C64 assy 250425
The following photos are from my commodore 64 breadbox assy 250425 serial number U.K. B163438 made in England. As can be seen, there are numerous modifications.
C=Key
I bought this adapter because I wanted to write on a common PS/2 keyboard connected to the commodore 64.
Actually I used it a little but I have to say that it works well.
It can be purchased in Jim Brain’s Retro Innovations store.
Here is a brief description of the c=key taken from the site www.go4retro.com:
C=Key consists of an Atmel ATMEGA162 microcontroller in DIP format and an optional Mitel/Zarlink MT8812 crosspoint switch.
In “host” mode, the system reads data from the PS/2 keyboard and
emulates the Commodore switch matrix with the crosspoint switch.
In “device” mode, the system scans the Commodore keyboard matrix 60
times a second, converting keypresses into PS/2 compliant scan codes.
C64 Bluetooth Joystick
I found this project on the famous German site Forum64. For your convenience, you can download both the wiring diagram and the arduino skech from here . The device works very well, and is quite fast in communication.
C64 Real Time clock and Temperature-Humidity-Pressure Sensor
This is a small project of mine that I recently made (go to this link if you want to know more). This is the well-known RTC DS1307 module, on which I mounted a BME280 temperature, humidity and atmospheric pressure sensor. In the file c64weatherstation.zip you will find all the instructions to make it. There is also a well-known game that can be loaded into the RTC module eprom, to you the surprise to find out!
Reprom64
From the author’s website:This is a rom adapter board for the C64 which replaces all rom chips with a single 64kb 27C512 Eprom, offering space for four different kernals, four charsets and two basic roms. Any combination of roms can be chosen using control lines provided on the board.
Here you can download both the gerber files for the production of the PCB and the JDEC file to program the GAL16V8
C64 FM Radio
The RDA5807P is a single-chip broadcast FM stereo radio tuner with fully integrated synthesizer. Timo Voutilainen is the author of the software to drive the module via the c64 user port. On his site there are also other interesting projects. If you are an electronic gadget maker, I recommend you take a look.
PLAnkton
All fans of the commodore 64 know that one of the most frequent “blank screen” reasons is the burning of the PLA,
the replacement with a 512 kb eprom is slightly cheaper but not quite as reliable as the programmable logic CPLD.
PLAnkton is the CPLA substitute for the C64 PLA U17 part no. 906114-01 or 251064-01.
From here you can buy it.
C64 MP3 Player
This is another good Timo project,
if you are interested you can visit his website where you will find all the
instructions on the subject.
To interface the c64 with the VS1053 module it is necessary to interpose an arduino pro mocro or nano board.
From the datasheet: VS1053b is a single-chip Ogg Vorbis/MP3/AAC/-WMA/MIDI audio decoder and an IMA
ADPCMand user-loadable Ogg Vorbis encoder.
C64 reset
Everyone knows that the commodoe 64 is not equipped with a reset button, but everyone does not know that the reset
is very important because it prevents us from turning the computer off and on every time we have to load a new program,
which prolongs (at least hopefully) the life of the precious c64 chips.
There are various solutions, I refer you to the site of the famous Ray Carlsen where you can find a lot of information
on how to modify and repair most of the computers of the commodore family.
From here you can directly download the file reset64.txt
Restore key Fix
In old versions of the c64, “breadbox” for instance, to evoke an NMI interrupt it is necessary to press
the RESTORE button with a certain force. This problem is due to an inappropriate C38 capacity value which
should be 4.7nF instead of 51 pF.
In this link you will
find the original article.
PS/2 to C64 Mouse Adapter
I built the mouse adapter for c64 following the instructions taken from this site. The adapter works well and is especially useful when used in a GEOS environment
C64DTV2 Mod
C64DTV acronym of c64 Direct to TV is a CompetitionPro style joystick, inside which there is a c64 implemented in an ASIC
(Application Specific Integrated Circuit) chip.
In the ASIC of the DTV there are 6510 CPUs, VIC-IIs, SIDs, PLAs and two CIAs. This ASIC will do everything that the hardware
did inside a real C64. The RAM and ROM memory are not inside the ASIC but are separated chips.
The creator of this amazing jewel of electronics is Jeri Ellsworth.
There are various versions of the c64DTV, the one I have is the DTV2 or PAL in which there is a wide range of mods you can make.
On the internet there are many sites for the c64DTV hacking, I refer to that of
Richard Lagendijk where you can find a lot of
information about the world of the commodore computers.
C64 assy 250466
The following photos are from my commodore 64 assy 250466.
As you can see in this model I have installed a DualSID
board that mounts 2 SID 6581.
The Dual SID is a product of Tomi Malinen.
Another detail that you notice is the superPLA produced by IndividualComputer which, as the site reports,
can be configured in various ways to be used as a substitute for PLA for various models of commodore computers.
Another change is the presence of an eprom multi-kernal adapter with the
possibility to choose between 3 different kernal: default, speedDOS, JiffyDOS
