What appears like a Sinclair ZX81 however runs Forth? In case you stated a Jupiter ACE, you get a gold star. These are uncommon as a result of extraordinary individuals in 1982 didn’t need Forth, so solely about 5,000 of the units had been offered. [Cees Meijer] assumes they’re unaffordable, so he constructed a duplicate and exhibits you how one can, too. [Scott Baker] constructed one lately; you possibly can see his video under.
The resemblance to the Sinclair laptop wasn’t only a coincidence. Richard Altwasser and Steven Vickers had been behind the pc, and each had labored for Sinclair beforehand. Along with being well-known for utilizing Forth, the machine initially had a badly manufactured case and an unreliable keyboard. A later model tried to right these points, however there have been fewer than 1,000 made. [Cees’] reproduction used a design from [Grant Searle] with some modifications.
We preferred the real looking look of the 3D printed keyboard. The keyboard makes use of white plastic with raised letters. A fast black spray paint adopted by sanding provides the looks of black keys with white printed textual content.
Total, it is a handsome construct of a pc you in all probability gained’t see in individual. We want Forth had caught on within the early PC world, but it surely didn’t. [Grant] was prolific with reproduction computer systems, and [Cees] isn’t the one one who used that work as a place to begin for their very own tasks. If you need actual old-school Forth, you need to return a couple of extra years.
