Commander X16

Hey All!

I have joined the community to extend the software library for the X16.

Even though I started my career with an Enterprise 128, I soon hopped over to the mighty C=64 and have been in love with it ever since. I still own one and do some coding from time to time for it.

Watching David's videos on X16 and browsing through this site gave me inspiration to contribute to the project with some retro software development.

I am glad to be here, wishing You good luck with your project!

What made you prefer the Commodore 64 over the Enterprise 128 ?

 

My parents saw the trends changing (from ZX80 based home computers to the Commodore ones) and to make sure I keep up with the rest, one day they simply swapped it out for me.

My disappointment was immeasurable. No easily accessible graphics screen and commands, less memory, no built-in joystick.. but then got to know some new friends to exchange games with and more importantly I bought some C= magazines so I could make programs for myself.

I always loved how easy it was to make a simple but enjoyable game on the C=64, yet also by learning the assembly language and after picking up a couple of the neat tricks You could do real magic.

Even though I had dozens of different computers over the decades, this feeling never left me and from time to time I get back to playing some old classic or fiddling around with the coding.

 

When did you get these computers?

I got the Enterprise in 1986 and the C=64 in the next year. It was all behind the iron curtain, so technology always lacked behind somewhat from the western parts of Europe.

Yeah, I wondered just how your parents succeeded to get that through the Iron curtain. I recall people even being forbidden to bring game consoles out of Japan to other western countries due to these restrictions.

 

Honestly I do not know through whom they could get hold of the computers, at that time I did not really grasp the concept of two different worlds, west and east that is. I know my dad had some friends from the military who had other friends who could get these things, but that is roughly it.

I guess it's your dad's military connections then, because it was HARD to get anything from the west into the eastern block asfaik.

 

Welcome! I look forward to seeing your work! I'm new to here as well, and also wish to contribute to the retro computing community.

On 12/12/2022 at 4:06 AM, sternkern said:

Hey All!

I have joined the community to extend the software library for the X16.

Even though I started my career with an Enterprise 128, I soon hopped over to the mighty C=64 and have been in love with it ever since. I still own one and do some coding from time to time for it.

Watching David's videos on X16 and browsing through this site gave me inspiration to contribute to the project with some retro software development.

I am glad to be here, wishing You good luck with your project!

Welcome to the community!

Not being familiar with the Enterprise, I did what everyone does - wikipedia'd it - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enterprise_(computer) It does seem like a fairly evolved computer with lots of "tech" features. The page has this line: "The company shipped 20,000 units to Hungary on its closure, and a strong user community formed there.[11]"  

Strange that a western company could dump technology into the East. I assume that they was some money to be made in doing it....

PS -There even is a list of emulators for it too.