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Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

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Re: Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

#21

Post by hahamaster »

nickpp wrote: post #18
otto2 wrote: post #7

It is not correct to refer to it as Soviet-Era. Using the logic from the title, Apple Macintosh is also Soviet-Era. Yugoslavia was never part of Warsaw bloc, it had its own political system and no USSR army on its territory.

Everything East of the Iron Wall (German Divide) was under USSR control.

It was called iron curtain, not iron wall. Yugoslavia was in between the west and the east back then. We were not under USSR control. We could hop on a plane and fly to London any time we pleased, unlike for example, Hungarians or east Germans.

Re: Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

#22

Post by retrac »

nickpp wrote: post #18
otto2 wrote: post #7

It is not correct to refer to it as Soviet-Era. Using the logic from the title, Apple Macintosh is also Soviet-Era. Yugoslavia was never part of Warsaw bloc, it had its own political system and no USSR army on its territory.

Everything East of the Iron Wall (German Divide) was under USSR control.

Yes, but Yugoslavia wasn't behind the Iron Curtain. It wasn't aligned with the USSR. It wasn't under USSR control (after 1948 [1]). It was officially neutral during the Cold War (Yugoslavia founded the Non-Aligned Movement). Sometimes close to the USA, even receiving American military aid at times.

Relevantly for us and this topic, Yugoslavia was not subject to the Western bans on exporting sensitive technology to Communist countries. Western personal computers and semiconductors could be legally imported, in theory, assuming you could afford them and the unfavourable exchange rates.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tito%E2%80%93Stalin_split

Re: Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

#24

Post by tpm »

nickpp wrote: post #18
otto2 wrote: post #7

It is not correct to refer to it as Soviet-Era. Using the logic from the title, Apple Macintosh is also Soviet-Era. Yugoslavia was never part of Warsaw bloc, it had its own political system and no USSR army on its territory.

Everything East of the Iron Wall (German Divide) was under USSR control.

Except Austria, Finland, Yugoslavia, Albania (Enver Hoxha switched to China) and Greece and Turkey. So not everything at all.

Re: Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

#25

Post by salex89 »

nickpp wrote: post #18
otto2 wrote: post #7

It is not correct to refer to it as Soviet-Era. Using the logic from the title, Apple Macintosh is also Soviet-Era. Yugoslavia was never part of Warsaw bloc, it had its own political system and no USSR army on its territory.

Everything East of the Iron Wall (German Divide) was under USSR control.

Yeah, it was so much under control that Yugoslavia and the USSR were at brink of war. It's more under Russian influence today than then.

Re: Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

#26

Post by flohofwoe »

nickpp wrote: post #18
otto2 wrote: post #7

It is not correct to refer to it as Soviet-Era. Using the logic from the title, Apple Macintosh is also Soviet-Era. Yugoslavia was never part of Warsaw bloc, it had its own political system and no USSR army on its territory.

Everything East of the Iron Wall (German Divide) was under USSR control.

Yugoslavia was a bit of an exception:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tito%E2%80%93Stalin_split

Yugoslavia wasn't member of the Warsaw Pact or the COMECON for instance, and apparently people were even allowed to travel to western countries.

Famous message from Tito to Stalin:

“Stop sending people to kill me. We've already captured five of them, one of them with a bomb and another with a rifle… If you don't stop sending killers, I'll send one to Moscow, and I won't have to send a second.”

Re: Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

#27

Post by flohofwoe »

retrac wrote: post #22
nickpp wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything East of the Iron Wall (German Divide) was under USSR control.

Yes, but Yugoslavia wasn't behind the Iron Curtain. It wasn't aligned with the USSR. It wasn't under USSR control (after 1948 [1]). It was officially neutral during the Cold War (Yugoslavia founded the Non-Aligned Movement). Sometimes close to the USA, even receiving American military aid at times. Relevantly for us and this topic, Yugoslavia was not subject to the Western bans on exporting sensitive technology to Co…

Technically, import was legal into all Eastern Bloc countries, it's the export from a western country which was illegal because of the COCOM embargo:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coordinating_Committee_for_Mul...

I actually don't know if Yugoslavia was embargoed too though (technically, Yugoslavia wasn't part of the "Eastern Bloc").

But of course even without embargo the markets were just not interesting for western companies, because of the worthless currencies (for instance, 8-bit home computers didn't fall under the embargo, but they were still not generally available in shops, only on the grey market).

Re: Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

#28

Post by flohofwoe »

rob74 wrote: post #12

> The picture is one of a landscape littered with uninspired attempts to copy American IBM PCs, British ZX Spectrums, and other Western computers. As opposed to the Galaksija, which, er... copied the ZX Spectrum? I somehow fail to see the point that the article is trying to make here. If anything, the designers of the Galaksija had an easier job than those of the numerous other Eastern European Spectrum clones ( http…

The Z80 chip family was also "easily" available behind the Iron Curtain because East Germany manufactured reverse-engineered Z80 clones (called the U880).

AFAIK the ZX Spectrum ULA could be 'emulated' with TTL logic, that's what East German hobbyist Spectrum clones did at least. That's also why Spectrum clones were so popular, they didn't require any complex custom chips like the C64.

Re: Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

#29

Post by thriftwy »

otto2 wrote: post #7

It is not correct to refer to it as Soviet-Era. Using the logic from the title, Apple Macintosh is also Soviet-Era. Yugoslavia was never part of Warsaw bloc, it had its own political system and no USSR army on its territory.

'Soviet' is not a name, it is a political term, so I don't see why you cannot apply it to countries with USSR-like regimes, even if they don't carry S in their name.

For the curious, it is translated as 'council'.

Re: Galaksija: The Soviet-Era, Z80-based microcomputer

#30

Post by thriftwy »

flohofwoe wrote: post #27
retrac wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but Yugoslavia wasn't behind the Iron Curtain. It wasn't aligned with the USSR. It wasn't under USSR control (after 1948 [1]). It was officially neutral during the Cold War (Yugoslavia founded the Non-Aligned Movement). Sometimes close to the USA, even receiving American military aid at times. Relevantly for us and this topic, Yugoslavia was not subject to the Western bans on exporting sensitive technology to Co…

Technically, import was legal into all Eastern Bloc countries, it's the export from a western country which was illegal because of the COCOM embargo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coordinating_Committee_for_Mul... I actually don't know if Yugoslavia was embargoed too though (technically, Yugoslavia wasn't part of the "Eastern Bloc"). But of course even without embargo the markets were just not interesting for western…

It's a surprising sight to see Western companies showing no interest in 25 million strong economy.
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