Acorn Archimedes

The Acorn Archimedes of 1987 was a genuinely historic machine: the first home computer built around the ARM processor, a fast, elegant chip that Acorn had designed in-house. It was startlingly quick for its day, ran a slick graphical operating system, and made most of its contemporaries feel sluggish by comparison.

Popular in British schools, where it took over from the ageing BBC Micro, the Archimedes showcased an approach to processor design whose influence is almost impossible to overstate. It was powerful, forward-looking and, in classrooms and enthusiast bedrooms alike, more than a little ahead of its time.

The real legacy, though, is in your pocket. ARM chips, direct descendants of the processor that first powered this machine, now run the overwhelming majority of the world's smartphones, tablets and countless other devices. That makes the Archimedes one of the most quietly consequential computers ever built, a British classroom machine whose DNA ended up everywhere.