ZX Spectrum relaunched as gaming console

Backed by Sir Clive Sinclair, who launched the original ZX Spectrum computer in 1982, the company behind the Sinclair Spectrum Vega, Retro Computers, has used an Indeggogo crowd-funding campaign to attract investment in the project. The Sinclair Spectrum Vega is reported to take advantage of major advances in technology to achieve big cost savings by replacing most of the electronics in the earlier computer products. Instead the Vega uses a low cost micro-controller and a clever piece of software that combine to enable the Vega to run all of the games, 14,000 or more of them, which were developed during the years when some 5 million of the original Sinclair Spectrum were being sold.

The games computer is to be manufactured by SMS Electronics at its factory in Beeston, Nottinghamshire.  The decision to begin manufacture in the UK continues the policy of Sir Clive, who said: "I have always sought to manufacture my products in the UK whenever possible and I am proud that I have usually been able to do so. In this country we have some top quality factories that can give us the comfort of knowing that the Vega will be very reliably made. When our management team visited the SMS Electronics facility all of them were impressed with the thoroughness and attention for detail at every stage of the manufacturing process. And SMS will provide us with exactly what we need ‒ a ‘one stop’ service capable of delivering finished, tested, packaged product direct to our customers.”

The Vega is as simple to use as any of the popular games consoles, but far less expensive. It plugs into a TV, so no computer monitor is necessary, and comes complete with around 1000 games built-in. The Vega has sufficient memory to allow the user to download the many additional games that Retro Computers plans to make available from time to time free of charge.