Hold on to your RAM packs, the ZX Spectrum is back! (Or, if you’re under 40: Warning! Old people reminiscing about computing kit!)

When I was but a naive, annoying, layabout of a youth with a fine head of hair (as opposed to a cynical, annoying, layabout of a middle-aged balding bloke), I spent many a happy hour round at a friend’s house.

He was lucky – his parents brought him the latest stuff, so he was listening to ELO albums on cassette whilst I waited to catch a song on the radio, he could use their VCR to record a TV show, whilst I was banned from watching The Young Ones as it was all a bit anarchic, and his parents brought him the latest computing technology, whilst I...

Well, there wasn’t any comparison really. True, I had a digital watch that played Fur Elise, and we did have a calculator in the house, but these were like a toothpick next to a mighty Oak when it came to the Sinclair ZX Spectrum.

Descendent of the ZX81, the Spectrum was an altogether mightier beast – when hooked up to your TV (and after seemingly never-ending minutes of loading programmes from a cassette) it could deliver a stunning several-colours visual experience. Pricey, too – up to £175 when they first appeared, which is roughly equivalent to “No, you can’t have one for Christmas” today.

If serious programming, using it’s enormous 16K of ROM, wasn’t enough, you could give it a turbo upgrade with as much as 48K of RAM. For the first time, arcade games were available from the discomfort of your own living room floor, because the location of your TV, plug sockets, and the need to hook them all up using cables in an age when “wifi” meant you smelt bad, restricted your ability to go anywhere near the sofa.

Suspended in the middle of your web of wires, like some kind of futuristic techno-spider, you could while away the hours until tea playing all manner of thrilling games, using the hideously weird “dead flesh” keyboard.

Despite the fact that juvenile RSI was a definite risk due to the bizarre key combination required to, say, open the bomb hatch doors whilst simultaneously firing your laser, the fun never ended – unless someone wanted to watch the football, or you were getting a bit too overexcited playing Jet Set Willy.

Whilst many of the games from those happy 80s days are now available to play on your computing kit of choice, the rainbow-adorned Spectrum had seemingly gone to the great skip in the sky forever, save a few carefully preserved museum specimens.

Guess what though? It’s coming back! A crowd-funding campaign will soon allow rubbery-keyed replicas to connect to your tablet, wirelessly, enabling you to once again waste hours playing Manic Miner.

But only if you buy the Apps of the games you originally purchased three decades ago. Packet of Quavers and glass of Cresta optional.