Date   : Fri, 17 Aug 2007 16:26:55 +0100
From   : julesrichardsonuk@... (Jules Richardson)
Subject: BBC Microcomputer System Technical Specification

Andrew Benham wrote:
> Jules Richardson wrote:
>> Is this in common circulation (the one I have is a photocopy of issue 3, 
>> September 1981)?
> 
> Is this an Acorn spec, or a BBC one ?  Somewhere I probably still have
> the BBC spec which required a Z80 processor...

Aha - it's a BBC one. It mentions things [1] like the Z80 as being "various 
parts of the BBC Microcomputer system which are still being developed", which 
reads to me as though they'd figured out it was an optional extra rather than 
being mandatory.

[1] the list includes:

   Teletext adapter
   Prestel adapter
   Single-drive 100K disk unit
   Dual-drive 800K disk unit
   6502 second processor expansion
   Z80 second processor expansion
   CP/M-compatible disk system

... the last one's interesting - I wonder what the plan was and why it was 
different to just using a Z80 copro and the existing BBC drives?


Keyboard section's interesting. Resistant to cigarette ash, apparently. There 
was to be no break key (but there was to be a reset switch on the back of the 
machine). The 0 key was to be unaffected by shift, as though some special 
significance was attached to it - unfortunately it doesn't say what.

cheers

Jules