Robik

A Spectrum clone produced between 1989 and 1994 by Selto-Rotor (Scientifically technical industrial creative association) an ex military factory. The computer comes with a full QWERTY keyboard with 55 keys, separate EDIT, 3 SHIFTS, double RESET, DEL, separate comma and full stop keys. It has the possibility to switch between Latin and Russian fonts. It has built in kempston interface and cursor keys that works as this joystick as well. It has no edge connector and video output is RGB on a 5-pin DIN (same as the Pentagon) or on a 8-pin DIN (for connecting to HERCULES or EGA monitor), no composite video and all I/O ports are 5- and 7-pin DINs. Inside the case there is a male 64-pin connector you can map to the standard edge connector.

An interesting fact is that the hardware contained about 3 to 4 grams of gold and almost 18 grams of silver. The letters on the keyboard was written using cool laser beam technology. The buttons didn't used Cu or Fe contact plates, but "hercons".

When writing the screen memory to tv/monitor screen the writing does not begin not from the left top of border. It begins from border right under paper. This means that most multicolor effects and such don't work correctly. Errors in the ROM have been fixed and also cyrilic letters were inserted. This also ment some games didn't work.

The keyboard matrix is extended from 5 keys in 8 rows to 5 keys in 9 rows to allow more buttons. You coould do a reset by pressing two reset buttons.

The Robik came in four versions with only minor changes for russian localization. The hardware remained unchanged except that cheaper and cheaper parts was used for each version, but the 4th version was new with a single IC. This version didn't sell well because by then it was mostly hardware folks that bought the Robik and this design didn't allow you to fiddle around with the hardware.

Information comes from an article at http://polbox.com/r/rules/zxland/robik.html and via e-mail from Znahar.