The Sinclair Spectrum was and still is an icon of Great British design. 30 years on from its original release the diminutive computer still looks as cool now as it did when it was first released. 

30 years ago the Sinclair Spectrum was a revolution. A colour computer that was price at £125, affordable to the average person and to a lot of young men one of the be Christmas presents they would ever get. 

A lot has been said over the years about the ZX Spectrum. Yes it made hundreds of really amazing bedroom coders into some of the best programmers in the world. Yes it had a funny feeling keyboard given the moniker "dead flesh". Yes it sold zillions of units and had over 15,000 games written for it. But the best thing about the Sinclair Spectrum is the irksome quirkiness that each individual computer had. Whether it be holding your arms still in a particular position to help your game to load (sometimes standing on one foot helps too) or having to have the back of your computer slightly elevated to stop your computer from getting the dreaded interface wobble, instantly shutting down your machine and sometimes ever worse.

Doing a quick google will bring up tonnes of information on the humble speccy and today it will also show you a natty google doodle.

Here is some great links for the birthday boy.