
The Dual-Core, ARM-Powered Commodore 64 - ingve
http://hackaday.com/2016/07/02/the-dual-core-arm-powered-commodore-64/
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vidarh
Even more interesting as it's not dual-core as in two 6502 cores, but one
6502(or 6510, I expect, as bank switching and the tape port won't work on the
C64 otherwise) and one Z-80...

This is similar to the level of "brain transplants" it seems most remaining
classic-Amigas has these days (accelerator boards with FPGAs + a graphics core
and what-not on the FPGA in addition to the CPU core + fast RAM), to the
extent that the original boards are increasingly mostly a fat keyboard with IO
ports.

On one hands these hacks are quite cool. On another hand many of them are
pretty much full computers where going the whole hog and replacing the
motherboard is increasingly looking like the better alternative..

E.g there's a "emulator in a C64 cartridge" that's powerful enough to emulate
Amiga's, where the C64 is basically just turned into an IO device when it's
plugged in - but at least there's some poetry in that, as some Amiga models -
A500(+) and A2000 at least - had a 6502 compatible SoC as the keyboard
controller.

~~~
jacquesm
> Even more interesting as it's not dual-core as in two 6502 cores, but one
> 6502(or 6510, I expect, as bank switching and the tape port won't work on
> the C64 otherwise) and one Z-80...

There was a bbc setup with a second CPU on the other side of the 'tube' which
had a Z80 option.

[http://mdfs.net/Software/Tube/Z80/](http://mdfs.net/Software/Tube/Z80/)

[http://www.primrosebank.net/computers/bbc/bbcz80.htm](http://www.primrosebank.net/computers/bbc/bbcz80.htm)

~~~
Create
...the 32016 is almost available too (pity that the Master 512 and TMS5220
Speech Generators are not implemented)

[https://github.com/hoglet67/PiTubeClient/tree/master/NS32016](https://github.com/hoglet67/PiTubeClient/tree/master/NS32016)

...hopefully they will find their way back to BeebEm for Unix and run PanOS
with BCPL

[http://cpu-ns32k.net/Panos.html](http://cpu-ns32k.net/Panos.html)

~~~
jacquesm
I still have a 32016 chip stamped 'pre-production' somewhere in storage.

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ascotan
Years ago I tried running my old C64 games on faster hardware was disappointed
that many games from back then seemed to assume a particular CPU speed. For
instance all the D&D boxed set games (like pool of radiance/curse of the azure
bonds) would have characters move during combat based on the the speed of the
computer. On a faster processor combat was over in a blink of an eye making
the game unplayable.

I believe most of the software emulators slow down the clock speed so games
are playable, but on actual faster hardware, there's prob a lot of non-
playable games. I really don't know why this was the case :/

~~~
chillingeffect
Ah yes... it's finally been long enough... in the old days we used to see the
first attempts to make programs run at the same speed everywhere or at least
on two different PCs.... and it was a huge pain... wasted extra cycles to
figure out how fast things were moving....

And no consistent sw arch to run things at a steady rate. And even when they
did run at mostly the same rate in most of the sections of the program heh,
they usually did so by wasting cycles, so the prg ran no better on faster
hw....

But that was a long time ago, before sw libraries were common! And when APIS
were scarcely heard of, at least for home computers and also took too much
overheard....

It was the best of times, the worst of times hahaha. No one could foresee the
techniques and platforms we have now. :) ah the good old days...

~~~
vanderZwan
Alley Cat managed just fine, and that's a game from 1983-1984

> _One of the most amazing things about the game is that it actually sets its
> own clock speed so that the speed of your computer is irrelevant. This means
> you don 't need Moslo to enjoy the game :)_

[http://www.myabandonware.com/game/alley-
cat-1q](http://www.myabandonware.com/game/alley-cat-1q)

~~~
webtechgal
Ooo... I remember playing that a LOT on the good ol' Tandy 1000 (8088/4.77
MHz/256KB RAM/9-pin CGI/MS-DOS)!! Sure brings on the nostalgia... :-)

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Clubber
I've always wondered what made the C64 so lasting in our memories. My
Commodore 64 days were 1986-1990 when I switched to IBM clones. I still hold
my C64 days as the "good ole' days," some 26 years later. Perhaps it was
because I was young.

