Hello my friends. Last week we looked at the Commodore 64 that l brought from Etsy and what l did to future proof it and get that initial set up going. This week we will be looking at the next step with peripherals and software.
Let’s explore and welcome back ☺️
So, l had a few games on cassette tape and the datasette but l needed more software and a means to get that on to the system and a joystick as well. Let’s look at our means of running software first.
When l got the new updated power supply for the Commodore 64, l gave myself the option to get a disk drive and power that from the same unit with that double power outlet on the supply itself with the additional power cable for the disk drive.
I had always wanted to get a 5 1/4 inch disk drive and that would be the 1541 model to match the machine itself.
I can remember being very much intrigued by this when l was a kid with my original set up back in the 80’s but the 1541 was the same cost as the entire computer back then at £399.00, (£1,400.00 in 2023 money), so that wasn’t going to happen back then.
Once again, l started trawling through the usual places for 1541 disk drives and it was a mixed bag of non-tested units, working units in very bad shape and perfect working condition units in great cosmetic shape but at a premium price.
So, l decided to look at Commodore 64 original software in general. This comes in three formats for the uninitiated:
Cartridge
Cassette
And 5 1/4 inch disk
All of these have common traits, namely, availability, condition and most importantly price. Being a retro games collector for multiple consoles myself, (those blogs will be coming in the future), l knew these would be an issue.
Boxed examples of any Commodore 64 games or software in decent condition is becoming exceedingly rare, no matter whether it’s cartridge, cassette or disk.
Let me just say at this point that l am not a retro game collecting elitist that must have titles MIB (mint in box) as l don’t have a bottomless pit of money!
What l tend to do is to seek out titles that l have a special connection to from the past and find those as best l can. The goal here is to play these titles and re-live how it felt back when these where brand new and cutting edge.
The difficulty l think l would find with collecting and playing games and software for the Commodore 64, (or any micro computer from that era come to think of it), would be the reliability and degradation of the cassettes and the disks.
Cassette tapes can be notoriously fragile after 4 decades and speaking from another hobby of mine namely audio tapes, cassette decks and Walkmans, l know this to be true for music tapes,(those will all get their own blog entries lol 😂), and disks can succumb to “disk rot” which with the bigger disks like the 5 1/4 inch ones has become common.
There had to be a better way.
Let’s talk about emulation…settle down, settle down 🙄. Whether it’s hardware or software, in the reality of things it’s sometimes the only way you can play certain video games from the past, let’s be honest.
This is where a good friend and wonderful YouTuber retro gamer “Thomaniac” comes into play. Thomas has two YouTube channels which l will link here:
The first link is for his German speaking language channel and the second link is for his English speaking language channel. Along with regular weekly uploads, Thomas will often live stream on YouTube a couple of times a month in both English and German, which is great fun!
Thomas is based in the heart of Europe and his content has a wide appeal as you can see here. He has a wonderful collection of consoles and home computers from the 8-16 bit era which includes the Commodore 64 and this is how l found him.
I binged watched the channel and there was plenty to give me ideas on what was available currently in ways of games, prices and how you could use new methods of running games for the Commodore 64 using “Tape carts” and SD card cassette port readers.
This here is Thomas using the tape cart method to play games on the C64. He picks these up at the various retro gaming fairs and markets he attends in and around Europe and those trips are also uploaded to both his channels.
The cartridges are pre-loaded with over a hundred titles per cartridge and very simply, you insert the cartridges in the C64 while it’s powered off in the cartridge port. Then when you turn the C64 on, it instantly recognises the cartridge.
A menu screen will appear allowing you to scroll through the games listed via joystick inputs and you just select the title and confirm that by pressing the fire button on the joystick and the game will launch. Powering the system off and switching it back on resets the cartridge and you can select another title.
This was a great method but the only issues was that l couldn’t find a reliable source online to purchase these cartridges and unfortunately in Ireland there wasn’t any retro fairs or markets l could go to.
My second option was the same method but using the tape port instead of the cartridge port.
This is when l found the tape cart SD card system for the Commodore 64. Very simple again and this time the tape cart SD reader replaces the Datasette and acts as though it is the tape player.
It’s a very small and discrete unit, not even the size of an audio tape itself and made out of nice strong clear acrylic top and bottom.
The PCB is sandwiched in the middle with access to the included 8GB mini SD card and the reader on the top. The side nearest the computer has the same connection as the datasette cable and there is a small green LED light to indicate when it’s working.
The games/demos/software is on the SD card in a .PRG file format and they are fairly easy to find online on various sites to download the titles required.
The kit comes with a micro SD card to either USB or normal size SD card adapters so plugging it into a PC for file downloads is catered for and it’s a simple drag and drop scenario.
Once you have the titles you want, (and 8GB is just an insane amount of storage so it will hold thousands and thousands of files), plug your SD card into the tape reader and power the C64 on.
You will get the usual basic screen and then you use the standard two key tape load function and it will prompt you like you are loading a tape to press play and hit return.
Once you do that, it instantly sees the tape cart system and you have the menus like you do with the tape cartridge as before and you select you game in the same way via the joystick.
Speaking of joysticks…
Back to Thomas once again and an upload to the YouTube “shorts” section from his channel caught my eye.
The ArcadeR joysticks feature here and used by Thomas in that DISCovery C64 livestream seemed ideal for a Joystick solution for me.
I went with a colour as close to the C64 as possible and these are just excellent with lovely micro switch movement, that ear pleasing clicking and robust fire buttons with optional auto fire selector switch on the front.
A night and day difference from the original Commodore 64 joysticks l got with the computer that Christmas morning in 1982 and these make hours of gameplay super enjoyable.
So, we have our software, the means to run it and the joystick. Next week, let’s play some games shall we? I will be asking for Commodore 64 game recommendations in the comments for the week after.
I will also put that question on my social media platforms which are the following:
Twitter/ X: https://twitter.com/Daywalker73
Mastodon: https://mstdn.social/@BloodRayne
Please feel free to throw some C64 game suggestions my way and let’s see what we end up playing.
A huge thank you to Thomas for his permission to link him into today’s blog entry and l massively encourage you to check his channels out and subscribe!
As always, thank you so much for reading todays entry, your likes, comments, shares and general interest in the blog.
Let’s explore together again next week ☺️
We don’t tape the top 40 
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