1571 Archives - The Silicon Underground

1541 vs 1541C

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 30 Mar 2017 11:00:03 +0000

The dark beige/tan Commodore 1541 disk drive is rather well known. The lighter beige, almost white 1541c is more of a curiosity. The drives are closely related, but the difference is more than just the color. Let’s take a look

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Commodore 64 vs 128

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 19 May 2016 11:00:56 +0000

Commodore introduced the Commodore 128 in 1985 as an upgrade path from the Commodore 64, the most popular model of computer of all time. The 128 addressed the 64’s biggest shortcomings while remaining mostly compatible with its hardware and software.

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What it was like owning a Commodore in the 1980s

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 06 Oct 2014 11:00:57 +0000

Since questions occasionally come up, and I remember well what it was like owning a Commodore in the 1980s in the United States, I’ll share my recollections of it. It was very different from computing today. It was still interesting,

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LOAD “*”,8,1 – what it means

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 28 Aug 2013 11:00:01 +0000

The smartest guy in the room cited the Commodore command LOAD “*”,8,1 as something he used for years but never understood why it worked except it was the command he used to load games on his Commodore 64. So I

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Dredging up some old Commodore trivia

Dave Farquhar — Sun, 06 May 2012 18:18:48 +0000

I’ve seen a couple of Commodore-related search queries hit lately, so I’m going to take a stroll down memory lane with two questions: Can you connect two computers to one single 1541 or 1571 disk drive? And what was the

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Floppy disks for Commodore and other vintage computers

Dave Farquhar — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 13:05:09 +0000

It’s been many years since 5.25-inch floppy disks suitable for Commodore, Apple, Atari, and other vintage 8-bit computers (not to mention IBM PCs and PC/XTs) have been something you can buy at the store down the street. I found some

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How to connect Commodore disk drives

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 22:23:07 +0000

Connecting a single drive to a Commodore C-64, 128, or VIC-20 is pretty easy: Plug a 6-pin serial cable from the port on the back of the computer to one of the two ports on the back of the drive.

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My what-I-did-tonight piece

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 11 Mar 2003 04:54:12 +0000

I hate to do a boring this-is-what-I-did-tonight post, but I figure the occasional one of those is better than silence from my direction.

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