
Commander X16 8 bit computer now has its own website - orionblastar
https://www.commanderx16.com/
======
maheart
I was originally interested in this, but I recently found a seemingly good
alternative in the Color Maximite 2
([http://geoffg.net/maximite.html](http://geoffg.net/maximite.html)) which
sits somewhere between 8bit (feel) and 16bit (graphics).

~~~
djaychela
I was going to post a similar thing. I know the 8 bit guy reviewed it
positively, and for me the CM2 is a better bet as it can run BASIC code about
as fast as a 6505 can run assembler.

I know it's not as legitimately retro (in terms of chips), but that doesn't
matter to me; what does matter is having an accessible system to play about
with and hopefully show my son that programming can be fun and he can make
games without an impossibly step learning curve (ie how I felt about my ZX
spectrum back in the day).

~~~
jshaqaw
I hope it works out. I was excited to get my kids interested in programming
like I was in the early 80s. What I discovered was some combo of my kids are
their own people and not my clones, but I think more importantly, the bar for
computer magic has risen. When I was 8-12 just making a computer do anything
was magic. Computers were mysterious and still a bit rare. Today my kids are
growing up in a world of total computer saturation from phones to pads to
laptops to the cloud. Much as I wished programming would capture fire for them
like it did for me, there is no magic for them in making the computer do a few
simple things. The world still sort of awaits the next paradigm to spark the
next generation of inventors and creators.

~~~
cmrdporcupine
Yep I briefly had my 10 year old snagged on Pico-8 last week -- he immediately
and intuitively seemed to understand what was going on as we kind of pair
programmed together -- until I left the room. Then he just started playing
other people's Pico-8 games and described the whole thing as boring.

He's got potential as a programmer. Maybe someday someone will pay him to do
it. But you're right, computers now can do everything so easily, there's no
glory in doing simple things for the sake of it.

~~~
the_af
First, wow! I didn't know about the Pico-8. Seems fun! I like that its
limitations can foster creativity.

Second, maybe your son needs more time. Back when I was a kid, I played a bit
with BASIC on my C64 but it was very frustrating and I gave up trying to do
something complex, and ended up just playing games, much to my parents'
chagrin.

I ended up a programmer :)

------
jhallenworld
People should really get retro crazy about the TI-99/4A, now hear me out..

It's generally the cheapest retro computer you can buy, and it's really weird,
not some easy computer like the C64 or Atari 800:

The TI-99/4A BASIC interpreter is written in another byte-code interpreted
language. This is because the BASIC ROM is not directly accessible to the CPU,
you have to read it indirectly through a port. Likewise, the 16K of dedicated
video RAM is also only accessible through a port. Now keep in mind this is a
16 KB computer, so your BASIC program is stored in the video RAM. It only has
256 bytes of 16-bit native RAM (unless you have the PEB...)

Now it uses a pretty good 16-bit CPU (but weird mind you- its registers are
kept in external RAM), but massively crippled like this to keep the cost down,
but also to prevent the home computer from competing with TI's minicomputer
line. TI made millions of them.

~~~
II2II
While there are many reasons why people should be retro crazy for the
TI-99/4A, the Commander X16 is unique for a bunch of reasons that would make
it difficult to recreate for other systems:

\- Some of the hardware reflects 1980's designs. For example, it uses a CPU
that was used back then and is still available. (Edit: or rather a variation
of the CPU.)

\- Some of the software is from the 1980's. That requires rights holders who
are willing to license that software.

Those two criteria alone would limit the systems this type of project could
reimagine. Then you have to consider:

\- The people behind this project. Creating your dream computer in hardware
takes skill and determination. The people following through decided to use the
Commoder 64 as their model.

\- A large part of the rationale is that it is "easy" and lacks weirdness.
Many of the people interested in retro computers are looking for something
more engaging than games. They want hardware that is simple enough for them to
understand and develop software for at a low level.

Yet I suspect that the biggest reason why the C=64 was reimagined has to do
with the community around it today. For whatever reason, Commodore computers
have attracted a following of hardware and software tinkerers (this goes for
the Amiga as well). I haven't seen quite the same thing to a similar degree of
dedication on other platforms, aside from some particularly dedicated 68k
Macintosh hardware presevationists and 8-bit Atari software developers.

~~~
jhallenworld
I basically agree with you, just trying to get people interested in something
other than C64. It's impressive that they got permission to use Commodore
BASIC (and Kernal?).

~~~
II2II
That is a great thing in the sense that many of the less popular systems
encapsulate ideas that are mostly forgotten, presents a more balanced view of
the early personal computer industry, and represents a greater cross section
of society.

On the other hand, we are also dealing with limited resources so we have to
pick our battles. It seems as though society views Apple, IBM, and Microsoft
as the creators of the computer industry. At best, that is a partial truth. In
a sense, this perhaps disproportionate interest in Commodore offers an
opportunity to demonstrate that these nearly forgotten companies played a
significant role in the development of computers rather than being simple
failures.

If we go beyond that handful of companies, there are other factors that we
should consider. The computer industry is usually painted in very American
terms. It's understandable. American firms were, by in large, the winners. At
the same time it neglects what was happening in Europe, the eastern bloc, and
Asia. While those regions receive some attention, Africa, Australia, and South
America seem to be nearly ignored.

~~~
the_af
Pretty interesting thread you two. The history of computers is fascinating.

The thing with my own interest is this: I owned a C64 when I was a kid. I had
a friend with a Spectrum. A friend of my dad (a grown up) had a C128. That's
it. I can't feel nostalgic about computers I never saw as a kid. For example,
I never knew anyone who owned an Amiga, so -- fabulous as that machine is
reported to have been -- it means nothing to me.

... Though the relatively recent post here on HN about someone who picked up
an Apple II from the trash and repaired it did get my some weird nostalgic
vibes. Is there a word for nostalgia of something you never experienced? ;)

~~~
blue1
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sehnsucht](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sehnsucht)
?

------
bencollier49
I received my ZX Spectrum Next recently and it's fantastic.

Personally, I'd be put off the X16 by its weird form factor, which I guess is
intended to avoid the need to commission of custom keyboard design.

~~~
the_af
I really dig the looks of the ZX Spectrum Next. I never had a Speccie as a
kid, so it lacks the nostalgia factor for me, but it looks like a great
product.

I ended up buying TheC64: a C64 lookalike that has the looks but none of the
hassle of the real old hardware. I don't care for the games carousel (I know
where to get games anyway) and I wish it booted up faster, like the BMC64
emulator does, but other than that I'm sure I'll love it. I can't wait to
write petscii graphics with a C64-like keyboard ;)

------
rst
Odd to see "a real CPU, not an ... FPGA". For perspective, the first "real"
SPARC processor was implemented in a Fujitsu gate array (though not, I think,
field programmed).
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MB86900](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MB86900)

------
kgwxd
I hope this means the Facebook group is no longer the main community. That's
the only reason I lost interest in the project.

------
TeaDude
Been eagerly anticipating this thing for a while now. Originally it looked
like it was gonna come out before the MEGA65 (because they had been dragging
their butts for like 6 years) but now it looks like THAT's gonna be coming out
first! How times change!

I hope they don't clash with each-other as they both look awesome!

------
wbhart
What I'm really curious to know is at what effective screen resolution it will
have sufficient power to update every pixel on the screen in a single frame
(assuming you are using assembly language and true graphics, not a character
mode), with enough CPU cycles left over to do some computation.

~~~
jhallenworld
With an 8 MHz 6502? It's around 15 cycles per byte for memcpy, so 500KB/s of
data. At 60 Hz frame rate, that's 8KB- so 64x128 for byte per pixel, or
256x256 for a bit per pixel.

------
rbanffy
Things like this make me want to design an Apple IV...

Sadly, the IIgs was not really an upgrade to the II line, but rather a
65816-based "MacAmiga ST" with an Apple IIe inside, screaming to come out.

And we all know the III would have been a good computer, if it weren't
designed by the marketing team.

~~~
jecel
Something like project 1 in the "Other projects:" part of this page?

[http://www.byrdsight.com/apple-macintosh/](http://www.byrdsight.com/apple-
macintosh/)

~~~
rbanffy
I'd probably use a 65816 and a direct progression of the II and /// feature
sets. Maybe place the frame buffer on dual-ported RAM so it wouldn't be locked
to main system timings. Or add a palette that would merge 2 or 4 pixels into 4
or 16 color entries. Maybe linearize the HGR and DHGR modes too.

------
banana_giraffe
The emulator locks up if you type "DOS" and press enter. How odd.

~~~
unixhero
How did you manage to figure this out? Do you generally try that command out?

~~~
banana_giraffe
Nope, I just did a strings dump of the ROM file this page is running, and
noticed it near some other commands.

~~~
unixhero
Cool thanks

------
blue1
meanwhile, Stefany Allaire put an end to the C256 Foenix project :(

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gv9KELroAeo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gv9KELroAeo)

~~~
virtue3
I didn't know anything about this project. But it seemed like another creator
got fed up with the online criticisms.

She made mention of a youtube comment about "why not just make an emulator,
it's so much easier".

Really really sad that SO many people think that their comments just go into
the void and don't affect people :(

~~~
cmrdporcupine
I made an emulator for some aspects of her machine early on. Not to displace
her project, which I thought was great (she's insanely talented), but to
bootstrap development of software and demos for when the machine came out. I
was on the list to get one of the boards. What she was working on was a far
better machine than this 8-bit guy project.

But I pulled myself off the list and stopped working on it when she started
making ad hominem personal attacks on me. I don't think she ever liked the
emulator project, which is fine, but she made some rather paranoid false
accusations against me. So I walked.

It's a shame her project is gone. But there's a similar machine, the Neon816,
that is also really interesting.

But after having working with the 65c816 for that period of time I've decided
it's a processor I don't really want to play with. It's really unpleasant to
code for.

~~~
gecko
Thanks for providing more information. It’s too bad, but I’m glad there’s a
similar project. The true desire to follow the C128 made that a bit more
interesting to me than the Neon816, but I’ll give that another look.

One question:

    
    
        But after having working with the 65c816 for that period 
        of time I've decided it's a processor I don't really want 
        to play with. It's really unpleasant to code for.
    

I’d love to hear a bit more. I hate coding for the SNES, but mostly because
doing it properly feels like nothing but DMA. What about the 65816 makes it
painful in general, if you don’t mind my asking? I find the 6502 very
pleasant, if understandably limited.

~~~
cmrdporcupine
I've got comments elsewhere in this threat on this topic. Basically, the
opcode space wasn't big enough to add new 16-bit addressing modes properly, so
they bolted on a 'mode' flag and it's super awkward. It's hacky.

------
sepisoad
it reminds of another cool (maybe even cooler!) project named Uzebox:

[http://uzebox.org/wiki/Main_Page](http://uzebox.org/wiki/Main_Page)

Although it is focused mainly on games

------
blickentwapft
Retro machines always feel less authentic to me when they use an fpga for the
CPU instead of an actual retro CPU or descendant of.

Just opinion of course. Retro is whatever it means to you.

~~~
markonen
CPU

\- WDC 65C02S @ 8 MHz

\- 40-pin DIP package

~~~
blickentwapft
Oh ok that’s encouraging.

It does use an fpga for graphics. That’s kinda surprising I would have thought
there’d be a suitable graphics chip off the shelf.

~~~
phire
The problem is that there are no off the shelf chips that _feel_ anything like
the video chips of the late 8bit or 16bit eras.

You can do a bitmapped or character displays with just a bit discrete logic.

The graphics chips that do exist these days are all focused at driving LCD
touchscreen interfaces with the cheapest microcontroller possible. They
communicate over quad spi (not an interface that works with classic 8bit CPUs)
and support 24bit color with complex modern drawing primitives like "draw
line, draw box, draw circle and decode jpeg".

Sadly, if you want a sprite and tilemap video chip for your modern 8bit
computer without resorting to old stock, an FPGA is about your only option.

Which isn't that inaccurate. Most video chips of that era were custom designs
themselves, and FPGAs can be though of as just a simple way to achieve custom
chip design on a hobbyist budget.

~~~
fanf2
It was common to use ULAs which were effectively FPGAs that we’re not field-
programmable but with something like a ROM mask instead

------
bdowling
Why the 6502 instead of the 65816?

~~~
LIV2
A '816 would indeed be much better suited to access 512K of banked memory
rather than banking through an 8K window but perhaps they don't think 65816
counts as retro enough, or maybe they're just masochists

~~~
tssva
I briefly somewhat followed this project until it became obvious it was going
a direction I wasn't interested in. Originally they were going to use a 65816
but then switched to the 6502. I believe it had to do with the increased
complexity of implemention caused by the 65816 sharing data and address lines
which requires the lines to be multiplexed.

~~~
0xTJ
Part of the decision was that there aren't as many good tools available to
compile/assemble/disassemble. Also, the length of some instructions depends on
the current state of flags in the processor, which is a pain for disassembly.

------
WesBrownSQL
I'm in

