www.jupiter-ace.co.uk

News & Reviews Index > News from Sinclair User, October 1982


ANOTHER cheap micro has been produced for the home market. The Jupiter Ace is the first computer to be designed by Richard Altwasser and Steven Vickers since they finished design work on the Spectrum.

  The new machine, which will be sold by mail order for £89.95, uses the language Forth instead of the


more usual Basic used on other micro-computers. Forth was chosen because of its "combination of speed, versatility and ease of programming".
  The computer looks rather like a cross between a ZX-80 and a Spectrum. It has a full-size moving-key keyboard, although one thing it does not have is the one-key


entry system for which the Sinclair machines have become famous.   As with the Sinclair machines, the Ace can be used with a domestic television set and uses an ordinary cassette recorder for back-up memory. The basic unit has only 3K RAM.
  The screen is memory mapped with a 24 x 32 character flicker-free display and user-definable high-resolution graphics. The cassette interface performs at 1,500 baud and has a Verify command.
  It also has a programmable sound generator. "We hope it will be louder than that of the Spectrum," said Vickers.
  The Ace will be manufactured by TW Electronics. It has an expansion socket at the rear which the designers hope to use for peripherals, RAM expansion and a colour board. The machine was due for unveiling at the Personal Computer World Show in September.