The tube approach was great for the late 70's / early 80's computer, but the limitations on I/O throughput etc of the host likely contributed to its demise as the world changed to wanting (as opposed to necessarily needing...Having read the article recently linked from Steven from Bracknell's introductory post, discussing the abandonment of Acorn's Tube strategy in favour of the Archimedes
) faster / bigger storage and high bandwidth colour displays. If I can be allowed a moment to play 'what if' let's pretend a new range of second processor products were released which had a tube connector at one end for connection to an 8 bit Acorn and a 'fat conduit' (perhaps we could call it a podule?) connector at the other to allow expansion card(s) that the tube hosted OS could redirect via standard Acorn MOS API calls if it were present we may have had a more gradual upgrade path, but eventually relegating your Beeb to nothing more than a large keyboard...
Doubt it would ever have been a commercially viable thing, but an interesting concept to provide a path to e.g. the desktop workstation market that the 32016 / ACW never really hit.
Statistics: Posted by julians — Fri Dec 12, 2025 5:35 pm