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25 messages in this thread
As *I* heard it from an ex-CBM exec, they're interested in producing *C64s* for
the masses in China.
Remember, it's still a Communist society with near nil personal income.
Denny,
>they're interested in producing *C64s* for the masses in China.
Yea, I heard that. It just blows my mind. I can't imagine why they just
wouldn't build an A600, or even an A500 instead of the 64. Certainly the costs
are a bit higher but I just can't believe it would be that much different when
you consider how much more powerful a machine you could offer.
But actually, I doubt even the masses in China could afford a C-64. Thank God
we at least have a choice over here on what we buy. (Well, as long as it isn't
an A4000T that we want! :))
-Marty
Martin,
>Yea, I heard that. It just blows my mind. I can't imagine why they just
wouldn't build an A600, or even an A500 instead of the 64
I hear they are building the A600 (which seems silly to me but…) also. but
I agree that re-starting C64 production seems sillier….
>God we at least have a choice over here on what we buy. (Well, as long as it
isn't an A4000T that we want! :))
But it IS an A4000T that *I* want! ;/
Asha
I love the C64, so hopefully they will start production again. As long as they
can sell it of course. Anyway it won't be the C64 but the CBM64c (different
case and redesigned board, this of course was still on sale for many years). If
they had any sense though they would product the c65 as this is better (ok not
Amiga standards, but if you can make it for $50 instead of $200) If it's cheap
it will sell in some countries. The ZX-Spectrum sold alot in the UK, but really
it wasn't very good, it just didn't cost much.
Phill
Well, the C64 wasn't such a bad machine – you could/can even get a GUI for it
(GEOS) – not bad for an 8 bit/1MHz CPU… If they can produce it _really_ cheap
(which I doubt – I guess the A600 is cheaper to build) it might indeed become
'the _very_ poor man's PC'…
// Christian "ELP" Busse
\X/ near Frankfurt, Germany
The problem with producing the C64 isn't the computer. The 64 itself would
be very cheap to produce. The problem is the 1541 disk drive which is not
cheap to produce.
The current design of the 1541 is expensive, but I don't have a 1541, I have an
oceanic which is faster and smaller and cheaper. Someone must be able to make
them cheaper. CBM could have done it (and probably did three or four times).
Phill
Phillip,
I seem to remeber the 1580, or was it 1581, a 3.5" drive ? They were rather
expensive at the time, but so were all diskdrives. I can imagine that someone
could come up with a suitable interface to enable the use of standard drives.
Lieven Lema
…on autopilot from Belgium.
"The problem with producing the C64 isn't the computer. The 64 itself would be
very cheap to produce. The problem is the 1541 disk drive which is not cheap
to produce."
How true! I didn't think of that (and I had a big ol' hippopotumus of a 1541
with bad alignment problems and all). Well, that blows the C64 out of the
water.
-Chris
CNR Media Services
Why wouldn't the C64 be cheaper than an A600? Last I heard they'd gotten the
whole thing down to 1 or 2 chips…
Mr. Zombie
PI <<Why wouldn't the C64 be cheaper than an A600? Last I heard they'd gotten
the whole thing down to 1 or 2 chips…>>
As someone else mentioned, while the C64 would be cheaper to make, the C64 with
1541 drive would probably cost more.
If they could do it, I would like to see the new company make the cheap "A300"
Commodore had once planned on making before producing the A600.
Ron.
There are still users who fervently hope that the never-quite-finished C65
computer would be polished up and released by Commodore. It may be a vain
hope, but at least that machine was reputed to be compatible with
"unintelligent" drives, so that the 1541 and its cousins would not be a
necessary part of a system, and HD would be a snap.
It's strange, but many stunning 64 "demos" are still appearing, mostly from
Europe, with graphics, animation and sound that have never been matched on the
bigger, more expensive machines .. not even on the Amiga, which should be a
natural for this kind of thing (well, perhaps excepting the Eric Scwartz
stuff).
–Jim
Jim,
I examined several C-65 machines while visiting CEI on business last year. No,
nothing to do with purchasing Commodore. From what I could tell, it was
completed. It sported a front mounted 3.5" floppy disk drive and I believe, a
faster 8 MHz 6502 CPU. Regretfully, I didn't have time to plug one in and see
if it booted.
As to a market for this machine, I believe that South America, Eastern Europe
and the former Soviet Bloc are potential markets. China or any other nation
that has a 3000+ character set language, would probably not be suitable as a
front-end engine would easily overwhelm the resources of the computer.
Regards,
John Chang
I believe I would be a potential market for a C65 🙂
Phill
I heared that the C65 WAS finished and was three weeks from production when it
was pulled (they had tooled up the production line as well). There were about
100 C65 prototypes which were sold off when CBM cleared out all of their old
stock. Grapevine got most of the stuff and actually advertised the c65s.
Whether they sold any I don't know, I haven't seen anything from Grapevine for
ages.
I would like to see some 64 demos that were better than Amiga one, I have done
more demo coding on the 64 because it was easier than the Amiga. It was a good
machine with a good following, the days of the c64 scene were good times. The
Amiga sort of had the same but that's all gone now. The PC scene is supposed to
be pretty "hot" at the moment. If I could go back to the days of the C64 I
would be happy, it gave a buzz that will probably never return.
I would like to see the c64 back in production for all the wrong reasons, the
same reasons I would like the Amiga back. Nostalgia.
Phill
The a300 WAS the a600, they just changed the name because there had been a leak
about the a300 which they denied. If they had released it after denying it they
would have looked stupid. Also it was supposed to be a cut down a500. They
decided in the end that it should replace the a500 (strange as it could only
take 4mb of fast memory and had no DMA interphase).
Phill
PW <<The a300 WAS the a600, they just changed the name because there had been a
leak about the a300 which they denied.>>
I was aware that the A600 was the A300 renamed, and that some early A600's even
have A300 on the motherboard.
The story, I heard was that the A300 had been designed to be an ultra-cheap
Amiga designed to attract the C64 crowd. But due to (mis)management, it was
resigned into the A600 — a more-expensive-than-A500 to replace the A500.
Ron.
..at least the early A600's even had "A300" printed on their motherboards…
// Christian "ELP" Busse
\X/ near Frankfurt, Germany
Don't need to make 1541's… There must be shiploads of game carts floating
around… Anyway, it ought to be not too difficult to build a parallel
interface for the C64, then 'wedge' in a bit of software, and use the parallel
port disk drives that are floating around.
KD <<Don't need to make 1541's… There must be shiploads of game carts
floating around… >>
If they want the C64 to be seen as a serious "computer", then a way to load and
store business software & data will be needed. If they are going to use just
carts, they might as well try to sell CD32's and corner the the "game machine"
market.
As for making wedges for using the (IBM?) parallel drives, I think the
interface + drive would add up to be the same as a 1541/71/81 in the long run,
and not be as software conpatible.
Ron.
I always wanted GEOS, along with some other things but never had the cash at
the time. Nothing has been available in the UK for years now, I reckon with a
bit of a redesign you could knock them out at a profit for fifty pounds. The
advantage CBM had with the 64 is that they made most if not all of the
computer. They bought MOS years before and all the IC's were made by them. MOS
even made alot of the Amiga before CSG started making them. The RAM could be
put onto one chip now and the whole thing could be made smaller. Maybe even a
portable 64 (I don't count the SX-64 as portable 🙂 ).
Phill
I second that, I have a PC 386 that sports 4 Meg RAM, CGA Display, serial,
parallel, and 2 PCMCIA slots. It runs for DAYS on a set of 4 AA batteries. If
they can stuff all THAT into a 1.3 pound package that almost fits into a
pocket, then the 'ole '64 ought to be a snap. (I'd probably even dump the IBM
if a pocket 64 were available with some sort of REU built in…
Dale
Even though the C64 is low technology stuff compared to the Amiga and other
PC's of today, they would probably do quite well in China or previous Eastern
block countries as a nice home computer. And then once you get them hooked on
the C64, then introduce a low budget A500 or 1200. The only problem I see is
how to get the Chinese alphabet on a C64 keyboard <g>.
// John (Warp 4040 & Emplant Quadra 840)
\X/ Mercury@ins.infonet.net
Getting the chinese keyboard is easy, it would just take 4562 CIAS to generate
the scanning codes and 6.7 years to complete a scan of the keyboard :).
Phill
That's a definite possibility, Denny. I guess we'll just have to sit tight and
see what the next hand looks like 🙂
DJ
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