I never had a Spectrum, but it's easy to understand the magic of such a device.
It's tiny, it's relatively cheap, it's simple enough to take apart (disassembled ROM, or dis-assembled hardware I suppose).
Sure, it was underpowered, and the keyboard was cheap. But for a kid, those can be features.
My first computer was a relatively luxurious TRS-80 Color Computer. My family could almost afford the 16KB version. It was a technically clean design, and I learned a lot, and here I am.
Give a kid a tiny machine, some documentation, and tell them it is theirs.
I was luck to have had a number of computers that were essentially "mine". First a ZX Spectrum, then the +2A, an ancient Compaq luggable (which had the most wonderful keyboard), and an ancient Toshiba laptop. The fact that these were mine to do what I wanted with, without worrying about breaking them, was really important in giving me the freedom to really explore them.
It's tiny, it's relatively cheap, it's simple enough to take apart (disassembled ROM, or dis-assembled hardware I suppose).
Sure, it was underpowered, and the keyboard was cheap. But for a kid, those can be features.
My first computer was a relatively luxurious TRS-80 Color Computer. My family could almost afford the 16KB version. It was a technically clean design, and I learned a lot, and here I am.
Give a kid a tiny machine, some documentation, and tell them it is theirs.