https://youtu.be/cqXhtTYj7Oc
Retro Computers, the company behind the ZX Spectrum #zxvega TV mini console released back in 2015, is advising all customers that they are shipping the first batch of units for delivery between the 8th and 12th May, enabling the remaining hopeful fans of the company a portable spectrum on the go.
In recent years we have seen many arguments from both sides of the fence since the split between the shareholders over differences in how the company should be operated. Suffice to say since this occurred the new leadership have been extremely shy in releasing much information to the public about the console, from size and battery specs, down to box art or even a games list, sighting each time that ‘trolls’ have been organised to halt production at every opportunity.
This week the Company gave out a number of updates, from the ill fated copy-past obituary that backfired when caught by the original publisher, down to the delivery update 1 hour after a public statement from 75% of the current shareholders requesting a formal meeting to re-align management citing only a 50% commitment (but couldn’t provide evidence to confirm SRL’s reported stance).
On the whole as weeks go it could have been better on a public discussion front, eagle eyed followers of the company have also noticed the new website was registered and uploaded within 24 hours prior to the shareholders announcement going public, likewise a number of typing errors, leftover template content and broken links littered all over the site have shown concern that a free template from Squarespace has been used in an attempt to show activity since the previous website developer left over outstanding payments and difference of opinion with the current management team.
Likewise, within the latter part of the week, leaks have started to commence on the companies currently being utilised for the production and the production volumes currently produces, which have differed from the originally advised 10,000 units to a figure over 100 times lower.
And that’s before we go into the ever moving release date for the Role of Honour…
So where does this leave the project at this point?
As many suspect a delivery is indeed occurring over this weekend, however information is now circulating that the batch in question being dispatched is part of a recently produced prototyping session between PWT of Welwyn Garden city (PCB) and HDTooling of Ashford (Case and input buttons), with a further 3rd party assisting in the flashing of the few produced devices to get these out to a select number of individuals chosen for their pro stance to the company as it stands now.
In addition we have been notified that no completed box art exists for the ‘first batch’ that is about to be released (despite reports 12months ago of a completed deign) as below:
while other reports have been received that a simple no frills mobile phone size box has been chosen to reduce packaging costs.
So what about the games?
Presently the list should have gone live on 1st May 2018, but as with all other deadlines, this was postponed until Friday 4th May with the core reason being the MD was unable to transcribe the information onto the website.
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We did however find a solution by using [Copy+c] and [Copy+v]:
