Those were the days: The Acorn Electron

Yet again a journey down memory lane has produced a torrent of reader feedback, this week on the subject of the Acorn Electron (Technologies That Time Forgot: The Acorn Electron http://www.silicon.com/a50548 ). We've saved its big brother (and forerunner) the BBC Micro for today (http://www.silicon.com/a50750 ), but what's perhaps most amazing is the wide-ranging impact the Electron had.

Let's begin with that old chestnut - where it can still be found. As was the case with other 'home' computers of the 1980s, these machines were also used in all types of business.

One reader, Keith Bentley, told us about 2,700 Electrons being deployed alongside M2105 Messenger Terminals from BT in 1984 in Interflora branches across the UK. It seems the florist chain wanted a way of simply networking its retail outlets.

But that isn't the big story. The Electrons and the network proved so popular that not only did they win Interflora awards in 1989 and 1990 but our reader estimates 1,000 of the units were still being employed by content shop managers as late as 1999. And he should know - he was the Head of IT at Interflora in the 1980s.

Christopher Wall, an ex-Acorn employee, also pointed out that networked Acorn machines were used for all kinds of bus and train information screens. At least one screen - in Drummer Street Bus Station, Cambridge - still does, though we've yet to check that out.

Obviously the Electron could have been Big. A Tom Hohenberg wrote to us about his days as the marketing manager at Acorn responsible for the machine. The company spent £3m in TV advertising in the run up to Christmas 1984. He said: "The brilliant TV ad we made cost £150,000 - a fortune in those days."

Three hundred thousand orders flooded in but alas Acorn couldn't capitalise. The history books will show a production line problem in Malaysia meant a small fraction of orders could be fulfilled, consumers further embraced Sinclair and Commodore offerings that Christmas, and so crucially not enough software houses embraced the Electron.

Hohenberg added, perhaps still with the marketer's hat on, that: "People were fighting each other in Boots and WH Smith for the few Electrons that did make it to the shops."

But Acorn, post-Christmas, found itself with £43m of hard-to-shift inventory and floundered.

One person who did make it to an Electron-stocked shop that year is reader KK Richer. Her story is inspiring.

"I queued outside WH Smith at a ridiculous time to fall through the doors after they had a delivery. I then signed up for a BBC BASIC night school course at my local college, which gave me programming knowledge I still use as a sys admin."

She added: "I have the good old Electron to thank for sending me (at the age of 40!) down a completely new and still fascinating career path."

And she's not the only one who owes something to the elegant cream machine. Many a UK software house has roots in this period. Simon Mallett wrote: "We shouldn't forget the huge number of brand new industries created - most from kids' bedrooms, many still going! My brother created Vine Micros... now a major employer in Thanet and the premier supplier of Genlock hardware. What's more it's still all made in England, though no longer on the family's front room table."

Others understandably point to what they learnt from the BBC Micro and also the Electron's predecessors. There was the Acorn Atom and even the Proton. Of the Atom, Andrew Taylor said: "I learnt a lot from writing my own programs including a straight line 2D CAD program with object rotation, which was not bad for a 13 year old." Not bad indeed.

Then there was the 'It's-for-my-homework-honest' brigade. Unlikely as it may sound, Tim Mustill was that rare breed of user who did think of his education. He told us: "The main reason I was bought an Acorn Electron was to help with my Computing GCSE where writing a BBC BASIC program was worth half the final grade. My program simulated a general election with the final outcome based on a series of policy choices and other 'humorous' options. In a slight rebellion against my private schooling the odds were stacked towards Labour. Got a B anyway. Everyone else got As."

And while we've heard from manual writers and others who helped the rest of us get by, we've had a number of Reader Comments from people tempted by the mischief potential of any computer in a school. One story relates what happened with a manual, albeit for an RM machine.

"The section said something along the lines of: 'Don't use this sequence of instructions as they will cause a rapid and infinite loop that will over-heat the chip and cause it to melt', and then listed a three line bit of code. We were very tempted."

But the I-coulda-been-a-contender Electron did at least have something on the BBC, the computer of the Establishment, of schools. One anonymous reader said: "I always suffered at the hands of the few friends who had Electrons. My BBC was obviously not quite fashionable enough. The Electron was much more appealing."

Was it? Time for our look at the BBC Micro - http://www.silicon.com/a50750 . And keep those Reader Comments or emails (to editorial@silicon.com) coming.