About us
RetroDreams is four people who grew up with these machines and don't want to see them thrown away.
Don't let these machines die.
Why we do this
Many of these computers end up in the bin because of a fault that can be fixed: a leaking capacitor, a worn membrane, a tired power supply. Sometimes they have spent thirty years in an attic, waiting for someone to remember them.
We remember. Each of us had one of these machines, or wished we had, and knows what it was like to switch it on after school. It hurts to see them end up in a skip because nobody knows how to open them.
The project exists so these machines don't die and so that repairing them is easy. You bring the machine, we tell you what's wrong, and it switches on again. If it can't be fixed, we tell you that too, and use its parts to save another one.
The magic of simple machines
You switched on the Spectrum and, in a second, there it was: © 1982 Sinclair Research Ltd and the blinking cursor. No updates, no loading screens: the machine was ready, and so were you.
Then came the tape. You pressed PLAY, watched the stripes in the border and listened to that screech for minutes. Sometimes it said R Tape loading error and you rewound again. Nobody waits five minutes for a game today; back then, the wait was part of the fun.
On the Amiga it was the hand holding a disk, asking for Workbench, the click of the drive reading, the disks swapped with friends at school. And the magazines, with program listings you typed in line by line, and the one-letter mistake you only found at midnight.
These were machines one person could understand completely. You could see the chips, the schematics came in the manuals, and a soldering iron fixed a lot. That's why they can still be repaired today, and why they're worth it.
It isn't just nostalgia. A game that fits in 48 KB has to get to the point: you get it in the first minute and it's still fun forty years later. Those who grew up with it know; those who didn't usually find out here.
The team
Machine hunter
Sérgio Silva
Learnt to program in 1986 on a ZX Spectrum and later moved to an Amiga 2000, where X-Copy was a favourite. In the project, the one who scours the internet for the best machines to bring back.
Parts and upgrades
Miguel Polónio
An Amiga fan from the very start, with almost every model today. In the project, the one who finds replacement parts and upgrades the Amigas.
Electronics
Paula Silva
A long relationship with the ZX Spectrum and the team's electronics guru. Brings the machines back to life and checks that everything works.
Consoles and games
David Russo
Brings the view from more recent consoles, and a taste for simple games.
Where we are
The shop is in Loures. Bring your machine, or just come and talk about it.
Passeio das Ilhas, nº 3, Loja A, 2670-322 Loures