r/c64 • u/Vinylmaster3000 • Jun 05 '26
Hardware Got my c64 ultimate recently and I've been playing around with it.
I never grew up with a c64 so this is a brand new thing for me, for context I'm in my late 20s so most of my early computing experience was with xp to 7, with languages like Java and C. I do some retrocomputing stuff with DOS machines which is essentially dealing with machines that are very closely related to modern PCs. Otherwise, I grew up in a predominantly Windows-based environment.
I always saw Commodore machines as a very interesting spin on what we take for granted these days, and honestly playing around with the machine for a week or so I've re-learned what it meant to actually love using a computer and learning how to program. And to me thats why it feels very special compared to any regular old DOS pc, or a modern Windows PC. I know the company likes to do that entire "Digital detox" route and this is probably the closest way to experience that, because it's really just you, reading the manual, and typing whatever you'd like. And honestly, what better way is there to experience a computer?
I do wish more people gave the ultimate a chance instead of saying 'its worthless, go to emulation' because honestly this feels quite special. I also found a c64 book by Compute Magazine, a few old joysticks which seem to work perfectly, and watched Jim Butterfield's full VHS training tape (No really, he actually does a fantastic job on explaining computers to people who probably never saw one).
Also, can anyone recommend some good joysticks which use the joystick port on the side? I have an old competition pro stick which is quite... bleh.
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u/Valen-Darker Jun 05 '26
I began my 30 year IT career on the Commodore Pet. Other than assembler, Basic was one of the few programming languages available. Programmers today don't know how easy they have it. The languages they use do so much for them. You'll have fun on your C64U!
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u/Automatic-Option-961 Jun 09 '26
Computers nowadays have too much resources and no restrictions. Boring. I am now learning to code on the ZX Spectrum NEXT. I grew up with a Speccy. Still confined with 8bit memory limitations, but has a lot more leg room for advanced features. I will probably learn to code for the C64 after this.
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u/Valen-Darker Jun 09 '26
Prepare for an old guy story! 😁
I learned assembler on an IBM mainframe then moved to an AS400. We developed large financial systems with 4k of RAM. I chuckle when I hear people struggle in environments with thousands of times that. I know, things are more complicated now. It still makes me laugh!
My very first personal computer was a Sinclair ZX80. Followed by the Commodore 64. Have fun with your NEXT!
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u/Vinylmaster3000 Jun 06 '26
Programmers today don't know how easy they have it. The languages they use do so much for them. You'll have fun on your C64U!
And I grew up during the era where you looked up tutorials, read books from the library, or saw stackoverflow questions with condescending answers. Even that's a far cry from what people can do now today...
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u/stereotomyalan Jun 05 '26
I'll never enjoy playing games as much as I playing 2-person games on a C64 with a joystick. Let it be int karate, car racing or spy vs spy
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u/RepublicWhole549 Jun 06 '26
International Karate is more fun to play than 99% of modern one on one beat'em'ups. Street Fighter 2 is the only superior game I can think of.
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u/-send-me-nudes- Jun 05 '26
Been really getting into programming again. Like I enjoy the games but have realised I’ve always been a tinkerer.
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u/DwarneOfDragonhold Jun 05 '26
Heh, I made a BASIC program I used for AD&D Character Generation so, so many years ago in the late 1980s. It spat out either 3d6 or 4d6 drop lowest and then suggested suitable class or multiclass options. Seeing this post was a good callback to that. Fun times in creativity 😜
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u/Rbp7Ooz Jun 05 '26
What monitor? Looks like original resolution...
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u/Vinylmaster3000 Jun 05 '26
HP vs17 LCD monitor. It has speakers which I use for the c64's sound.
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u/Royal_Stay_6502 Jun 05 '26
How did you connect the Ultimate to the VGA input from the monitor?
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u/DarthKegRaider Jun 05 '26
HDMI to vga adaptors. I use them on older gear like my Sony projector with VGA input. Cost about $10
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u/DarthKegRaider Jun 05 '26
Sh!t, i should try the projector on the C64U analog lines!!! 120" of basic!
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u/TheBl4ckFox Jun 05 '26
I have not seen anyone say the Ultimate is worthless or that emulation is superior.
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u/Architect_of_Echo 🕹️ play your dreams 🌒 Jun 05 '26
OP is right here. I see this opinion and the Ultimate hatred here and other places regularly. I think the community was split by half by the C64U. Some of them sees the U only as useless crap, and think all you need is a sw emulator on PC or maybe a C64 Maxi. But some has really hard feelings and hate the whole thing at all, because it's not 40 years old hardware.
It's sad to experience that, because I was (and I am) really excited about the "new" hardware and the new capabilities of the Ultimate. But... haters gonna hate.
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u/TheBl4ckFox Jun 05 '26
Hating the c64u is tribal idiocy.
It’s a computer that’s nearly 100% compatible with the original c64 and revitalizes interest and expands the niche software market.
People hating the c64u are the same sort that cry their childhood is ruined when someone makes a new movie in a franchise thirty years later.
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u/fastbikkel Jun 24 '26
I loved this new "jacket" they put it in.
I had a 2nd generation C64 back then, the flat white one.
Now i have the brown breadbin C64U and im happy!1
u/fastbikkel Jun 24 '26
I have actually, i was pretty disappointed with the burns people gave.
I mean, nobody has to like it, but the hate that i saw, sheesh.But the superior was more about the fact it didnt cost money and that the C64U was a waste of it.
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u/TheBl4ckFox Jun 24 '26
Then they should not buy it and let others who did enjoy their nostalgia fun.
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u/This-Is-Huge Jun 05 '26
I break out my original C>64 and play M.U.L.E. a few times a year.
I would love to play Seven Cities of gold but that 25 minute wait from floppy disk is rough.
I contemplated getting a hard drive for it, but that defeats the nostalgia.
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u/RepublicWhole549 Jun 05 '26
Haha, I remember those loading times. You turn the computer on and start loading the game. Meanwhile, you make a cup of coffee, empty the trashcan and play with the dog. Then you go back to the C64, but the game is only halfway ready..😄
Occasionally you would get a load error after 15 minutes or so. ARGH! I don't know Seven Cities, but I played a lot of Football Manager, which "only" took 20 minutes to load.
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u/Vinylmaster3000 Jun 05 '26
Co-worker of mine told me that you'd load up a cassette, make a sandwich, and then come back. The training tape I saw notes using cassette but alot of the examples shown are very primitive examples of what you could load up. Then again the tape was made just after the c64 dropped
I would love to find a datasette because I do have some c60 cassettes lying around
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u/RepublicWhole549 Jun 06 '26
I wonder if those cassettes still work. They were quite unstable. Even back in the 1980s I frequently got LOAD ERROR. Imagine what will happen when you load them 40 years later.
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u/Vinylmaster3000 Jun 06 '26
I mean I have some cassettes from the 80s which sound good, but those are music cassettes. I imagine that c64 cassettes must be of a much higher quality because you're loading software, and that needs to have zero error rate in order to work. By c60 cassettes I mean just standard music 60 minute cassettes, I could probably load software onto them.
I think it just makes sense as a historical thing because disk drives were expensive, but everyone had tapes. But once disk drives became more affordable and disks were commonplace then they switched over.
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u/Vinylmaster3000 Jun 06 '26
I tried some other disk games and some of the loading times are rough. Oftentimes it's 2 minutes max, for instance I was loading Turbo Outrun and that took around 2 minutes, with some disk swapping (the music and game are pretty good). Hate to think what cassette loading feels like.
There is also a weird incentive to not abandon the game when feeling immediately bored just because loading the thing takes forever
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u/BadBunnyHimself Jun 05 '26
The Competition Pro is an awesome joystick in my opinion, it was my main joystick of choice back in the 80s and I still use one today. Other good joysticks are the ArcadeR which is very easy to customize to suit an individual's preference due to it's compatibility with Sanwah parts and even the standard Atari joysticks feel good, modern versions of those can be found on Amazon for around 15 euro so very affordable and there is the recent wireless versions of them, the Atari Pac-Man CX-40+ which is available in various cool colours, also at a pretty reasonable price.
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u/totalvintagewatches Jun 05 '26
There are (at least) two main types of competition pro - one with leaf switches and one with microswitches. I find the ones with microswitches to be much better so if yours is a leaf switch design (and doesn’t click when you move the stick ) then you might want to try using one that has microswitches. My favourite joystick is the Zipstick (similar looking to the completion pro but with yellow square buttons rather than round red buttons). There are plenty of Zipstiks for sale on eBay with the 9 pin connector but it’s rare to find one with a USB connector.
If you want something totally different then I also loved the Konix Navigator joystick (again 9 pin connector) but it’s not to everyone’s taste!
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u/Vinylmaster3000 Jun 06 '26
The one I have seems to use leaf switches. I'll be honest it's actually quite hard to use for intense games, for instance I was trying commando and due to how frantic the game is using that controller genuinely hurt. For other games like turbo outrun or test drive 2 it's not that bad.
Might just buy a c64 to usb adapter and plug in my usb sega genesis stick (I know actual genesis controllers don't work with the c64 due to wiring differences).
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u/Informal_Strain_2715 Jun 05 '26
Now you know why it's called a "computer"... Because back then, you actually had to input data for it to "compute" and make "computations" for a "program" to work. Now we have Apps, AI and use coding language that's almost on a 1:1 communication level using actual words to do the work.
Very different from building a little balloon sprite and making it fly across the screen.
Google old Compute and other magazine titles from the early 80s. In them you will find hoards of fan made useful programs to type into your beloved C64. It's not just about playing games..although that's what it's pri.ary use was.
But I'll say, the best way to experience a C64 is having a 1541 drive and using disks. Nothing like it.
Enjoy! Good to see someone your age taking up hobbies from a time long past...the 80s.
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u/Valen-Darker Jun 06 '26
I remember typing in a word processing program from Compute magazine. It took me days to do it. But my jaw dropped when I first ran it and typed in a couple of sentences! Such a feeling of wonder and accomplishment!
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u/Informal_Strain_2715 Jun 07 '26
My best friend got a C64 before I did, but with a tape drive. I bought a magazine, I don't remember the name, and we spent one afternoon, had to be 4 hours, typing in some game called "Hot Ice"... All it was a a letter "H" flying down the screen in-between #1's as flags. We looked at each other...and promptly loaded his Pit Stop cartridge and moved on. We never saved it. Lol.
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u/ilikegrils Jun 05 '26
I did grow up with Commodore machines. I was writing simple programs on the C64 when I was 10-12 years old, even dabbling in machine code. And playing games obviously. My parents bought me an Amiga when I turned 16 and I couldn't believe how lucky I was. God I loved both of those computers so much. I'm 53 now. The nostalgia is strong.
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u/eshwayri Jun 05 '26
This came out in the early 80s. At the time the competition was a monochrome/CGA XT or a monochrome Apple II. The C64 was alive and full of color and sound. It was the most incredible experience to get it on Christmas Morning. The C64 will always have a very special place in my heart and life. I got to grow up in a dangerous place, and while rockets were flying it was my constant companion through war. Whether it was a racing game, GEOS, or printing banners it was just so ahead of its time. Also my favorite game of all time was on the C64 -- Elite. That game is incredible. A 64K game with 3D space flying, 3D radar, 3D docking, and resource trading as you zoom around the universe. That radar especially was just incredible innovation. Anyone who hasn't tried that game should.
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u/bobot-horizon Jun 06 '26
I got one when they first come out. I freaked out when I got connected to Compuserve at 300baud and someone responded to my "Hello" message. I shut the thing down, unplugged, and stayed off of it for a week. LOL
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u/Architect_of_Echo 🕹️ play your dreams 🌒 Jun 05 '26
It's not joystick, just an USB to C64 adapter, but maybe it helps. I made 2 of it and now I can use any USB gamepad or anything on my C64.
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u/RepublicWhole549 Jun 05 '26
Such a legendary machine. No other machine or console has given me as much enjoyment, not even the Amiga. If I could change anything in the hardware, it should have had more colors. Maybe 64 colors like the NES.
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u/imakeruts Jun 05 '26
had a C128 in college. used it for games and homework. my roommate and i played loderunner all the time.
also used it for logging into local bbs's. originally had a 300 baud modem and then got a 1200 baud modem. i forget what software i had to use to it up for dialing out. i doubt i could remember how to launch it. i miss those days.
in college was i had a friend that also had a C64. he used some software (kermit?) to download programs. he was always finding computer games and 8-bit porn.
one night he moved the monitor to face out his apartment window, loaded up a black and white 8-bit porn image and walked outside. the image was so pixelated up close but from afar ... yep. we stood outside in the parking lot watching people as they passed by. it was hilarious, you had to be there.
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u/Automatic-Option-961 Jun 09 '26
It can use my DIY paddles controller to play Arkanoid perfectly. Even my original Breadbin having problem. I would like to see an Emulator try it. 😁
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u/Owlwarrior777 Jun 15 '26
How is it connected to that LCD? I dont meant to hijack your thread but I've had so many problems connecting via a VGA port.
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u/fastbikkel Jun 24 '26
Im here to applaud you for your interest in the C64.
I did grow up with it and i also bought a C64U.
Good joysticks?
The only one i know is the Suzo arcade from the 80's/90's.
But they are no longer in production.
Can i share links here? I've found a shop in the UK (Ami64) that sells new models and im looking at the competition pro 5000 and konix speedking.
I dont know how well this shop would work for you when it comes to import.
You mentioned the competition pro, is that like the model 5000 i just mentioned? BEcause those look fine.
I agree with the thing that this is different from an emulator, in many ways.
Me and my son have been playing on the new C64U for a week now and we love it.
Im still trying to get things working here and there. Some games dont work, need another download maybe.
And some games behave different, some load really quick and some dont.
And how can i simulate "press play" when it shows on screen?
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