Jupiter Ace

Summary

Engineer Richard Altwasser and software developer Steven Vickers played major roles in developing the Sinclair ZX Spectrum. After completing it, they founded Jupiter Cantab and developed the Jupiter Ace. It went on sale in September 1982 for £89.95 in very small numbers. Its hardware differs little from that of the Spectrum.

Unlike other home computer manufacturers, Jupiter uses the programming language Forth instead of the usual BASIC. Thanks to Forth, the Ace can work more efficiently than comparable 8-bit BASIC computers. In addition, Forth programs require much less memory — a luxury product at that time.

Since competing products have color graphics, more than 3 KiB memory and Forth is little established, the Ace is not commercially accepted and disappears after two years from the market.

In the following, Jupiter tries to gain a foothold in the US market with the Ace 4000.