Microframe

ZX Computing

FRAMED The Gordon Microframe is one of the few peripherals designed to be expanded and developed in the style of the early pioneers of computing in itself it is an open frame disk drive controller with connectors for a range of five special cards to be plugged in at will, these give a wide and versatile application to your computer. OK, so it doesn't look as tidy and neat as most of the peripherals on the market, but if you are one of the many hobbyist computer users and want to get the most out of your machine then this system is worth looking at. The cards available to plug in at the moment include a Centronics interface, RS232 Modem drive, D/A and A/D converters, 64K paged map memory and there are more under development. The main purpose of I heir contacting us this time was to let us know that they have now implemented Interface 1 and Microdrive syntax, including Hook codes, to their Floppy Disc interface. They tell us that all programs which will work with the microdrives will now work with their system. The basic Microframe disk controller and chassis will cost you £149.50 and cards are priced between £10.00 and £64.00. If you are interested phone them on [redacted], or write to Gordon Micro Ltd., [redacted].

Sinclair User

DISC SYSTEM WITH MOTHER With the recent flood of disc interfaces for the Spectrum the Gordon Microframe has been largely overlooked. Although at £149.50 inclusive it is the most expensive it does have more potential than the others and can be built up into a very comprehensive system. The Microframe is a disc-based motherboard system with a range of plug-in cards. A number of cards are under development at the moment, ranging from a simple Centronics interface through A to D, D to A, RS232 - for use with a modem - to I/O cards suitable for robotics. The disc interface software is held on disc and booted into 16K of onboard RAM. That RAM is paged when a syntax error occurs. That means that not only is the DOS easily changeable but also that you can extend the Spectrum Basic; for example, the I/O boards can be driven using a Logo-like language. As a disc system it is old fashioned in that it only uses single density. That, typically, gives 98K for storage on a 40 track, single-sided drive, and up to four drives can be used. All the necessary commands are available: Load, Save and Verify for Basic, Code and Data plus Format and Erase. Open and Close are soon to be added. As it does not take up any of the Spectrum memory, even for a buffer, transferring software to disc is relatively easy. Gordon expects to release commercial software on the system soon. The motherboard has been well thought out and it is quite straightforward to add your own boards. The manual is comprehensive and gives details of all the relevant pin outs plus a description of what each one is used for. There are example programs, with some simple ones on disc, including one showing how to extend the Basic. Although the board can be powered from the Spectrum Gordon does not recommend it as the tolerances are tight. It is designed to be powered from disc drives and, if those need power, Gordon supplies a supply for £63.25 inc. The system is expensive, as you are paying for facilities that you are unlikely to use. In education, however, those facilities would be used to the full. Gordon Microframe Ltd, [redacted]

Your Spectrum

IT'S GOT TO BE GORDONS Now you and your Spectrum can plug into the power of the mains. Or rather, Gordon Micro Ltd, a new company from Ayr has itself launched onto the market with a product which claims to give the Speccy owner the power of a mainframe computer in miniature. The Gordon Microframe, is not the prettiest of peripherals. No doubt, if enough interest is shown it will be re-housed in a designer black box to make it indistinguishable from all other Speccy add-ons. For the technical user function's more important than form. The Microframe provides a disk interface plus five 64-way slot connectors. And if you don't know what you'd do with a 64-way slot connector then you don't need a Microframe. There are much cheaper disk interfaces on the market if that's all you're looking for, but if you've got the cash, Gordon Micro can be contacted at [redacted].