Commodore History Part 3 - The Commodore 64 (complete)

(please note that this video replaces a previous Commodore 64 history video, and adds an additional 15 minutes of content)

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[raynethackery]

We didn't have a lot of money when I was growing up. Neither of my parents ever finished high school and they worked hard blue collar jobs. They bought me a Commodore 64 in middle school and eventually the 1541 disk drive. I did tell them later in life how much I appreciated everything they did for me. Now however, looking up the prices for those 2 things in today's dollars, I realize just how much they must have sacrificed. My mother must have put them on layaway at KMart. They are both gone now so I can't tell them again how much it mattered to me. I spent over 10 years in IT because of that machine. I never became a programmer but I credit that machine with never being afraid of any computer that was put in front of me. Thanks Mom and Dad.

[theallknowingsause]

I love how every time David talks about graphics on commodore machines, he'll go right to Qbert on the Vic-20 and mention how awful it looks

[johsum]

I no longer watch telly, not because netflix etc but because channels like this. It's the content that counts. Brilliant work.

[andymadden]

A seemingly lesser-known fact is that the C64 was originally called the VIC-40, after its 40-column display.

[drthmonkey]

Considering the company is called Commodore, you'd think they would spell "kernal" "colonel".

[themarblers]

My dad went in the Hungarian army (light communism at the time, but 1 year military service is a must) and they discovered that one of the Tanks had a C64 based laser/infra aim system. He and his friends learned the basics at home, and they managed to "hack" the machine. They bunched in the vehicle and played day and night, smuggled and exchanged games.
I think they are never got caught.

EDIT:
Just got more insigt from my dad, and sligt corrections. (Thermal guidance was not correct, but almost)

The time is the 1992 yugoslav wars, and my dad and his brothers/friends snuck in the neighboring tank unit. This T72 tank was in for the First Responding unit for Hungary. It was closed off for this immediate use, nobody attended them, nobody thougth soliders went to play in the tanks. (communist showbiz preparedness, these kinds of things never kept on well, never serviced, basically gathered rust)
They nearly went to war with Yugoslavia, cause yugo warplanes flew in the hungarian airspace. (Probably just sleeazy pilots, not provocation)

Slight correction here: the tank was geared up with a laser aim, infrared cameras and special steerable projectiles. You need to take and keep aim by hand, and the rocket stayed on the target. The infrared scope is for the always clear visuals.

Yes, we instincivly look down on soviet engineering, but the military had always the better budget opposed the public stuff. I guess it was some kind of soviet-hungarian tech co-op for the time.

Hope it helps clear out some questions after a year

Hajrá magyarok!

[alewisa]

"Another visitor. Stay a while. Staaay forever"
Loved that game, and miss my C64

[DevirothS]

i think that David is the only person that would go through such task of adding some additional content to a previously made video just for the viewers... he seriously cares about us, that's extremely rare these days

thank you, David, for this amazing content :)

[palemacaroon]

So in 2018 more games were released for C64 than the 3DS

[Nemo]

The SID chip still sounds amazing in 2019 :)

[Objectorbit]

I knew you were revising the episode, but 15 minutes of additional content? Wow.

[shreyaskul]

34 minutes?! I didn't notice how the time flew!

[Dzeroed]

I will never forget the first time I put "Impossible Mission" into the C64 with my friend and it *_spoke_* to us! I had a ZX Spectrum 48k (can't wait for that video!) before the C64 and we'd never heard a computer do that in our lives- actually _talk!_
*_'Another visitor! Stay a while...STAY FOREVER!!!'_*
That sentence will be with me forever! I remember we purposefully got ourselves killed, just so we could hear that and the other dialogue again and again, laughing our heads off.
Awesome memories, awesome video. I love this machine.

[AdamsBrew]

I love how an unintended “ bug “ of the sid chip was a 4th audio channel for 4bit sample playback.. wish all bugs were that great

[Dirtyboxer]

The C64 was my first computer. I learned how to program on it, from the manual and also from magazines. I always appreciated how that early exposure to programming helped me in school by training me to break problems down to their component parts, design solutions to those problems, and troubleshoot solutions that fail. I don't do much programming anymore, but that work ethic I learned way back in '83 as an elementary school student is still a factor in how I approach life's challenges.

[c.andrew]

"Let's not forget the movie Pixels..."

I really wish I could though.

[vwestlife]

Note that not all 64C models have the newer motherboard and SID chip. Those were introduced beginning in 1987, so the first year of production still had the old motherboard and SID chip. And most sold in the USA still had the graphics symbols on the front of the keys.

Also Atari fans would argue that the POKEY chip, designed in 1978, could hold its own against the SID chip, especially in terms of sound effects. And the Apple II and TRS-80 could actually do multi-voice sound, although it took up a lot of the CPU's processing power, so it was mostly only used for title screens.

[deltatango]

I used to love my C-64. I spent many, many hours programming in basic and assembly. In the days before the internet, we had BBS's. There was no BBS or terminal software for the C-64, so I wrote my own. I called it the "Satellite BBS" and it became quite popular.

My BBS software had all the features of the others, plus a "window" layer (written in 6502 assembly) that stayed in one spot on the screen, showing the current or last caller's information, while their activity scrolled behind it. I like to say I invented Windows. It was very configurable. I'm still kicking myself 40 years later for not completing my plan to sell it.

When I moved across the country many years later, I ended up giving everything away, including everything I wrote. I always wondered if the guy ever made use of it.

Unless you lived back then, you can't imagine the fun we had.

[qbrt]

My mom walks in and says, "Oh wow, a Commodore!! I used to play Pitfall and piano with the snap-on thing."


Now I'm looking for Pitfall and the snap-on thing....

[Appleboy]

Fun fact: Quantum Link eventually evolved into AOL.