Commander X16

Where to start... ?

I am an old school tech enthusiast (and modern too). Growing up on machines like the Commodore VIC20/C64, Texas Instruments TI-99/4A, and the Tandy Color Computers. While I love modern PC hardware, and have been building them since the 80386 era, I often miss the classic BASIC powered, command line driven, machines of the 1980's. I still play with many of them, via emulation on Windows and Raspberry Pi, but my wife and I simply don't have the space for me to keep a collection of the original hardware.

Then I heard about the X16 project and who was all contributing to it, and I have been following it ever since. I normally don't have a lot of time to mess around on forums and such these days, but I wanted to join this one. If I could own one "classic" inspired machine, then the Commander X16 would be it. It seems like it would be the only machine of it's type that would fit my needs and wants of an 80's style computer today.

Speaking of 80's computers, I got my first one  in 1981, the TI-99/4A, and from there my love of these machines grew. I was lucky enough to either own, or got to use via friends, several different computers back in the 80's, including the Commodore VIC20 and C64, two of my all time favorites! I moved into the Amiga line of computers and Tandy 1000 series before moving completely to DOS/IBM PC machines. My least favorite machines of the era were the Tandy TRS-80 Color Computers, I know they are more commonly called "CoCo", but my friends and I back then called them "Trash 80's", we just never liked them compared to Commodore. They grew on me much later, after they were long since obsolete, and today I wish I had given them more of a chance.

Now I use all modern Windows based, Ryzen powered, machines for myself and family. Doing a lot of emulation for classic computers and consoles for the above mentioned reasons. Most of my console emulation is done on Raspberry Pi, and classic computer emulation in Windows. I really enjoy using VICE, FS-UAE, WinUAE, DOSBox, and now I messing around with the X16 emulator of course!

I think that's about it... ?

Ah yes, I had a friend in high school who had a Trash 80. Never got to use it much, though, since we were out in the country and "a friend in High School" might live 8 miles away.

15 hours ago, BruceMcF said:

Ah yes, I had a friend in high school who had a Trash 80. Never got to use it much, though, since we were out in the country and "a friend in High School" might live 8 miles away.

A good friend of mine, who incidentally also lived out in the country, also had a Color Computer 2 16K I think. He was the one who got us calling them "Trash 80's".

What sucked, until he got a VIC20, we never had the same machine, so we could never share software among ourselves. It was great when he got a C64, so we both had one, good times. ?

4 hours ago, Strider said:

A good friend of mine, who incidentally also lived out in the country, also had a Color Computer 2 16K I think. He was the one who got us calling them "Trash 80's".



What sucked, until he got a VIC20, we never had the same machine, so we could never share software among ourselves. It was great when he got a C64, so we both had one, good times. ?

Yes, I learned the nickname of the system from its owner, but only a handful of high school students had any home computers at all, as home computers were just coming onto the market in the middle of my high school years. Indeed, neither the VIC=20 nor the C64 existed until after I went to college. My first home computer was a Timex SInclair, 1000 which was an educational gift from my dad, and after it educated me on the joys of membrane keyboards, crashing external RAM expansion and waiting on data tapes, when later that summer I had an opportunity to buy a better system, that led me to the C64 which had gone on the market early that year.

My uncle is the one who got me hooked on computers, buying me the TI-99/4A in 1981 once he seen how fascinated I was with the one he owned. At the time, he was working as an engineer for McDonnell Douglas in St. Louis. After that, I discovered Commodore. My first VIC 20 was a used one we got from a local shop, the C64 was already on the market, and I was able to finagle one of those out of my parents for Christmas in 83. That held me over for several years, especially with the NES being released in 85. My next computer was a used Tandy 1000, followed by an Amiga 500. After that, the ones I have been privileged enough to own came well after they were outdated.

Looking back, I was pretty lucky I think. I got many of my friends hooked, so I was able to use many more computers than I could have owned back then. As I said, the only drawback was the incompatibility between the different brands. Of course,  once we had all moved to DOS machines, that became much less of an issue.

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