There were six of us in the whole startup: myself, Billy Skyrme (director), Bob Behler (engineering), Carlos Dragovich (production), Margot Murphy (marketing) and Dan Ross (VP). All of these names where characters in a maze game I wrote called Grimm’s Fairy Trails.
I was the Software Manager for Timex Computers. I was there at the beginning when we first got a ZX81 (we made them in our Dundee Scotland plant for Clive Sinclair).
This small group got the Timex 1000 and 1016 versions out to public. We rebranded as a Timex/Sinclair 1000. We changed the 1K RAM chip for 2k. A 16K RAM pack quickly followed. They were mainly repaints of ZX models.
It was like a dream to me. Everything was new. And it was quick. Software authors came from the world over to see me and get a machine.
We sold 600,000 but a lot were returned. The UK and other European markets were far more tolerant to Clive’s stuff and just ran with it. Americans however expected it to work with no effort required.
The RAM pack was a weak link as it continually fell off. We used erasers from pencils to form wedges between the body and the ram pack. It was always my contention that just because my team could keep the 16K RAM pack on, the general populace could not nor could they tune the tape recorder to the right volume.
We had Radio Shack in the supply pipe for cassette recorders.
Almost immediately we were engaged by SoftSync (Sue Currier). Sue and her team began gathering up ZX software from around the world. I wrote probably 12 titles, and the rest of the world chimed in for hundreds more.
I hired 6 software/hardware people to screen and test these submissions.
Bill Gates made a visit. He asked if he could he port his OS into 16K. He was so young and, of course, just another player at that time. No deal. IBM made him king.
Next came the Sinclair Spectrum.
Timex attacked it like Atari: it needed joysticks, cartridges, a real keyboard. The Spectrum thrived in Europe. We were just going to beef it up, be ready in 2 months. We hired engineers to rework the hardware, ROM guys to rework the ROM. QC guys. This crew was over 50 people. One year later, we were still waiting.
The software had gone exponential …. DeathChase, Ant Attack. Atari guys are sending us software from their cellar. So many great titles but by now they are written by real gamers, writing screens during the interrupts for seamless smooth action. God, I was overwhelmed. All we needed was the hardware.
In the final days, we were looking for financing: we were running out of cash fast. Still no 2068. We did not make our own chips (ROM) so were totally dependent on a company in Arizona. Just one error and we would wait months for a re-burn.
When the IBM PC arrived, it was game over for Texas Instruments, Radio Shack, Atari, Commodore and Timex. The PC age was being born during our run and just eclipsed us …. after we were only $99.
The people in most part were fine. Most of the software players went to Microsoft and like companies. I stayed because I could write code that delved into deep algorithms for complex systems. I left after 30 years at Timex in 2000.
Europe and Portugal, even some South American countries never gave up. I used to get a lot of calls but come on …. it’s a relic. I don’t think it changed history but it sure was affordable and landed in the hands of who knows and what they later became.