Commodore 64/128

Type: Computer
Publisher: Commodore
Firstly released in: United States
First release: 1982
Release and compatibility details: Compatible types are C64 II (1986), Golden C64 (limited series of C64 II with S/N 1.000.000 - 1.000.199) and C64 III aka C64 G (august 1987). All these types differ only in design, the hardware is almostidentical and compatible.

Success and unsuccess:

Most popular years: 1982-1986 (Cassettes), 1983-1984 (Cartridges), 1986-1989 (Floppy disks)
Most popular countries: Germany, UK, Finland, Netherlands, Hungary, Sweden, Poland
Amount of games in database: 6712 (list)
Amount of music records in database: 2164 (list)
Amount of downloadable MOD tunes: 200 (list)
Amount of downloadable MIDI tunes: 168 (list)
Importance on the market in the most popular years: Very high

Characteristics:

Commodore C64 was without doubt most successful 8-bit home computer and if we can count number of released games, it was the best non-PC home computer ever. It was successor of Commodore VIC20 and it has very powerful hardware especially in graphics and music, what made this machine ideal for playing games. Music was maintained by SID chip, 3-voices realtime synthesizer with filters, modulation and synchronization was big step forward of that time. Graphics VIC II coprocessor supported hardware sprites, which made 2D-games programing a lot easier than before.

Through almost 10-years C64 carreer (it was removed from the shops already sometimes in 1992, replaced by Commodore Amiga models), was sold around 17 millions of all C64 models.

It uses three media types, cartridges, cassettes or 5.25 DD floppy disks.

CPU: 6510 at 0.985 MHz (PAL) or 1.023 MHz (NTSC)
COPROCESSOR: VIC II (Video), SID (Sound)
RAM: 64k
ROM: 20k
TEXT MODES: 40 x 25
GRAPHIC MODES: several, most used : 320 x 200
COLORS: 16
SOUND: 3 voices / 6 octaves (sound output through TV)


More info: http://www.c64.org/

Games and music info:

Most common media for storing games: Cassette
Average packed game size: 30 kB (Cassettes), 10 kB (cartridges), 60 kB (Floppy disks)
Music formats: SID

Emulation info:

Emulators are in very good state and the best ones are very close to 100%, when setup properly. Maybe you can be a bit confused from various storage formats (TAP, T64, D64, PRG, CRT), which comes because C64 uses various media types during its 10 years era. But when you are familiar with the environment, you should run really almost all.

VICE - the very complex emulator of C64 for variety of platforms with lot of features, emulates near C64 also C128 and VIC20 (C16/Plus 4 emulation is planned for the near future). This is really best and first try.
CCS64 - a bit older emulator which is very fast and has great compatibility (in some cases it may be better than VICE). Though it hasn't lot of features and has old DOS-like UI, check this if you experience problems running VICE.

This emulation info was written on 21.January 2003. (This time is very important, because emulation info very depends on the time it was written - emulators can improve a lot after this time..).