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Sinclair's Answer To The Segway

Posted by simoniker on from the c6-hopefully-to-include-rubber-keyboard dept.

slumos writes "BBC News Online is reporting on Sir Clive Sinclair's reaction to the Segway. The British inventor thinks it's fine for factories, but not for crowded streets, and he's even planning some competition in the form of a top-secret follow-up to the Sinclair C5."

5 of 302 comments (clear)

  1. Sinclair's other attempts... by altgrr · · Score: 5, Informative

    I believe the article makes reference to Sinclair's other efforts at transportation: the Zike (a folding electric scooter) and the Zeta (a motor which attaches to a normal bicycle, harnessing energy when you go downhill and using it to propel you uphill at a stately 8mph, as I remember).

    These relatively unknown inventions were peddled in the small ads sections of newspapers for a long time. The electric scooter sold for about 500, the bike motor for about 200. But no, I don't know anyone who had one.

    --


    Like car accidents, most hardware problems are due to driver error.
  2. Re:Oh what a surprise... by Lars+Arvestad · · Score: 5, Informative
    Well, this is some another company bashing it's competition - ooh, what big news.

    I don't think he bashed it! To the contrary, Sinclair said:

    I found it very enjoyable - a nice sensation once I got over the initial nervousness. It's very manoeuvrable, no trouble there at all. After a few minutes practice you can do anything you like.
    Later in the article, he says it is not suitable for British sidewalks, but has applications elsewhere, and I think that is correct. It is a vehicle comparable to a bike and belongs on the street.
    --
    Reality or nothing.
  3. Who needs followups? by fleafan · · Score: 5, Informative
    ZX-Spectrum. Ha! That was one overpowered machine. We used to own a ZX-81 with 1K (one kilobyte) RAM, and a keyboard with no keys (well, at least not real ones).

    It didn't have a disk drive or tape deck, so if we wanted to play a game we had to type the program in (in BASIC) from scratch every time the computer was turned off.
    My dad used it for his budget at first, but since we had to keep everything on paper and re-enter the data anyway, he soon dropped it.

    Oh boy, those were the days.

    1. Re:Who needs followups? by fruey · · Score: 4, Informative
      There was a tape interface on it though. Nicking Grannie's little cassette recorder from her bedside, and then plugging in the grey and black wires from EAR and LINE respectively (or was it EAR and MIC?) whatever, and you could save to tape and reload later.

      This was standard equipment on our ZX81... although there was always that dreaded DODGY POWER LEAD which if someone so much as breathed on it, the computer would reset... those were the days.

      --
      Conversion Rate Optimisation French / English consultant
  4. Gone googling... by register_ax · · Score: 5, Informative
    Sir Clive's C5 was "Driven by a combination of battery and pedal power, the C5 was declared a death trap by the Automobile Association because it was too small to be seen by lorry drivers."

    If it isn't safe, it fails for practical use. The segway circumvents this as being reliable sturdy (heavy) US alteration it seems. Of course I'm merely a young chap[sic] residing in the US who has never heard of it before now.

    Before I depart, I was wondering just how dangerous it was. Proceeding to google it, I found an interesting interview that appears to have taken place August 1986.

    Of course relational interests are too much so I had to look into the Clive Computer. I came across some interesting information since my inception was the NES ;-]