Sometimes you come across a build so far along you wish you could go back and enjoy it just a bit at a time. This C65 build is so far along, it’s like binge watching a retro computer build. One that never actually existed.
Okay, that’s admittedly a bit rash. But technically the C65 (successor to the Commodore C64) never saw its way through development. A good place to start looking in on the build is from the second post way back in March. The FPGA-based project is already looking promising with proof-of-concept display tests. Are we the only ones surprised by the 1920 native display resolution?
Checking back in June we see that there is some software working but a bounty of bugs will definitely keep [Paul] busy for a while. Fast forward to the beginning of September and he’s come full through to getting a network connection up and running.
The Wikipedia page on the C65 gives a good idea of how awesome this would have been back in the day had it actually made it to market. We suppose it joins the Commodore lists of would-haves and should-haves with the likes of the C128.
I now feel tempted to try and recreate acorn computers final computer design, phoebe….
What would IMHO be nice: a fast Archimedes. That includes support for 26bit mode, either a shared cache or an instruction cache that snoops writes, MEMC support etc.
While it is possible to run RISC OS on modern hardware older software either have to be patched or run in emulation as modern processors aren’t fully compatible with the ARMv2 and well the graphics/sound etc. hardware is different.
Its also nice to consider the fact that the video was being run from a fpga in the protototype phoebe!
What they did come out with, for the time, was also pretty awesome. A unix based system with an OO GUI that could boot off a floppy? A lot of video houses had nothing but problems for the first few years in the mid 90’s when they were forced to switch from the Amiga to Macs.
That seems to have been the problem with Commodore, great hardware, couldn’t sell whores to sailors on leave, makes you wonder what could been if they’ed been able to get solid foothold after the 64?
The C64 is still the second most-sold personal computer in the world after the iPad. That makes for something, I think.
Today they would be making badly marketed, but affordable tablets and mobile phones.
That die after a few years b/c shortcuts in manufacturing THEIR OWN ARM-compatible chips :-)
That was thanks to the Atari a****les, and their CEO that left Commodore and took their trade secrets, schematics etc, then patent sued them over and over until they claimed bankruptcy. Look it up, greed killed the coolest computer company ever created
Amiga OS is based on a custom microkernel-ish base glued together to a TRIPOS layer (essentially untouched in the first version), no Unix stuff at all.
A retro computer as the one like C65 creates the anticipation and keenness to explore with the system. But its “under construction” status creates the question whether it would turn out real?