BBC 8 BIT Machines And 32 Bit Acorns
By A.Burgess. D2C.
As the owner of a simple BBC B (well
actually 2 now) I have often wondered
what all the other versions are. When
BEEBUG tried to seduce me to an
Archimedes with an (unrepeatable?)
offer of an A3010 for a cheap price I
started ploughing through my back
numbers of BEEBUG Magazine to sort out
all the versions of the Arch to see
what was actually on offer. In the
process I also listed out all the 8 Bit
machines with their specs. For anyone
who is interested I will reproduce the
list here and perhaps those in the know
will tell me if I've got anything
wrong. At the risk of castigation I
will also list the Arch's I found, but
this ends at a point a couple of years
ago when BEEBUG stopped the Magazine.
8 Bit Machines: 1981/82
BBC A & B Launched 6502A Processor at
2MHz.
A = 16K RAM, B = 32K RAM
Operating Systems OS 0.1, 1.0 & 1.2
BBC BASIC 1 & 2
(August 1983 Electron 6502A Processor,
BBC BASIC 2, 32K RAM)
June 1985 BBC B+ 6512 Processor, Issue 10 Board
64K RAM, 1770 Disc Interface, OS 2.0,
BASIC 2
December 1985
BBC B+ 128K RAM BASIC BAS128 (on disc)
January 1986 Master Series
MASTER 128: 128K RAM 65C12 Processor
Operating at 2MHz,
BBC BASIC V4.0, OS 3.0
MASTER TURBO: 128K + 64K RAM, 6 C12
Processor with 65C102 8 Bit
co-processor operating at 4MHz
internal,
HI-BASIC 4 on disc.
MASTER 512: 512K RAM, 16BIT 80186
Co-processor at 10MHz,
OS DOS Plus, MS DOS compatible, Mouse,
16BIT BBC BASIC.
MASTER SCIENTIFIC: 512K RAM, 32016 32
bit co-processor at 8MHz
plus 32081 Floating Point processor,
FORTRAN, PASCAL, C, 32BIT BASIC, 32000
Macro Assembler, PANOS Operating
System.
MASTER TERMINAL: Econet version of
M128.
September 1986
MASTER COMPACT: 128K RAM, 3.5 Disc.
OS 5.0, BASIC 6, ADFS.
May 1993: Master 128 Ceases Production!
32 BIT Machines July 1987 Archimedes Series Launched
All with 32 BIT RISC Procesor(ARM2?)
operating at 8Mhz, BASIC 5
A305: .5MB RAM
A310: 1MB RAM
A410: 1MB RAM, Hard Disc Interface,
'IBM' Keyboard.
A440: 4MB RAM, 20MB Hard Disc, 'IBM'
Keyboard.
April 1989
A410/1: RISC OS
A420/1: 2MB RAM, RISC OS, Hard Disc
May 1989 A440/1: 50MB Hard Disc + faster
circuitry.
June 1989
A3000: ARM2 Procesor, RISC OS, 1MB RAM,
Archimedes BBC BASIC, 3.5" Floppy
Drive.
October 1990 A540: ARM3 Processor at 30MHz, 4MB RAM,
100MB Hard Disc, RISC OS, 3.5" Floppy
Drive.
October 1991
A5000: ARM3 Processor at 25MHz, RISC
OS3, 2MB RAM, 40MB Hard Disc, 3.5"
Floppy Drive.
July 1992 Acorn A4 Laptop ARM3 Processor at
25MHz, RISC OS 3.1, 3.5" Floppy Drive.
Version 1: 2MB RAM
Version 2: 4MB RAM & 60MB Hard Disc
October 1992
A3010: ARM250 Processor at 16MHz, RISC
OS3.1, 1MB RAM, TV Modulator.
A3020: As 3010, but 2MB RAM, Hard Disc
Controller, No TV Modulator.
A4000: ARM250 Processor at 16MHz, RISC
OS3.1, 2MB RAM, 80MB Hard Disc, 3 Box
style.