Introduction: Guido Schell

INTRODUCTION: GUIDO SCHELL

Hello ASC freaks! Hello Leszek!

Today I would like to introduce myself to you. My name is Guido Schell and I live in Löhne. Löhne is a small town in East Westphalia, in Northern Germany, somewhere in the triangle formed by Hanover, Bielefeld, and Osnabrück. I am 32 years old, married, and have a three-year-old son. Besides computing, I am an active sports shooter. I also enjoy riding a motorcycle.

Back in 1995, I wrote down my personal "computer story" for both German Spectrum clubs. To avoid having to write everything from scratch, I took that text, revised it a bit, and here is the result:

My first contact with computers happened back in my childhood, around the mid-1970s. I grew up in an industrial area, and for us kids, it was fascinating to rummage through the large factory dumpsters. Along with various items useful to us kids, there were piles of cardboard cards with holes in them. Around that time, I also went on vacation to Italy a few times. I was still too young for the pretty Italian girls, but they had arcade halls with video games like Space Invaders and so on, which kids were allowed to enter. Such a thing would have been unthinkable in Germany back then. I spent quite a few hours in front of those machines, blasting away as hard as I could.

I also remember my father's tax advisor bringing over a printed Mickey Mouse once. It wasn't high-resolution graphics, but printed using letters and characters. If you held the continuous paper far enough away, you could recognize Mickey. My father also had a computer in his small business. It was a Triumph-Adler with, I believe, 128K of main memory and some 8-bit processor, plus a Winchester drive. For a long time, I didn't know that was simply a hard disk. The term "Winchester" stuck with me because as a kid, I loved watching Westerns on TV (the Winchester rifle). But why the thing was called Winchester, I only found out a few days ago in an old computer book.

Lately, I've been reading a lot of old computer magazines and books. By now, I'm interested not only in the ZX Spectrum, but in virtually all vintage computers—at least in theory. It's impossible to deal with all those old machines in practice. You wouldn't believe how many different computers existed in the early 1980s! Nowadays, things are simpler: when someone says "computer" today, they usually mean "IBM compatible", don't they?

For those interested: IBM was (allegedly) the first hard drive manufacturer. The engineers at IBM called them Winchester drives because they had the same model designation as the Winchester rifle—30-30. So I was basically spot-on as a kid! You just have to make that connection. The book, by the way, is titled "Homecomputer / Ein praktisches Handbuch" by Peter Rodwell—a real treat for computer nostalgics. But anyone still working on a Spectrum today (you all have one, right?) is a nostalgic anyway. Don't worry about it; other people take vintage cars apart and put them back together. Is that any better? Nowadays, by the way, my dad has a PC box.

Am I boring you? Let's get back to the main topic:

So how did I actually get into computing? It was early 1984. The home computer boom was really taking off here. A friend of mine bought a ZX Spectrum with 16K RAM. I was immediately fascinated by this machine. I still remember clearly how we loaded Sinclair's demo tape. Or one of the many BASIC games—how were we supposed to know you had to type RUN to start them? Well, that was soon sorted out. I started studying the manual. And once I figured out the LET command, Space Invaders appeared on screen in different colors! Yeah! The ice was broken; I had to have one too. So, a rubber-key Speccy with 16K it was. My friend quickly lost interest in computers, and frustration soon set in for me as well: most of the good software (games, ahem!) required a 48K Spectrum. Well, at twenty years old, you have other things on your mind, so I soon sold the Speccy.

In early 1985, the second Spectrum special issue from Happy Computer came out. I bought the magazine even though I hadn't had a computer for a while. The first withdrawal symptoms, so to speak. The situation was clear: I was addicted, computer-addicted. Around the same time, someone at my apprenticeship workplace wanted to get rid of his 48K Spectrum with a Saga keyboard. Naturally, I jumped at the chance. Those were the days—a black-and-white TV and a cassette deck. I will never forget the countless TAPE LOADING ERRORs; it was horrifying. Soon, I got an Interface 1 with a Microdrive. I dreamed of an Opus Discovery, but back then, it was just too much money. Eventually, I joined the Spectrum User Club Wuppertal and made my first contacts with others. In Germany, the Spectrum was slowly going downhill. The computer enthusiasts in the area all switched to other machines, as many (all?) of you witnessed.

In 1986, I had to serve in the Bundeswehr in Cologne. While it was the most useless time of my life, at least I met another Speccy freak there. Everyone else was talking about Atari ST and the like. The Spectrum was slowly fading away, and the Spectrum scene was (by force) driven underground. Luckily, there was still the CK magazine with a few pages dedicated to the Speccy. No tears, please! Anyway, while serving in the army, I also had some computer duties—a few pointless typing tasks. The terminal was hooked up to an IBM mainframe. There, I tried my hand at being a HACKER. Unfortunately, without much success: everything that interested me ended with an "Access Denied" message or something similar. Well, it wasn't a Speccy! Am I going to get arrested now?

I eventually left the User Club, rejoined briefly, and then left for good. Around that time, I got in touch with the Spectrum Profi Club. If I remember correctly, it was going through a transition period; the WoMo team had taken over the club. Now I am back in the User Club as well. But back to computers:

After the Bundeswehr, in 1987, I worked as a mechanical draughtsman in a small mechanical engineering company. Goodbye drawing board! CAD was the magic word! Drawings were done on a computer. Back then, it was an Intel 80286 PC running at 8 MHz! Those were my first contacts with the DOS world. Well, I still work with PCs today and know my way around them fairly well. I've also worked on a Unix system. In recent years, a Sinclair QL also sat on my home desk, not to mention the SAM Coupé! But I sold both machines again. The QL wasn't on my wavelength; I never really felt comfortable with it. Parting with the SAM was very hard, but keeping two different computers (not forgetting the Spectrum!) was just too much for the free time I have. And I simply cannot let go of the Spectrum.

Lately, I've swapped and changed my hardware so often that I can barely keep track. Going into detail would take too much space. My first floppy system turned out to be an Opus Discovery after all, and I really liked it. After it went to hardware heaven along with my Speccy and I had to wait an eternity for repairs, I switched to the Plus D. That was around 1991, and hardly anyone here knew the Plus D. Fortunately, the Plus D is Disciple-compatible, and there were a few users who had a Disciple. My thanks go to Rudolf Pirsch, who sadly passed away, and Paul Webranitz. Both provided me with tips and utilities back then. Currently, I have two active Speccy setups: Setup 1 with a +3 and a +D. Setup 2 with a 128K (the toastrack!) and also a +D interface. Plus all sorts of peripherals like printers, Multiface, Videoface, and so on. And in the corner, a few spare Speccies!

I've often thought about buying a PC. I really enjoy gaming (at least I admit it), and the PC has great games, but the prices and especially the rapid obsolescence of PC hardware have kept me from it so far. A PC older than two or three years can rarely run the latest software. I maintain our CAD system at work and know that song all too well; it's truly dreadful. And what would I do with a computer I don't understand? The Spectrum is challenging enough for me. And just for gaming, a PC box is too expensive—not to mention the cost of PC games!!

As you can see, I've seen and tried quite a few computers in my life. Recently, someone even gifted me an Amstrad CPC. But I prefer the Spectrum. As I said, PCs and the QL weren't (and aren't) my thing, but I think the SAM is simply great. Nowadays, there is even a hard drive for it.

Nevertheless: ZX SPECTRUM FOREVER!

— Guido Schell, May 1997.

Editorial Note (Leszek):

Thank you very much, Guido! I could spot certain parallels in our stories: in my childhood, I also turned certain dumpsters upside down and found all sorts of interesting things—recently even a working 386 SX 25 motherboard with various expansion cards and a scanner. I also received character-printed graphics (a woman's face) back then, because my mother was a COBOL (ugh!) programmer. Up until now, I despised the PC due to cost and virus issues, but now a PC box is indeed entering my home because I want to use it for translating texts, and I really hate having the Amiga tied up for days rendering raytraced images (for LEGACY).

Yes, sometimes the Spectrum just needs a slave computer, and I also want to test my games on an emulator. I originally wanted to buy a Pentium II at 266 MHz, but a K6 MMX 200 will do just fine. Still, I will never become a slave to Bill Gate$ and Micro$oft.

Speccy 4ever!