ZX81

Sinclair launched the ZX81 in March 1981 at £49.95 as a kit or £69.95 ready-assembled, and more than a million found homes, most of them built in Dundee, Scotland, by Timex. Few machines did more to put a computer within reach of an ordinary British household. Owning one now is about the experience rather than the software. You get just 1K of RAM, expandable with add-on memory, so a RAM pack is essential for anything beyond short programs. It is small and makes a perfect display piece next to the Spectrum that followed it.