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Commodore 64 Back In Production !

Well, sort of.  This has slipped under my radar for a while -- and now that I know about it, it is either the coolest hardware Ive seen lately, or the most insane business plan ever conceived.  Probably both.  I learned about it via my wife, who opened up a copy of Disneys TRON: Legacy DVD and found a very well-targeted paid advertisement in the enclosed brochure, for Commodore USA.

See, this new company called Commodore USA has the rights to produce Commodore computers, including the Commodore 64, the VIC-20 and the Amiga.  Isnt that cool?

Yes, its 2011.  But theyre not completely loony -- theyre actually putting a PC compatible in a C-64 shell, with emulation of the original machine built in.  Theyre supplying a new Commodore OS, eventually; initial shipments will arrive with the Ubunto 10.04 LTS operating system onboard.

I wish the hardware was closer to real -- the company isnt taking advantage of the amazing work done by Jeri Ellsworth to fit a C-64 on a chip, and many people would love to see a new run of SID sound chips in production, rather than relying on emulation (though with modern manufacturing techniques the varied and unique sounds characteristic of the original design might be lost anyway.)  And of course, theres no Commodore 1541 disk drive in production, and no cartridge slot, so getting vintage games into the machine will shatter any illusions of authenticity quickly.

The companys only in the preorder stage, so much remains to be proven.  But if I were in the market for a desktop PC, Id definitely be taking a look at the new Commodore 64.  Its just cool that somebody is doing this, and if it crashes and burns, it will still have been a noble effort.  They also plan to release Amiga-compatibles, though those are even less "coming soon" than the C-64 and VIC-inspired machines theyre soliciting pre-orders for.

Visit www.commodoreusa.net for the details.