Oric-1
More info
- Creator
- Tangerine Computer Systems
- Released
- 1983
- Type
- Home computer
- CPU
- MOS 6502
A British home computer from 1983 that flopped at home but became a favourite in France, where it took on the ZX Spectrum.
The Oric-1 was built by Tangerine Computer Systems around a MOS 6502 and an AY-3-8912 — a variant of the AY-3-8910 — which gave it real sound when the ZX Spectrum could mostly beep through a bare speaker. It came with 16 or 48 KB of memory, colour graphics and a rubbery keyboard reviewers loved to complain about.
In Britain it drowned in Sinclair's shadow, but in France it became a sales success and enjoyed a long life through its successor, the Oric Atmos (1984). One of several cases where a home computer's fate turned on market and distribution as much as on the silicon.