OTHER WORLDS Links to Spectrum resources

Books

ZX Spectrum Basic Programming by Steven and Penny Vickers 1982.

Edited by Robin Bradbeer who did pre-production testing.

"The Best introduction to BASIC programming".

Dropped by Sinclair Research who considered it idiosyncratic.

Resurrected by Amstrad who permit republication online.

Available to download in Chris Owen's write format (FTP) man_v1-0.zip

Available online at World of Spectrum

 

Understanding Your Spectrum by Dr. Ian Logan 1982.

My first Spectrum Book. In at the deep end. Good list of bugs features at the back.

 

The Complete Spectrum Rom Disassembly by Dr. Ian Logan and Dr. Frank O'Hara. 1983

The most sought after book on newsgroup:comp.sys.sinclair.

Ever since Alan Turing suggested storing code and data on the same medium it's been difficult for we humans to sort out which was which.

These are the guys that did it, and more, for the Spectrum.

I've used the labels from this book in my assembly file.

 

Pitman Pocket Guide - Sinclair Spectrum by Steven Vickers 1984.

Pocket sized command summary. Mentions the odd bug and manual error.

Covers Interface 1, microdrives, network, RS232 and Interface 2

.

The Spectrum Machine Code Reference Guide by Richard Ross-Langley 1984.

Complete ROM Disassembly. Sparse labels and few comments.

A4 output from a Spectrum Disassembler.

 

Das Spectrum ROM by R.Arenz and M.Görlitz, 1984.

Complete documented Assembly File for cross-assembler.

 

The ZX Programmer's Companion by John and Kate Grant 1984.

By the people who wrote the ROM of the ZX80 computer.

 

The Cambridge Colour Collection by Richard Francis Altwasser. 1982.

Not really concerned with the ROM but this is the guy that designed and patented the hardware that surrounds it.

A neat collection of BASIC programs including a shoot-em-up with Vic20's as the target.

Web Sites

World of Spectrum

Martijn Van Der Heide's Official World Archive. Over 10,000 downloadable programs which can also be played online. Good documentation section including Martijn's
The Complete Opus Discovery ShadowRom V2.2 Disassembly also
The Tape Loader in ROM from 'The Complete Spectrum ROM Disassembly'

 

Matthew Wilson's Crash - The Online Edition

Ninety Nine editions of the ZX Spectrum Magazine.

Matthew has also developed the

128K Spectrum ROM Disassembly

 

Ian Collier's Home Page

Author of xz80 X-Windows emulator,
Plus 3 Oddities and the imcrom - a modified Spectrum Rom with fixed bugs for use in emulators.
imcrom documentation

 

The NoNowt HomePage

Interesting Magazine with a good articles section including
BUGS IN THE ROM - a comprehensive list of Spectrum features.

 

Ilja Freidal's Spectrum Rom Disassembly

A German text complete disassembly posted to comp.sys.sinclair in 1994.
Zipped file from the NettVerksGruppa (NVG) ftp site.
ftp://ftp.nvg.ntnu.no/pub/sinclair/docs/technical/spec-disasm.zip

 

The 8K Z80-based Mattel Acquarius ROM.

An incompletely commented disassembly of the BASIC interpreter by Kenny Millar

 

Chris Owen's Planet Sinclair

A massive and well-established site that includes, amongst much else, the background stories behind the Spectrum Rom development.

 

Troels Noergaard's ZZ-Spectrum Java ZX Spectrum emulator

A very capable Java-based emulator that features nostalgic colour modes, sound, microdrive cartridges and a host of models and evolving features.

 

Worthy of mention is the Jasper ZX Spectrum Emulator Homepage.

I've used this Java applet extensively on these pages and if your browser has Java enabled you can see Richard Altwasser's Rainbow program and Penny Vickers's Pangolins program .