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The Return of the Commodore?
PseudoSapien writes "A Dutch consumer media company is hoping it can tap the power of the VIC 20, the PET and the Commodore 64 to launch a new wave of products, including a home media center device and a portable GPS (Global Positioning System) unit and media player. They're talking about Resurrecting Commodore." From the article: "Commodore is far from the first company to try to revive a once-popular tech brand. The Amiga, Commodore's onetime PC brand, has had its own decades-long history as fans tried to preserve both the computer's operating system and brand despite the lack of strong corporate backing."
Some Dutch company bought rights to use the commodore name and logo and is stamping it on some Chinese made OEM products?
Atari was bought out by French game publisher Infogrames a few years back, which uses the Atari name purely because people have a history with it. There's no Atari left in Atari.
-- I prefer the term "karma escort."
Can't we just let the dead rest in peace anymore? I loved both my C=64 and my Amiga, but they're history. This is just marketing/branding, it has nothing to do with the original products, nor it's spirit.
"It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
The good news: It will run Open Office. The bad news: The Open Office suite will come on 382 floppy disks.
Just don't publish programs in magazines. That really was a painful and stupid way to distrubute software.
It also happened to be the only viable way to distribute software, economically atleast.
Actually, in The Netherlands there was a programme on radio that broadcast data tapes (!). Just tape the radio show to cassette, run a translator from BASICODE (which was the "univeral" basic dialect the broadcasts were in) to your home computer's very own basic dialect, and you were in business. The show was called NOS HobbyScoop if I recall correctly.
Also, I recollect (fondly) an issue of MSX Magazine which had a flexi disc record (you know, like one of them vinyl records your grandaddy used to have, but the flexi disc was a superthin version of this) which you also copied onto cassette to load onto your machine.
Later on I even became aware of broadcasts of computer data using Teletext pages on Rai Uno (Italian tv - teletext is broadcast in the superfluent scanlines of PAL television, much like closed captioning is broadcast in the extra scanlines of NTSC); these were also targetted, at first, at home computer user, and only later at PC users (but by then, BBSes were the norm).
SCO employee? Check out the bounty
Typing, typing, typing, typing, save to tape.
Typing, typing, typing, typing, save to tape.
Typing, typing, typing, typing, save to tape.
Typing, typing, typing, typing, save to tape.
Unplug computer from TV and watch news.
Plug in computer to TV and continue!
I actually think C= has potential as a gamer's brand like Voodoo or Alienware.
A lot of people who grew up with C=64s are adults with money now who want high-quality gaming gear.
Just think about the commercials:
Fade in old-style C= logo, maybe some old-skool tv shots of people playing around with something on a C=64. Then an explosion and some new-style C= logo glowing or perhaps crackling with electricity behind it. Caption (or voiceover): "It's Back..."
+++ATH0
I stopped reading here.
I don't know what these people are doing with the Commodore name, but whatever it is, it isn't Commodore.
With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
Um, just the company that created the single most successful model of computer ever (the C64); had a bunch of other very successful models (the C128, the VIC-20, the PET, the Amiga 2000, the Amiga 500); is generally acknowledged for inventing multimedia (with the Amiga 1000); had switchable GUIs, multiple processors, independent graphics processors, decent (stereo) sound and graphics, and scripting capabilities back before most other computer platforms even thought about such things; had reliably chainable external hardware well before USB; etc. Most of the best programmers I know today started on one of the Commodore series.
You kids. Remember loading the terminal driver for the 33ASR on front panel register switches, then bootstrapping from paper tape? Remember playing Star Trek games that printed out the entire board after every turn?
Remember where i put my teeth?
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Wouldn't a non-portable GPS be kinda pointless? I'm seeing a big rock with "You are here" carved on it.
Imagine what would happen if somebody really did produce a modern-day equivalent to the commodore 64.
1. The C64 had all of its OS in ROM, which meant :
a) No patching could be done after manufacture, so it had to be right the first time
b) No unnecessary features could be added to the OS -- an add-on was required
c) Virus and Root kits were possible, by copying ROM to RAM first and modifying the copied code, but could not survive a cold boot.
d) Instant on
2. The C64 didn't use a native GUI, or DOS or a Unix shell, but the BASIC computer language (also in ROM). Anyone who learned to use the computer at all, was actually using a real computer language. Someone wrote a version of DOS for the 64, and people laughed at him. Who needs DOS when you have full BASIC as the command line?
3. A small tweak to the C64's screen editor converted it into a full screen editor that scrolled BASIC programs in both direction.
4. It used a standard TV for video output.
Now, I know this Dutch company is just using the Commodore name, but if you didn't have to worry about backward compatibility, what would a 21st Century version of the Commodore look like?
1. The OS written in 100% optimized machine language (not C++ or any other high-level language) and stored in ROM, so it could not be changed by malware (not even Sony's). The computer would, therefore, be instant-on.
2. The computer would power-up with a command-line window using some sort of easy-to-use language (any suggestions for something your Mom would be able to handle?)
3. The command-line would appear on a GUI screen of some sort (perhaps something like the XBox-360's?), and be a full-blown GUI text editor with syntax highlighting.
4. Connect natively to an HDTV, with settings for multiple resolutions including 1080p
5. Native output for 5.1 and 7.1 surround sound as well as stereo.
6. Dual-format HD DVD player/recorder
7. Native wireless networking
8. Native wireless keyboard, pointer (mouse, pad, whatever), and game controllers
9. Optional SATA hard drive
10. Optional model with built-in integrated HDTV receiver and PVR software
Anything I missed in this fantasy machine? Use a 64 bit CPU, and you can even call it a C-64! Now, not having played with one, I can't say how close this is to a real-life Xbox360, or a PS3, but I don't think either one is intended to be a computer, and I know Microsoft would have a fit trying to write optimized assembly code that worked right the first time, without patches or bloat. As for Sony, we know that they'll probably build their malware right into the PS3 from the beginning to save us all the trouble of installing it for them
"My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right." --Senator Carl Schurz (1872)