Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20 - Consumerist Comments

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Fizzle000 — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 00:25:09 EST

My first computer was a Commodore 64 and I totally loved it!!!! 1MHz processor, 64 KB (KiloBytes) of RAM, INSTANT BOOTUP!!!!

Writing a BASIC program was tricky but nowhere near as complex as todays programming languages. I even bought a machiene code compiler to write 'lightning fast apps'

Software made for it actually ran fast and was mostly bug-free and completely free of viruses. My dot-matrix printer was loud and could be heard buzzing from the other room.

When I 'upgraded' to a 10MHz IBM 286 it didn't seem much faster!!!

Fizzle000

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

therealhomerjaysimpson — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 23:44:45 EST

Oh man, memories!

A friend of mine had the VIC 20, another the Atari 400, another the Timex whatever-it-was, and I got the C-64. Lasted me through high school and college, too. My first storage device was a tape drive. Dear Lord, to think where we are today compared to back then. Ultimately I added one of those house-sized disk drives, an Okimate ribbon printer with interchangeable color and black/white ribbons (and the printer would work with different computers, if you bought the right plug-and-play module). Finally, I added a modem (12 baud? Something like that…) and signed up for Q Link's online service. Whatever happened to Q Link…oh yeah, that name change to AOL. I guess it turned out ok for them, for a few years anyway. If I'd saved their cheesy promotional items, those would probably be worth a buck or two on E-Bay now.

Even after the 64 gave out for good, I tried sticking with Commodore, with their Amiga line. That thing was better by far than PCs of the day, but it was too late for Commodore.

I remember the basic programming. In school, we learned on TRS-80s, and I adapted a lot of what I did there to the slightly different way it worked on a Commodore, but man, did I love that. I think my main computer magazine was actually "Enter," from CTW. I think I read some others, but don't remember which ones.

therealhomerjaysimpson

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

BeFrugalNotCheap — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 23:41:46 EST

I'll have to file this under "Christ where did they dig THIS up from??". On another note, NOTHING will ever replace my Atari 2600 with the sweet ass wood grain trim. God I feel old. :(

BeFrugalNotCheap

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

cde — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 22:14:23 EST

@facework: Nimoy had/has less fans then Shatner did. He was just able to keep them, unlike Shatner. But still, I can't wait for the Nimoy = Blood Elf Paladin or something like that, something completely opposite of Spock.

And Mr. T = Night Elf Mohawk <3

cde

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

crashman2600 — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 21:03:33 EST

My first computer was a Vic-20, I loved that thing and still have it somewhere. I think it lead me to where am I today with my computer knowledge. I guess my dad had good foresight to shell out $300 (a ton of money for us at that time) to get me it for Christmas.

crashman2600

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Rey — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 17:06:02 EST

I feel like I'm about to be eaten by a grue.

Rey

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

KJones — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 16:35:31 EST

For those on a C64 nostalgia trip, download the freeware emulator for it:
[www.dmoz.org]
[www.zophar.net]

For the really obsessed (and in case you've never heard of it) go look up the program "Contiki", a graphical operating systems with a webbrowser and TCP/IP controller for eight bit computers. You can actually use the internet on a C64.
[en.wikipedia.org]
[www.sics.se]

I use Apple II emulators myself to play old games. "Drol" and "King Tut" were lots of fun, and I spent thousands of hours (NO exaggeration) on "Wizardry" and "Ultima".

KJones

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

superchou — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 15:59:40 EST

WOW! my family had one of these!

superchou

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

TurboWagon — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 15:50:29 EST

SYS 64738, baby

TurboWagon

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Chris Walters — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 15:11:42 EST

@homerjay: [sheepishly] ...yes

Chris Walters

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

smartwatermelon — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 14:56:11 EST

I should pull the VIC-20 out of my garage and see if it still works. Let's not discuss the C-64 or original ca. 1982 IBM PC.

smartwatermelon

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

facework — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 14:36:05 EST

LOL!@Joeblevins

I love William Shatner. How did Leonard Nimoy get all the fans when Shatner was so delightfully full of all that cheesy melodramic style?

facework

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Chase — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 14:33:05 EST

@deedub113: Uber sexy, you mean. ~.0

Chase

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

alhypo — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 14:19:19 EST

Did you see how that kid got beamed in like that? I doubt that was authorized by the Star Trek franchise.

alhypo

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Fist-o — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 14:05:39 EST

NOT BAD!!!

GOOD-VERTISING!!!

SHATNER RULES!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fist-o

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Trae — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 13:43:59 EST

I have a Vic-20 in a closet somewhere.

Nothing beats Commodore computers from the 80s. :)

I just wish my Commodore 64 hadn't gone up in smoke so many years ago, I loved playing Trek 64 on that thing.

(See how I brought that back to Shatner? Yeah.)

Trae

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

homerjay — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 12:19:21 EST

@Chris Walters: NOW can I hassle you about checking your facts??? :)

homerjay

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

joeblevins — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 12:15:34 EST

I remember the manual for teh Commodore 128 had pictures of people carrying it around the College Campus like it was portable. It didn't show them hauling around the 15in CRT, Disk Drives or the 15lbs Power Supply.

joeblevins

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

joeblevins — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 12:14:32 EST

Dudes, I started with a Vic-20 as well, just like 3DRage I did a lot of copying in programs from magazines. Specifically 'Family Computing'. It really sucked in the sections that dealt with PEEK/POKE. You could miss up one number and would take forever to figure it out. I did learn Basic and it helped me.

I moved to the Commodore 128 after that. It had a Double Sided Mini Floppy drive. 340k I think. Then I bought a single sided one. 176k. I had enough to run a BBS that was prompted hacked and wiped. Those were the good old days.

joeblevins

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

f0nd004u — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 12:09:09 EST

Man, this makes me feel young for having used DOS on a 486 for my first machine.

You know what I remember? Telnet.

f0nd004u

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

j-yo — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 12:08:29 EST

Ah, memories... We had a Commodore 64 and thought we were pretty hot stuff. However, my dad insisted on buying an amber-colored screen to go with it (remember when you could buy screens that were all one-color?) to discourage us from playing games. Apparently he thought we'd all turn into a bunch of genius computer programmers. At least I could do some word-processing on it.

j-yo

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Noyo — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 12:05:58 EST

Somewhere on my property there are a couple of these mouldering in the dirt, I suspect. Sic transit gloria mundi. So passes away the glories of this world.

Noyo

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

HOP — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 12:02:42 EST

vic 20 was my first ,then the 64 also had a commodore 4, i think it was...had four built in programs, and some of the prettiest color.....
i also typed in programs from the run and compute mags....i usually made a bunch of mistakes,i'm a one finger typist,and had to retype....commodore made a good machine....shame they didn't keep up with it......

HOP

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

NefariousNewt — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:40:55 EST

@3drage: Same here. Graduated to a Commodore 64 and a Sinclair ZX-81 eventually. The VIC-20 though had some of the coolest games -- I remember playing the games endlessly till the poor box just gave out.

NefariousNewt

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Chris Walters — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:39:46 EST

@inelegy, @homerjay, @GitEmSteveDave: Corrected! Thanks.

Chris Walters

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

faust1200 — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:33:28 EST

@headon: You're right Headon, the Dark Ages was where it was at. I can't even find a place to get a good blood letting anymore. And when I accuse my neighbor of practicing witchcraft they look at me like I'M crazy.

faust1200

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Veign — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:22:47 EST

My first computer.

Ah, the hours spent typing in a game found in one of those gaming magazines only to find out it didn't work.

Veign

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

agiorgio — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:10:22 EST

Wow...just...wow.

agiorgio

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

3drage — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:08:36 EST

I learned how to program in BASIC wit a Vic 20, well it was more like copying code from a magazine and saving it to the audio tape drive. But it was really my first interaction with a computer. I was a little kid back then.

3drage

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Git Em SteveDave seeks Lego build buddy. How about you? — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:08:22 EST

@inelegy: Yeah. Wink Martindale does Orbitz. It's game-showy.

And now Shat does World of Warcraft. The Shat-man is a Shaman.

Git Em SteveDave seeks Lego build buddy. How about you?

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

Troy F. — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:01:12 EST

@homerjay:

By the way, it doesn't say "Unlike Atari" it says "Unlike Games"

Good thing, too - the Atari 400/800 series both had keyboards!

This reminds me of the old George Plimpton "Mr. Intellivision" commercials like this one with the kid from ET:
[www.youtube.com]

Troy F.

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

headon — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 10:53:58 EST

If only that was the last computer advancement. Then we wouldn't now be having our lives controlled by the evil, wicked, soul stealing machines we now have. I'm sorry you can't have a refund the computer say's no. They are in stock, oh no, sorry computer error, they aren't we will credit your card back in 60 days. Computers have sucked the brains out of America. Whatever the computer says goes.
We can thank computers for allowing us to have crap customer service all the way from a foreign country. Ya computers are great. Shatner you screwed everything up.

headon

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

deedub113 — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 10:46:08 EST

What in the world was he trying to do with his voice? He sounds ridiculous!! Oh and it's Priceline commercials, not Orbitz. You know the commercial where he hits on some young hotel worker and tells her she's naughty. Uber creepy!

deedub113

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

homerjay — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 10:45:34 EST

Wow, he's really come a long way. :)
By the way, it doesn't say "Unlike Atari" it says "Unlike Games"

homerjay

Jimmy T Pitches The Commodore VIC-20

inelegy — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 10:43:39 EST

Orbitz?

Doesn't The Shat hawk Priceline.com?

inelegy