OldSchoolRetroGamer Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 These computers seem interesting, my limited understanding are that these machines were popular especially in UK schools at one time? Even more interesting to me is the RISC based CPU and OS they used? I believe they were of no consequence in the US/Canada but I have seen some impressive looking games on these machines. Again, has anyone ever owned or used any version of these machines? I would be grateful for any info or stories/experiences regarding this platform THANKS! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
high voltage Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 (edited) Now there was a decent British computer indeed, being the first RISC home computer (BBCs were used in schools in UK, some time later Archimedes too, but by that time it was too late, the success of the BBC in schools was never repeated (some supermarket did a 'computers for schools' voucher sheme if I remember right, Acorn was on its way out anyway by early 90s). I've eyed one up in UK recently, but didn't go for it in the end. No sorry, can't help Edited November 21, 2010 by high voltage Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Laird Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 We had 3 at my school and I also had a friend who owned one. It was certainly an impressive computer from a technical standpoint but all the games I played on it were pretty poor. I remember a game called E-Type which was a crap Outrun clone that used the classic Jaguar in place of the Ferrari. Also an update of the BBC classic Chuckie Egg. There were also some conversions of games like Lemmings and Cannon Fodder but I seem to remember they all had niggling little things that spoiled them for me compared to the ST versions I owned. My friend used to brag about owning one all the time to people at school but always got laughed at by the ST and Amiga owners who had the latest games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+orpheuswaking Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 Oh the Acorn Archimedes A3000, what a joyous day it was when our school got this... Sadly I don't remember much besides playing a game with a small space craft flying over a wonderful 3d landscape. wish I could remember the name of it!. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iwan-iwanowitsch-goratschin Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 Oh the Acorn Archimedes A3000, what a joyous day it was when our school got this... Sadly I don't remember much besides playing a game with a small space craft flying over a wonderful 3d landscape. wish I could remember the name of it!. Zarch? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Laird Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 Oh I remember Zarch too, It was by the legendary David Braben and released on other formats as Virus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
svenski Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 As discussed elsewhere on AA, Acorn focused largely on the educational market. It was never really pushed as a home computer until Acorn released the A3020 in 1992. That was the first Archimedes to feature standard joystick ports. From what I remember there was one main distributor that focused on the Archimedes. The name escapes me now, but they also handled conversions of the very few big titles that made it onto the Archimedes from the ST/Amiga. The 3020 was a move in the right direction but came too late. We used to sell tons of Archimedes stuff to local education authorities and there were incentives for teachers to buy one and use at home. Acorn did very well for quite a while selling to education and for high end business computing but, like everyone else, they couldn't compete against the Wintel PC. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GroovyBee Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 Acorn did very well for quite a while selling to education and for high end business computing but, like everyone else, they couldn't compete against the Wintel PC. Hmmmm... ARM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
svenski Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 Acorn did very well for quite a while selling to education and for high end business computing but, like everyone else, they couldn't compete against the Wintel PC. Hmmmm... ARM ARM was started as a joint venture involving Acorn Computers. Acorn Computers, as we're talking about the Archimedes, was broken up in 1998. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carmel_andrews Posted November 21, 2010 Share Posted November 21, 2010 i recall that the designer of the orig. ARM proccy used in the archie was the same person that designed the first acorn compauter, Sophie (formerly roger) wilson, apparently she is the only woman to have ever developed or designed a popular processor/cpu Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mimo Posted November 22, 2010 Share Posted November 22, 2010 There are a few guys into acorn stuff over at http://retrocomputermuseum.co.uk/forum/ Friendly bunch Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+orpheuswaking Posted November 22, 2010 Share Posted November 22, 2010 Oh the Acorn Archimedes A3000, what a joyous day it was when our school got this... Sadly I don't remember much besides playing a game with a small space craft flying over a wonderful 3d landscape. wish I could remember the name of it!. Zarch? AWESOME! that's it! spent hours playing that game (on my lunch time of course) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
retrozoneorg Posted January 25, 2011 Share Posted January 25, 2011 I have a Archimedes A3020 which was donated to me by a nice lady from west London who stumbled upon my website. We used these almost exclusively in schools here in the UK. I remember our IT room was full of RM Nimbus machines emulating BBC Micro's! But in the corner there was a Archimedes! Which the teacher was always using! When I started my Design Technology lessons in year 8 I got my first taste of the Archimedes and the true brilliance that is the game Elite! I also went on to produce my first computer animation on an Archimedes - a circuit diagram showing the flow of electrons. Archimedes were more powerful than IBM PC's by a long way - the thing that held them back??? PRICE!!! They were too expensive! The processor could not be matched by anything else at that time - but Acorn messed up on their operating system which forced many users to upgrade later. The Archimedes graphical hardware was not as advanced as the Amiga - but the faster processor made up for a lot of that. 3D games were very popular on the ARC but 2D sprite games were very processor intensive due to the Video Hardware restrictions. The RISC PC went on for a long time after the Archimedes - and some people are still using them. Google search for the RISC PC Pizza Oven! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Usotsuki Posted January 26, 2011 Share Posted January 26, 2011 The ironic thing is that a descendant of the Archimedes' CPU (ARM) has a chance of replacing the descendants of the PC's CPU (x86)... xD 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seob Posted January 26, 2011 Share Posted January 26, 2011 Look at this site for more info on the archimedes: Old Computers. There was even a 486 cpu board available for the archimedes, so it could run win pc 32 bit software. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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