shoestring

The real cheapies would not be very suitable for continuous use even though their ratings may fit within parameters of the machine. I just realized that I have a spare Sony PSP charger lying around, rated at 5v @ 2a. This "may" be a better alternative.

Great news, Jurgen's products are awesome.

Now you're being ridiculous. Every manufacturer finds more efficient ways to do things, it's the only way you can compete. As technology improves and gets better, costs are cut and new revisions are released into production and in some cases mistakes are made along the way. Atari was no exception in "cocking things up" as you say. They dropped the chroma line completely in the XL series ( and in some cases the luma in the 600XL ), rumour has it that they forgot to connect it and nobody even noticed so they didn't bother fixing it. Another design error resulted in mismatched signal impedance in the video display. The wrong valued resistor was also installed in the video output section during production making the mismatch even worse, this mistake wasn't noticed until production moved from Hong Kong to Taiwan. But just to reiterate what I said in an earlier post, the c64s video output improved throughout the different revisions whilst the display in the Atari 8 bits actually deteriorated, especially in the XE series where the video output is the absolute worst of all 8 bit machines.

Pitstop II was another one of those great multiplayer games on the c64. Had my cousin over and that's all we played for an entire summer

They improved over time though and eventually came with a proper aluminium shielding which also helped address some of the original heat related issues. Video output also improved significantly in the later revisions, compare the video output quality of an original c64 and one with the short board. Apple did the same, compare the number of chips in the earlier Apple 2e and Platinum board. They even went from dual wipe sockets to single wipe = poor quality.

Is it blank or black ?. Yes there's a difference. Black would indicate video sync, blank means no video sync. Blank would most likely indicate that the clock circuit isn't working. No clock = dead machine = blank screen. Only way to check for the correct clock signal is with a scope, it's one of the first things I check when a machine is totally dead. It's a rare fault but still possible. Edit: Sorry, didn't realize this was an old post.

I couldn't see Jack buying the Amiga anyway and knowing what he was like ( always looking to reduce the chip count ) he would have thought that there were too many chips in the machine. Steve Jobs actually thought the same. Affordability is what pushed me away from the Amiga, and that's probably true for most users. There were certain things I couldn't do with the Amiga anymore like browse the web, play the latest games. At that point Amiga become too expensive to upgrade and maintain. PC it was for me.

Amiga was designed around to use the 68000 from the beginning ( before Commodore acquired them ). They had a couple of divisions working on the machine, whilst Jay Miner & his team worked on the chipset. All of this work was based around the 68000. They already a couple of demos running on it by the time Commodore purchased the technology, so I assume it would have been too late to change the specs for the chipset to use a different CPU. It was a monumental task, to get an OS written for the machine in time and take those suitcase sized breadboards and convert them into real hardware. They were able to do that because of the MOS plant. I don't believe there would have been many competitors around at that time capable of performing such a task and bringing it to market at an affordable price point, especially without their own semiconductor plant.

The company was liquidated so nobody really knows what the figures were. The numbers we hear of today come from fans, ex employees & computer historians. Which explains all of the confusion.

Probably closer to 12-13 million units ( based on known serial numbers ) if you don't count the 5 million c128 units sold. In interviews Tramiel says he sold between 300,000 - 500,000 a month but he wasn't really there long enough to know the exact numbers. In other interviews, he says between 22 and 30 million units total. Jack came up with the name Commodore after he saw an Opal Commodore make a short stop in front of his cab in Germany, Leonard says that story is impossible because the model was introduced in 1967 but Commodore was founded in 1954. Jack also said that he paid Bill Gates $25,000 for the V2 basic but in one of Leonard's interviews, he says that they paid a one time fee of $50,000 for the basic. I guess the point I'm making here is people's memories can also be fallible especially after so many years.

Maybe a bad example, but I always loved the music in this game.

Great video. I wish I'd seen this before I did mine because it would have saved me some trouble and time, I did see the one you did for the 400 though. I was getting some vertical banding as well, so I still needed to connect the gnds from the green vertical block as well. I recall that I soldered the ground wires on the opposite end together then to the gnd of C176 ( which was a convenient spot ).

I remember seeing your thread and that was the way I did mine except I just lifted the end of some components at the video output section and soldered to those points.

I'm using Jurgen's card as well in my 800. I have the output going into my PVM and yes, the picture is spectacular. I think it would probably take a little bit more work to install than the UAV, since Stephen has both maybe he can comment further on the different challenges. I installed the grey cable internally as I ran into some trouble trying to route it through the hole in the metal cage and I didn't want to punch a hole through the plastic case. I know some folks disconnect the RF modulator and route the grey cable through there but that wasn't an option for me. Now the only I need is someone to do another Incognito run and I'll be set

Have you considered the Super CPU Color Card for the 800 ?. This is another alternative and uses the same UAV circuit on the card.

If you install the 4464s as is, the machine will still see the 16kb. Check the 138 demux as well, I don’t have a schem infront of me right now but I believe that handles the output enables to the roms.

Hello. Do you have the chroma pin hooked up in the 800xl ? This sounds normal though. Using chroma/luma might fix it as it has for some folks. Not for me though, I hooked up my NTSC 800 to my PAL 1084 via Y/C, and I get the same back and white image. So I gave up and bought a PVM.

I don't know about 'ergonomic'. You had to perch your hands in such a way which made typing difficult as there isn't much room on the front of the machine + the massive space bar. They give you a little more room on the front of the C model but the XL is still, a much better keyboard for typists.

Looks like it is.

That’s a good question, I don’t think it’s stepped but I’ll have to check. In a nutshell, I describe the feel of the c64 keyboard like you’re hitting bricks with a mushy stop as opposed to a sudden stop on the XL. Not the best to type on but still much better than the XE. The later keyboards in the c models feel better, they use 3mm plungers instead of 5mm but they stil have that mushy stop everyone hates. My original brread bin c64 didn’t have that mushy stop though, it felt quite different to every other keyboard I’ve typed on. Touch typing is possible but the space bar on mine feels a little tight so you may find it less appealing than touch typing on an XL.

Yes why not enjoy both . I'm trying to get my hands on an Incognito to make the 800 more useful but it's almost like mission impossible. The keyboard on the 800 feels amazing, reminds me of the Apple 2 plus keyboard. I just can't enjoy typing on my other Ataris after getting the 800. As for the c64. I would probably avoid the 1541 and go for a 1541 Ultimate+ cart which can also simulate the 1541 . The c64c style is more reliable and I think the case is much more durable than the breadbox style. My case is is getting quite brittle and I need to be very careful with it in comparison to my XL case which is still tough as ever. Just a word of caution if you're thinking of setting up your XL/XEs right next to your C64. Here are two Futuretronics ( an Australian distributor of Atari and Commodore products in the early days ) power supplies, one Atari vs C64, they look identical... a disaster waiting to happen. I have my 800 set up right next to my c64 so I can never make that mistake.

^ this I hear this kind of rubbish a lot on this forum. There was nothing wrong with the quality of the PCBs used in the early c64s, easy to work on. Never ripped up a plate through hole, or destroyed any traces. Compare this with a Spectrum or early 80s arcade PCB and you'll agree with me. I agree that the case does not feel as solid as a 800XL but there is nothing wrong with the quality inside, especially for the price and features you're getting. The early models had some bad issues but this improved over time, especially in the c64c model where heat related issues were addressed, a proper aluminium rf shielding was used instead of the flimsy cardboard thing which also helped cool the chips. The video quality also improved significantly in the c64c compared to the breadbox model whilst the video display in the Atari deteriorated for various reasons.

I first played Boulderdash on a c64, that was the machine my parents first bought me. The Atari version plays identical, maybe a little faster and smoother than the c64 version but the controls respond and feel identical. I also prefer the colours on the Atari version, c64 version looks a little washed out and less vibrant. One thing that struck me was how similar the sound was between the two versions so Im not sure what you mean. Did you compare the POKEY sfx with the 6581 or the 8580? The SID has several revisions with each sounding slightly different... also if you only compared the sound via emulation then throw in additional variables there since the chip has never been fully reverse engineered therefore emulation is even more of an approximation or guess work. The SID is a digital controlled analog synth which is quite difficult to emulate, quite different to your traditional PSG. Commodore did not want to make their low end 6502 machines compatible with each other, doing so would just ruin their own market having the machines compete with one another. Their philosophy was, if you want to play games, get a c64 .

Get a c64

carlsson has a good point, not sure if there was preview documentation either but I'd say probably not.. based on how slow sales were in the first year due to lack of software. The C64 Programmers Reference Guide, which was a Commodore publication was definitely available within the same year the machine was released. But it took at least two years before decent titles were released.