that Clive kick started the multi billion pound games industry by getting young people interested in computer games
sure it would have happened anyway, but he definately made it happen earlier
almost 100% of the people who work in IT (in the UK) over a certain age had one of his affordable computers
Yet the commoditization of computers he brought forth was a genuine gift to the people that opened a lot of doors for many. He has positively influenced the lives of many.
