Quote:
Originally Posted by mole42uk
I quickly grew fed up with my MK14 because it didn't have any storage.....and entering a complete routine (one could hardly call them 'programs') on that keypad was to say the least, a tad awkward.
I swapped mine for a mini synthesizer and later bought a NASCOM which did have a cassette interface. But that's another story!
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What kind of synth? One of the Casio CZs, or something more exotic like a Roland SH101? (Just trying to imagine what would have equivalent value to an MK14 at the time).
When a computer expert (lecturer) from the nearby Newcastle Polytechnic came in to see us with a view to persuading us to take up a career in computer engineering, he brought with him a fully expanded Nascom built into a wooden suitcase. As we'd had prior warning of his visit, I proudly took my MK14, at the time really neatly installed in a hard briefcase with a concealed chunky battery supply (6 * D cells!) into school to show him.
I thought he'd be delighted to encounter someone with a genuine interest but he just made a bit of a face and said he thought I'd wasted my money and should have bought something like the Nascom. I asked him how much money he thought a fourteen year old schoolboy had, and pointed out that if I didn't have the MK14 I wouldn't have a computer at all.
My later progress was through the ZX81, Spectrum, and then the first really expensive computer I bought was an Atari ST, but by then I had been working for a few years. I was never able to afford any of the Acorn machines when they were contemporary, although I do now own two complete, working BBC model Bs complete with disc drives - I bought them for about £5 each when their price had hit rock bottom in the mid nineties.
Much like your first car or what have you, the MK14, the first computer I ever owned, remains my firm favourite, and I'm very glad that I did keep it. I continue to do odds and ends with it so it doesn't feel too neglected. Several years ago, I made a hex downloader / programming interface for it (which makes playing with it a lot easier) and more recently - since my original manual was in terrible shape with schoolboy pen and pencil writing all over it - I managed to buy a nice clean replacement manual for it.
Ultimately, it would be nice to find a complete replacement set of original rubber-mat keypad parts for it, but that is extremely unlikely given that most people got rid of them at the earliest opportunity.