Sirius 1

The Sirius 1 was a re-badged (and re-cased) version of the Victor 9000.    Victor Technologies arose out of the merger of Sirius Technologies and Victor Business Systems in 1982.

The Victor 9000 was designed by Chuck Peddle, the designer of the original Commodore PET and lead designer of the 6502 processor.  It was launched at COMDEX n 1981 with a choice of either MS-DOS or CP/M-86 operating systems.

While the computer ran MS-DOS, it was not fully IBM compatible.  The screen resolution was higher than that on the IBM PC and used a different floppy drive format that used variable speed drives to keep a constant head speed across any disk track - this meant they had a higher capacity (600Kb per side compared to 160Kb per side on the IBM).

A single model of the Sirius 1 was sold  by ACT, costing £2,395. 

IBM's delayed introduction of the PC in Europe gave ACT and Victor the time to establish itself, and the Sirius 1/Victor 9000 became the most popular 16-bit business computer in Europe.   Most sales in the UK were of ACT's version, which gave them the experience and financial base to develop the Apricot PC.

Despite the 'first-to-market' advantage and better specifications, the Sirius (and the Apricot PC) eventually succumbed to the sheer market dominance of the IBM PC.

CPU

Intel 8088 @ 5MHz

RAM

128Kb or 256Kb, expandable to 896Kb

Graphics

Hitachi 46505 CRT Controller

80x25 text or 800x400 graphics on a green monochrome CRT

Storage

Two 5.25" Floppy disk drives - 600Kb per disk.

External Ports

Parallel printer port - Centronics

2 x RS232 serial ports (up to 56Kbps bisynchronous)

1 x Parallel Centronics port (IEEE-488 compatible)

1 x Parallel 50-pin KK port (internal)

Expansion

Four expansion slots

Optional 8087MPX Math co-processor

Width: 15'

Depth: 13'

Height: 7'

Weight: 28lb