BBC Micro - Specifications

The BBC Micro, affectionately known as the Beeb, was an early home computer. It was designed and built by Acorn Computers Ltd for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). In the early 1980s, the BBC started what became known as the BBC Computer Literacy Project. The project was initiated largely in response to an extremely influential BBC documentary The Mighty Micro, in which Dr. Christopher Evans from the National Physical Laboratory predicted the coming (micro)computer revolution and its impact on the ...

Including:

• BBC Micro - Background
• BBC Micro - Market impact
• BBC Micro - Description
• BBC Micro - Hardware features Models A and B
• BBC Micro - Software and expandability
• BBC Micro - Successor machines and the retro scene
• BBC Micro - Specifications
• BBC Micro - Trivia

Read more here: » BBC Micro: Encyclopedia - BBC Micro

Four independent sound channels (one noise and 3 melodic) using the Texas Instruments SN76489 sound chip Built-in hardware support included: pluggable ROMs, directly or via "Sideways" daughterboard tape interface (with motor control), using a variation of the Kansas City standard data encoding scheme Centronics parallel printer (model B only) serial communication (using RS-423, a superset of RS-232) display output for TV, RGB or 1v p-p video monitor four analo ...

See also:

BBC Micro, BBC Micro - Background, BBC Micro - Market impact, BBC Micro - Description, BBC Micro - Hardware features Models A and B, BBC Micro - Software and expandability, BBC Micro - Successor machines and the retro scene, BBC Micro - Specifications, BBC Micro - Trivia

Read more here: » BBC Micro: Encyclopedia II - BBC Micro - Specifications

Musician Vince Clarke of the British synth pop bands Depeche Mode, Yazoo, and Erasure used a BBC Micro (and later a BBC Master) with UMI music sequencer to compose many hits. In music videos from the 1980s featuring Vince Clarke, a BBC Micro is often present or provides text and graphics such as the clip for Erasure's Oh L'Amour In addition to Yazoo, also Queen used the UMI on their A Kind of Magic record. The UMI is also mentioned in the CD booklet. Other bands who have used the Beeb for making music are a- ...

See also:

BBC Micro, BBC Micro - Background, BBC Micro - Market impact, BBC Micro - Description, BBC Micro - Hardware features Models A and B, BBC Micro - Software and expandability, BBC Micro - Successor machines and the retro scene, BBC Micro - Specifications, BBC Micro - Trivia

Read more here: » BBC Micro: Encyclopedia II - BBC Micro - Trivia

The BBC wanted to base its project on a microcomputer capable of performing various tasks which they could then demonstrate in their TV series The Computer Programme (1981). The list of topics included programming, graphics, sound and music, Teletext, controlling external hardware, artificial intelligence etc. It decided to badge a micro, then drew up a fairly ambitious (for its time) specification and asked for takers. The BBC discussed the issue with Sir Clive Sinclair, who tried to offer the unsuccessful Grundy NewBrain micr ...

See also:

BBC Micro, BBC Micro - Background, BBC Micro - Market impact, BBC Micro - Description, BBC Micro - Hardware features Models A and B, BBC Micro - Software and expandability, BBC Micro - Successor machines and the retro scene, BBC Micro - Specifications, BBC Micro - Trivia

Read more here: » BBC Micro: Encyclopedia II - BBC Micro - Background

The machine was released as the BBC Microcomputer in early 1982. The machine was wildly popular in the UK; as with Sinclair's ZX Spectrum, also released around that time, demand greatly exceeded supply and for some months there were long delays before customers received the machines they had ordered. A brief attempt to market the machine in the United States failed, due largely to the dominance of the Apple II family. The success of the machine in the UK was largely due to its acceptance as an "educational" computer – the vast majority of ...

See also:

BBC Micro, BBC Micro - Background, BBC Micro - Market impact, BBC Micro - Description, BBC Micro - Hardware features Models A and B, BBC Micro - Software and expandability, BBC Micro - Successor machines and the retro scene, BBC Micro - Specifications, BBC Micro - Trivia

Read more here: » BBC Micro: Encyclopedia II - BBC Micro - Market impact

BBC Micro - Hardware features Models A and B. The Model A had 16 KB of user RAM; the Model B had 32 KB of user RAM. A particularly nice feature of the hardware was that the RAM was clocked at 4 MHz with alternating accesses given to the CPU and the video display circuits, giving a fully unified memory address structure with no speed penalties. Most competing micros with memory mapped display incured CPU speed penalties depending on the actions of the video circuits (e.g. the Amstrad CPC and to a lesser extent the ZX Spectrum) or kept video memory completely separate ...

See also:

BBC Micro, BBC Micro - Background, BBC Micro - Market impact, BBC Micro - Description, BBC Micro - Hardware features Models A and B, BBC Micro - Software and expandability, BBC Micro - Successor machines and the retro scene, BBC Micro - Specifications, BBC Micro - Trivia

Read more here: » BBC Micro: Encyclopedia II - BBC Micro - Description

A cut-down version of the BBC Micro, intended more for game playing was the Acorn Electron (1983); games were written specially for the Electron's more limited hardware, but they could usually also be run on the BBC. Acorn introduced the Model B+ in 1984, increasing the total RAM to 64k and including floppy disk support as standard, but this had little market impact. In 1986, Acorn followed up with the BBC Master series, which offered 128KB memory and many other refinements which improved on the 1982 original. This attracted more interest an ...

See also:

BBC Micro, BBC Micro - Background, BBC Micro - Market impact, BBC Micro - Description, BBC Micro - Hardware features Models A and B, BBC Micro - Software and expandability, BBC Micro - Successor machines and the retro scene, BBC Micro - Specifications, BBC Micro - Trivia

Read more here: » BBC Micro: Encyclopedia II - BBC Micro - Successor machines and the retro scene