Speaking of Retrofits

[carllooper]

Two days ago I was planning a short website experiment involving time travel communication between the present and a computer in the early 1980s. I did a search for any online emulators I could find but found, to my amazement, a strange headline in PC World magazine. What was stranger was the date. It had been posted 5 mins earlier:

The Commodore 64 is finally here for real.

It was as if something in the universe was playing with my head once again.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/224722/n ... _real.html

http://www.commodoreusa.net/CUSA_C64.aspx

Now for those who still program the original machine (those in the C64 scene), some think it's quite strange since what they appreciate is not the look of the original machine per se but the original 1980s hardware inside the box. And that's what I get into as well. I taught myself programming on the original machine (it had something like 20 more pixels of screen real estate than the Apple). And I still enjoy getting the 1980s hardware to do things that would have been considered then, and even now, next to impossible to do on such hardware. It is a particular artistic constraint one can enjoy working within.

So this new machine, with a vintage casing, is not something necessarily aimed at those like me. The question then, is to whom is it aimed?

But that all said I am strangely attracted to getting one of these new machines, with it's vintage casing*.

And it parallels (in a reciprical way) the same completely irrational desire I would have for a Super8 digital cart, were it actually available.

It's not as if these things would stop me from programming the original C64 machine or shooting Super8 film. They would simply become part of my collection of strange but usable things.

Carl

*For a computer of any persuasion it's actually quite a decent machine for the price. You can get one with a blu-ray player and terrabyte drive for under US900. Comes with Linux but can also run windows as well. Perhaps the only criticism I would have, ironically, is the ergomomics of the casing. The C64 was always a pain on one's wrists and this would be even worse. But plug a modern ergomomic keyboard into it and away you could go.

[super8man]

It's aimed at me...folks that enjoy the history but can't always be bothered with the constraints that old technology imposed. To put this comment in perspective, I build BMX bikes. I love the old-school bikes. But, at the end of the day, I love the newest bike-tech for BMX since it is just so much more efficient. I don't want unsealed bearings anymore. So, to the untrained eyes by bikes may look like old BMX bikes with low tech, they are actually built incredibly strong and superior in pretty much every way possible.

So, with that loose analogy, that new C64 looks fun, but then I have to ask, why bother when the cool Asus 1015T Seashell Netbook for $275 does everything and has HDMI native output. Love it.

[carllooper]

So, with that loose analogy, that new C64 looks fun, but then I have to ask, why bother when the cool Asus 1015T Seashell Netbook for $275 does everything and has HDMI native output. Love it.

Yep. I have to ask myself that same question as well. I too already have a box with which I'm completely happy. Commodity fetishism. A hard habit to kick.

Carl

[grainy]

So, with that loose analogy, that new C64 looks fun, but then I have to ask, why bother when the cool Asus 1015T Seashell Netbook for $275 does everything and has HDMI native output. Love it.

Yep. I have to ask myself that same question as well. I too already have a box with which I'm completely happy. Commodity fetishism. A hard habit to kick.

Carl

That's the story of pixelvision in a nutshell. A cool little device, but do you really want to rely on a cheaply-made cassette-driven analog video camera for your projects? But they do have them on ebay... and devices to capture the images digitally... woah! For about 800 bucks I could get a complete rig!