The original Commodore 64 had a pretty long run for a computing platform, released in 1982 and discontinued in 1994. Its fortunes mirrored that of the company which developed it as Commodore achieved its greatest success with the C64 and never quite managed to achieve a similar level of market dominance thereafter. Now there is a new Commodore 64, the Commodre C64 Ultimate, which promises to be an end-all, be-all solution to running C64 software on a platform worthy of the Commodore legacy. Today, having had a chance to play with one for about a week, I can put those claims to the test.
Background & Ordering
Commodore filed for bankruptcy in 1994 and its assets were sold off to various companies Those assets have changed hands time and time again. The saga of the Commodore assets (including copyrights and trademarks), including attempts to revive the brand and lawsuits, has been told elsewhere. Thus we have seen things like the C64 Direct-to-TV and C64 Mini/Maxi which use the original C64 firmware (including BASIC, CHARGEN & KERNAL) but nowhere in these products' names is the word "Commodore" because that trademark was held by another company. But we have also seen things like modern Commodore branded PCs and even a Commodore phone but these devices shared little in common with the machines that were once at the forefront of the computer revolution.
One man, a British expatriate named Christian "Peri Fractic" Simpson, made it his mission to change that. He saw that the Commodore assets were diffused wanted to revive Commodore fully. He runs a popular YouTube channel originally called Retro Recipes, specializing in retro-computing content (with a fair bit of Knight Rider thrown in). Now it is called Retro Recipes x Commodore. He had made his money in Hollywood and had the resources to pursue purchasing the necessary Commodore assets to produce a legal "Commodore 64." He and other like-minded people founded a new company called Commodore International Corporation (hereafter "New Commodore") and several subsidiaries to handle the distribution in various countries.
Simpson functions as the CEO of this New Commodore and its most public face. He also consulted with hardware developers who had made names in the C64 community like Jeri Ellsworth, Jim Drew and Gideon Zweijtzer Several former Commodore employees including Al Charpentier and Bil Herd and even Jack Tramiel's son Leonard has some involvement in the company. In terms of company revivals, this is as legitimate as they get. Even so, there is one challenger to the Commodore trademarks, an Italian company called Commodore Industries S.r.l and litigation is being pursued by New Commodore to resolve the issue.
The C64 Ultimate was not developed from Simpson's resources or from scratch. It is an FPGA-based system using a Xilnix Artix-7 XC7A50T, but it is based on the Ultimate 64 Elite II mainboard developed by Gideon's Zweijtzer of Gideon's Logic. The functional ICs of the system are contained on a removable daughterboard. On that daughterboard is 128MiB DDR2 RAM. Credit must be given to What's Ken Making's video for going over the specs of the FPGA board running the C64U. Go watch his excellent video for more details.
Other enthusiasts had made an replica plastic-injection mold to the original C64 breadbin case (Retrofuzion) and a replacement C64 keycaps (CBMStuff/Jim Drew). The ingredients for a complete new system were pretty much there already.
New Commodore has declared that has purchased the rights to the 47 valid trademarks associated with the Commodore brand. It has said nothing about acquiring copyrights, so I gather that the copyrights to the software that makes the C64 run, the BASIC, KERNAL, CHARGEN and CBM DOS, are owned by Retro Games Ltd. (makers of the C64 Mini/Maxi) and are licensed by New Commodore.
New Commodore advertised these systems and took preorders in mid-2025 starting at $299 for the "BASIC Beige", $349 for the Starburst Edition and $499 for the Founders Edition. The system prices have gone up by $50 each for 2026. Considering what it can take to repair an original C64 or replace dead chips and dangerous power supplies, (and believe me I have done both) the price is reasonable.
I do not to pre-order new hardware from companies without a proven track record of delivery until real customers have received units in hand. I have emphasized real customers because sending review units to social media influencers and YouTubers is not the same as making products available to the customers who fronted a lot of money for them. Many a venture and crowdfunding campaign has failed because best intentions were not sufficient guarantees against mismanagement, feature creep, product delays, supply chain breakdowns, loss of key personnel, rising part costs, factory worker strikes and unforeseeable events like tariff increases.
When New Commodore showed it was able to deliver just before Christmas 2025, I was ready to order a unit as soon as my petty cash vault recovered from the holiday. With a $20 off discount offered due to selling 20,000 C64Us, I paid $401.49 (shipping and tax included) for a BASIC Beige. I ordered it on January 31, received a shipping notice on February 25 and it was delivered to my door on March 2.
Box & Manual
This product comes to the customer in two boxes, the shipping box and the system box. The shipping box is somewhat plain but not generic. A shipping should not stand out too much from the crowd of generic brown boxes typically seen in the delivery truck otherwise it might as well say "steal me" on it. My box had a scratch but otherwise came in good shape.
The product box was designed similarly to the original C64 box. The cardboard is a bit thinner than an original box but the product is lighter. The cardboard does not need to be as thick, this product is not intended to sit on store shelves and there is no heavy power brick and lots of metal in the system to add weight. It does the job of telling the user what the machine inside is and what it can do. Some of the text and imagery from the original box is used. More room is required for modern elements like certifications, content ratings, bar codes and such. The box is colorful but not so garish that it would look out of place on a retro computer enthusiast's bookshelf.
System & Accessories
Inside the product box is the Commodore 64 Ultimate held in place with a pair of styrofoam holders, wrapped in plastic and with a "welcome card" over the keyboard. The accessories and power supply are held in a small box to the right of the C64U and the manual is underneath the computer.
The enclosure is a near perfect replica of the original C64 "breadbin" case. I think you could put many of the original C64 mainboards in this case. I was almost going to drop the extra $50 for the Starlight Edition but I heard there was excessive flex in its keyboard assembly. (I have read that this issue was much improved after launch unit owners complained.) The C64U is considerably lighter than an original breadbin. It can be opened by removing the three Philips-head screws on the bottom, just like the original. Lift the lid slowly because the keyboard is connected to the mainboard by a short USB Type-C cable. The power LED connects to a 4-pin header and should be put back on LED1 and GND pinswith the red wire going to LED1.
Keyboard
The keyboard is also a near-exact replica of the original C64 keyboard, and this is an enormous benefit to owners. The Commodore 64 keyboard had a very different layout compared to a typical PC compatible keyboard, one which causes no end of grief for emulator users. Are you to know inherently that the WinVICE emulator maps the Run/Stop key to the Esc key? What about C= key (Tab)? And how about the legends on the fronts of the keys? Do you know that £, *, @, =, ← and ↑ were all discrete keys on the Commodore keyboard and were put in places covered by 2u keys like Enter and Backspace?
With the C64U you have an authentic keyboard, you no longer have to hunt for the correct key when it does not correspond to a modern keyboard layout or wrestle with VICE's keyboard mapper. This keyboard uses mechanical switches unlike the C64 Maxi which used rubber domes. The C64U keyboard switches are Cherry MX-style linear switches but do not feel stiff and make a pleasant sound. The long spacebar is not especially rattly.
The C64U keyboard is USB powered, no doubt in part because the SHIFT LOCK key on it is not a latching key. Windows does not recognize the C64U's keyboard when plugged into my PC. It turns out that the keyboard is not using a standard USB controller but uses a custom interface. It is based on the Blingboard64, also from Jim Drew of cbmstuff.com. There is a small PIC microcontroller on the C64U's keyboard to handle the SHIFT LOCK, RESTORE key and keyboard LED lighting. I see no reason to use other keyboards with a keyboard this nice and correctly labeled, I'm not writing my upcoming book on a C64U. (I'd need at least 80 columns for that!) Although my original C64s have gray function keys, there were original models with tan ones like the those used on the C64U.
Unfortunately there is no indication on the BASIC Beige model when the Shift Lock key is activated except via whatever the key pressed registers on the screen when a Shift key is activated. In Commodore BASIC, activating the Shift Lock key changes the character set seen on the screen. My Apple IIc mechanical replacement keyboard from MacEffects has an LED which lights up underneath the Shift Lock when it is active (which is most of the time). There is a header on the C64U's mainboard to attach an original C64 keyboard. My original C64 keyboard keys suffer from uneven wear, some keys are not easy to get registered. I have seriously considered replacing the original C64 keyboard with something like a Mechboard 64.
Power Supply & HDMI Cable
The system has a universal 12v/2.5A switching power supply, which is made with translucent plastic and has the Commodore logo on it. There are four detachable connectors for the power supply, Type A, Type C, Type G and Type I. This power supply is almost identical to the one which came with the Analogue Nt Mini Noir but the barrel plug connectors are different sizes. The cable appears to be about 8.5" long.
There is an 8' HDMI cable included in a Commodore bag but it does not have the Commodore logo branding on the cable itself. This cable is robustly built and I am not just talking about its thickness. The cable is well-shielded against EMI interference, my test is using an Analogue 3D and an 8BitDo 64 Bluetooth Controller. With lesser cables the wireless connection will have dropped and repeating inputs operating the controller just a few feet (maybe 3) from the console. Using the controller from 5 feet away had no issues. Lengthy quality cords are always appreciated.
Printed Manual
The manual, like the original, is spiral bound. The new manuals comes in at 262 pages. Printed on glossy paper, it is a high quality book. Including a manual exceedingly rare these days, most manuals for modern retro systems are almost completely online. As the manual is spiral bound it can be laid flat on any page, helpful for referencing while working on the computer. It reprints much of the original manual but also has sections about the features of the new machine. There is a PDF version of the manual found here. The manual is not without its omissions, as will be seen.
Using the C64U - First Impressions
Multi-function Switch
A long-time C64 user should be comforted in that the power switch in the C64U is in the same place and has the same shape as an original C64. Fortunately you do not have to deal with the original C64's beast of a power supply or its large DIN7 power connector. The power switch does more than turn on and off the system, so the C64U calls it a multi-function switch.
When you plug in the machine to power supply, you turn it on by pushing the multi-function switch, which is a momentary rocker switch, up. To turn the system off, hold the multi-function switch down for four seconds. To reset the system push the multi-function rocker switch up for one second. When you boot the C64U for the first time you will see the normal BASIC prompt unless you have a cartridge inserted.
Menus
The C64U has a metric ton of options and settings to tweak and play with. The user will start at the Main Menu, invoked by pushing the multi-function rocker switch up for less than a second. This menu allows you to set hardware configuration options and access the Disk File Browser through submenus. It can be exited by pushing the switch again or pressing Run/Stop. The C= + RESTORE key combination (not mentioned in the manual) can also enter and exit the menu, and this is by far the best way to access the menu almost at almost any the time. (The RESTORE key is the only key on the keyboard which was not connected with the rest of the keys to a CIA chip. Instead it generated a CPU Non-maskable Interrupt). Keep the multi-function switch just for turning the console on. There is also a header on the mainboard which you can connect to switches to have dedicated reset, freeze and menu buttons like the Ultimate II+ C64 Flash Cart
If you are familiar with Gideon Logic's past products, namely the Ultimate II+ or the Ultimate 64 mainboard, then the menu system should be familiar to you. The menu can be navigated with a Joystick in Port 2, the CRSR (+Shift) keys or the WASD keys. WASD is not supported on my Ultimate II+ cartridge. Right activates an option, Left or Run/Stop moves back up one level. Pressing the Return key or the joystick button on an option will give you a list of the options to choose from for a particular setting.
If you are not familiar with the menu system, then you might be in for a harder time than you might expect because there are a lot of options and many of them are not described in the manual. As the C64U is based off the Ultimate 64 project, some of these menu options are documented on the Gideon's Logic website. In the Main Menu you press F1 to enter another menu, the Tool Menu where you can control some of the system's functions instead of just configuring them. The Power & Reset option in the Tool Menu will allow you to reset, reboot, power cycle or turn off the system without touching the multi-function switch.
If the Tool Menu was not enough, there is a menu that can be entered with F2 (Shift + F1) which lists all menu options in alphabetical order. This menu has some options which cannot be entered from the Main Menu shown above. The C64U's manual makes no mention of this, Advanced, Menu. Cartridge and ROM Settings, Data Streams, Machine Tweaks, Software IEC Drive Settings and Tape Settings seem to be only accessible through this menu.
Configuration can be saved to flash, but if you screw something up you can restore the settings to the factory defaults either using a menu option or the Safe Mode procedure identified in the manual. You can also save your current configuration to a text file but you have to be in the File Browser to save it. By my count there were 218 separate lines for various settings in the config file.
One important option in the User Interface submenu is the "Overlay on HDMI" option with "Interface Type". The default is Freeze, which will switch the active screen into a full-screen menu. Overlay on HDMI allows you to keep the C64U's screen active and shows the menu at the same time. The C64U will physically shift the active screen to the left (720p/1080p) and show a smaller version of the menu on the right side of the screen. For 4:3 modes the menu will appear over the bottom left corner of the screen. The menu in this mode looks garbled in anything other than 1080p and 1280x1024. This also avoids needing to send an interrupt to the VIC-II. The keyboard and joystick will still only respond to the menu until the menu is off the screen. This will not work with analog video, you must use the freeze option to use the menu with that form of video output.
One annoying default feature is that the system is configured to save configuration changes every time you make a change. You can turn this off in the "User Interface" submenu with "Auto Save Config." The File Browser recognizes special C64U .CFG files and you can load the .CFG file for giving a particular game exactly the configuration it requires.
Storage
The C64U has four forms of built-in mass storage support. The first are the pair of USB ports on the back of the system where the User Port was on the original C64. These can accept USB storage devices and the C64U comes with one 64GiB USB stick (exFAT formatted, FAT32 is also supported) that is shaped like a cassette tape. Fortunately the case for the cassette tape was not glued to the side of the accessory box for my unit, unlike the launch/reviewer units. On the system's mainboard is a microSD card slot. You can store files to the C64U's internal flash (11MiB free) or a RAM drive (15MiB free) which is created on bootup. The File Browser can copy files onto .D64 images instantly instead of through the disk drive interface.
The USB stick has a bunch of software, demos, SID files, homebrew games, GEOS and the like included. The Tuneful Eight demo was designed for the eight SID chip playback capabilities of the C64U. As the flip out feature of the "cassette" adds extra weight on the USB port and leaves a gap between the connection and the underlying surface, I recommend copying the contents of the stick to another, smaller USB stick or removing the USB portion of the cassette from the cassette enclosure itself with a screwdriver.
Peripheral Support
The C64U can support most peripherals an original C64 can. Atari CX-40 joysticks worked fine in both of the C64U's joystick ports and Atari CX-30 paddles worked well in games that support paddles like Arkanoid and Clowns. (The Atari paddles will work in an original C64 and a C64U, even though they offer a greater resistance range than Commodore paddles.) The Commodore 1531 Mouse is reported to work properly. I do not know if anyone has tried a NEOS Mouse, which uses a different protocol from the Commodore one.
While more games, mainly European ones, required a joystick to be inserted into port 2, a substantial minority of games, mainly U.S. developed or those which support multiplayer, require a joystick to be in port 1. This could be extremely annoying on the C64 and not without risk to the CIA chip which reads those lines. There was nothing between the CIA inputs and the joystick ports, so touching the joystick pins can fry the CIA chips with static electricity. The C64U has a great menu option which will allow you to swap the joysticks temporarily instead of having to insert and remove plugs.
One thing that is still dangerous with the C64 or C64U is using Sega Genesis controllers in their joystick ports. The chip inside a Genesis controller expects +5v from a different pin (5) than the pin (7) provided for +5v on an Atari/Commodore-style joystick port. The Genesis controller is pulling power from a pin not designed to supply it, so it might work but it will not be good for the long term of your computer. (Non-turbo Master System controllers are fine to use, they do not use +5v.)
The Magic Voice expansion plugged into the cartridge port and was supported by Wizard of Wor and Gorf. I do not know if it works in the C64U but if it does you must output the audio from the cartridge, you cannot use the cable which came with the Magic Voice which plugged into the A/V connector because the C64U's port does not have an audio input line. The cartridge port and the SID chip sockets have level shifters attached to ensure the safety of both sides of the logic.
There is a Datasette Port and a DIN-6 IEC Serial port. The Serial Port was used for disk drives like the Commodore 1541 and 1571 as well as Commodore's serial printers.
Out of the box the only major element lacking from the C64 Ultimate is the User Port. Instead there is an Ethernet port and a pair of USB ports for mass storage. There is an add-on (currently out of stock) on the Commodore website for $9.99 to add a User Port. This is added via a ribbon cable to a header on the C64U's mainboard and run out the back of the machine.
The User Port was something like a PC's parallel port but it also had serial port lines. It was mainly used with parallel printers (Commodore's were mostly serial-based) and modems. The User Port is also required for DolphinDOS, an aftermarket upgrade for the C1541 disk drive that can dramatically improve transfer speeds through a parallel connection as opposed to a serial connection.
There are a bunch of joystick adapters which attach to the User Port which typically added two more joystick ports. The Starbyte and Kingsoft adapters were introduced when the C64 was still being sold although the Protovision adapter is universally supported with homebrew and hacks. 8-bit Guy's Attack of the PETSCII Robots' C64 version has a SNES adapter for the User Port available. The port is by no means vestigial.
The C64U simulates a Commodore MPS-1230 serial printer (which outputs to ASCII text, .png or raw binary data.) It also simulates an RS-232 cartridge and Hayes-compatible modem. Conceivably you could play Modem Wars or The American Challenge: A Sailing Simulation with it.
Running Software
The C64U has a Disk File Browser in its Menu which will allow you to load programs and files. This browser can do basic file operations like delete, rename, copy files and create and delete directories. Copying works with C= + C and C= + V. Multiple files can be highlighted and worked on by pressing the spacebar on each file. The Disk File Browser can also read text and configuration files.
Loading Carts
C64 cartridges use the .CRT extension. Cartridge images up to 16KiB and without extra hardware should work without any issue because they do not use bankswitching. Game cartridges with bankswitching should work (Zaxxon & Super Zaxxon worked) as should most EasyFlash cartridges. Utility cartridges should work unless they have additional hardware.
When you loaded a cartridge on the original C64, you had to insert the cartridge then turn the system on. To use another cartridge required turning off the machine, replacing the cartridge and turning it back on. With original cartridges you must follow the same procedure, the C64U does not support hot swapping cartridges (insertion/removal without cutting the power). I had no trouble loading my physical Tooth Invaders cartridge on the C64U.
Loading/unloading .CRT files does not require a power cycle. If you wish to run one .CRT image after another, you can do so. When you are finished with cartridges and want to do something else, enter the menu, press F1 and use the Reboot C64 option. This will return you to the BASIC prompt and unload the cartridge. You can also remove the cartridge by going into Memory & ROMs and selecting None in the Cartridge option. Reset C64 will not unload the cartridge.
There is an option to select a cartridge, "Copy to Flash" to automatically load on every boot, like an Epyx Fast Load cart, which is designed to work alongside disk drives. The cartridge can be "removed" by going into Memory and ROMs and selecting - None - under "Cartridge." I found that Jumpman Junior was especially sensitive to the state of the C64U and getting it to work reliably meant loading it on boot rather than via the menu.
Loading Tapes
C64 tapes use .TAP or .T64 files and they may be automatically started or manually started. The C64's Datasette can be controlled by the C64, as in manually starting and stopping the playback, if you "Press Play on Tape".
Most C64 games load themselves into the C64's 64KiB of RAM and then play from there once they finish loading. Some tapes, like Manic Miner, take an age to load (on anything) but will successfully load on the C64U. Loading times of ten minutes are not unheard of. These tapes will typically show some indication of loading like flashing colors on the screen (epilepsy warnings are appropriate for some of these) and make some awful noise. You can silence the awful noises by disabling the built-in speaker in the "Speaker Menu" under "Audio Setup". Tapes with good loaders will play a song while they load.
Some C64 tape games use multi-loading. Summer Games (and its successors) from Epyx is a good example. When you start Summer Games from tape, the tape will load until it gets to the main menu. There are eight events in the game and you can compete in all of them in order, compete in one of them or practice in one. If you compete in all of them the game will load in the data for the events sequentially as they are located on the tape. The event data on the tape is stored in the order it is shown on the event selection screen, so the data for Pole Vault is followed by Platform Diving and so on.
If you want to load a specific event which is not next to the data previously loaded, you will likely run into trouble on the C64U. Do not select "Run Tape" here because it will reset the C64U and reload the tape from the beginning. "Start Tape" may work but it may start the tape from the very beginning, making loading longer than it needs to be while the program waits for the data it is looking for.
Once you select an event the game will run the tape until it comes to the data for the event you wanted to load. If you have just started the tape and want to run the last event, Skeet Shooting, you are going to wait until the tape nearly reaches its end before that event will load. A savvy user soon learned to write down when the event data started to playback on the tape counter and used the fast forward and rewind buttons to get near that area before the program did its loading. Some games use more than one side of the tape, so the user may need to flip the tape over and see it is rewound to get to an event.
On the C64U there is no indication if a tape is actually loading if the tape is not making noise or doing something to the screen. A real Datasette will turn the tape spools when it is loading, giving you some kind of indication that it is working. If data is not being loaded the system may make no sound. WinVICE has a little icon which indicates the state of the tape. I wish there was a function to allow the Power LED to act as a Datasette active signal, but this only appears implemented for floppy disk drives.
The C64U supports .IDX files, which are index files for .TAP images which indicate where programs or parts of a program begin their load. This can make loading individual events using "Enter (Index)" and the like easier but the process was not the most reliable in my experience. Also, the .TAP image has to have an .IDX file and not all do.
My real Datasette worked without issue with the C64U. The C64U has a helpful feature that will write .TAP files to real tape using the Datasette. I used this with Summer Games to write a .TAP image to tape and bypassed the issues with random event loading I had with the simulated Datasette.
Loading Files
The C64U handles two types of files as opposed to images. The first is a .PRG file, which is just an executable program file which an emulator can run directly. Unlike EasyFlash .CRTs, which are bankswitched, .PRGs are limited to the C64's built-in RAM. They load quickly. The second is an .SID file, which contains music data. The C64U has a built-in SID music player. If the .SID has multiple tracks you can use the number keys to start a track or the + and - keys to cycle through the tracks.
Loading Disks
Five types of disk images are supported by the C64U: .D64, .D71, .D81, .G64 and .G71 images. .D64, .D71 and .D81 images are the sector dumps of native Commodore 1541, 1571 and 1581 disk images. .G64 represents disk images at the bitcell level and is vital for preserving original disks, their loaders and their protection schemes intact. The built-in internal speaker will simulate disk playback sounds but this can be silenced in the emu. The Power LED can be set to light up on disk drive access.
Up to two drives are supported and can be any combination of Commodore 1541s, 1571s or 1581s. The 1541 and 1571 are 5.25" drives, the 1581 is a 3.5" drive. The 1541 is a single sided drive capable of supporting 170KiB per disk side. The 1571 is nearly mostly backwards compatible with the C1541 and can support double sided 340KiB disks. The 1581 is capable of 800KiB disk support but is not especially backwards compatible with the C1541. Almost all commercial C64 software released during its lifetime came on 1541 disks.
Some games, like Skate or Die! (Pirateslayer), will refuse to boot on a C64 or C64U if a second drive is detected. A game may expect the disk to be write protected or not write protected, depending on the game. These issues are universal to any C64 or emulator, but the C64U adds an issue which is unique to it.
Arkanoid, Bubble Bobble and Gauntlet and others (NTSC versions, which use the V-MAX! loader) will not want to boot in the C64U because they detect something in the cartridge port (either the additional SID chips or the RS-232 for the modem) and think it is a freeze cartridge. For these games their cartridge detection routines must be bypassed, once I did so they loaded properly. (Avoid Gauntlet's first version, it uses V-MAX! only for protection and loads like molasses, the second version is fast.) Otherwise every properly mastered .G64 image I have thrown at the C64U has worked, including California Games (Vorpal), Pirates! (RapidLok) and Bounty Bob Strikes Back (Spiradisc).
JiffyDOS is supported for the C1541/1571/1581 drive and and DolphinDOS can be enabled for the C1541. These ROM replacements dramatically improve loading times with software which utilize the standard DOS transfer routines. Both methods require replacing both the C64's KERNAL ROM and the disk drive's DOS ROM. You can select the firmware file in the file browser and the system should recognize what the ROM does and will let you replace the default ROM with it. DolphinDOS also requires enabling "Extra RAM" in "Built in Drive A" disk drive and the "Parallel Cable to Drive A" option (option accessed by pressing F2 in the menu and entering "Machine Tweaks"). There are reported reliability issues with both solutions which Commodore is working on. Unfortunately it does not have the very helpful Virtual Device Traps option of VICE which pretty much makes disk loading instantaneous (but is not supported by all software).
I know full well that most homebrew software is contained on EasyFlash or .D64 images as are game cracks. My principal concern is for original retail game disk images. As most of those are copy protected using disk-based protection methods, .D64 will not work for advanced protection methods (but it can work for simple ones that rely on sector errors). These images must be represented in the .G64 format.
While people sing the praises of fast loaders, I have found that most of the time, for original retail disk images, they are useless. Fast loaders intercept calls to these routines and substitute their own faster routines. Commodore DOS supplied loading routines in the firmware provided in the C1541 disk drive. Retail disks almost always used their own disk loading routines, even if they competed with Commodore's own routines for the slowest routine prize. Fast loaders, which include the Epyx Fast Load, the Final Cartridge III, JiffyDOS and DolphinDOS all rely on a program using Commodore DOS to transfer data to and from the disk drive. When the program does not, like most games, then they are useless. Maniac Mansion (Activision release) will refuse to run with the Epyx' cartridge.
The one notable exception to the above rule is the Epyx Fast Load. As Epyx was a game publisher it began designing its games to support its Fast Load cartridge. The Fast Load's manual identified six such games: Impossible Mission, Pitstop II, Summer Games, Breakdance, The World's Greatest Baseball Game and Robots of Dawn. The speedups are very impressive when using the Fast Load cart compared to booting them on a "stock C64". Not all of Epyx's games support the Fast Load cart. Epyx' Vorpal loader later managed to achieve previously unwitnessed speeds with software routines and a custom disk format.
A nearly comprehensive archive of .G64 disks is available from the C64 Preservation Project 10th Anniversary Collection. You should download both the .G64 archive and the .NBZ archive, as some of the .G64s were poorly mastered from the NBZs, which are the raw bitcell dumps of C64 disks. Usually any .G64 file with a [!] in its name should load properly. Those that do not may need to have their NBZs run through the ReMaster Utility. Grab the latest beta for maximum compatibility with protection schemes. This utility can patch out the cartridge checking routines which cause the V-MAX games listed above (and there are sixteen other known V-MAX! games with the cartridge checking protection routine and many of them have legitimate alternative images) which fail in the C64U. Applying the patch gets them working. Marginal images may need to Adjust CBM tracks or impose True 300 RPM in the ReMaster Utility's options.
Video Output
The C64 Ultimate has a variety of video output options. HDMI supports 480p/60Hz, 576p/50Hz, 720p and 1080p. It also supports PC monitor resolutions at 800x600, 1024x768 and 1280x1024. (The original Ultimate 64 Elite only supported up to 576p.) It also supports NTSC and PAL analog video via Composite, S-Video and RGB Video. A menu option is required to switch between Composite/S-Video and RGB because the pins are repurposed for RGB. At present I cannot test the RGB because I do not have an adapter cable for the RGB pinout of the C64U's DIN-8 port. An original C64 never supported RGB, it could only handle S-Video, Composite Video or RF.
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| C64U S-Video Output |
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| C64 S-Video Output |
The C64U has very impressive audio capabilities. It supports stereo SID output, not something supported in games developed when the C64 was current but is supported in certain homebrew games and many more recent demos and .SID music files. Internally it simulates up to eight SID chips. The SID simulation sounds very passable to my ears. The C64U can also support up to two original SID chips via a pair zero force insertion/levered sockets on the mainboard for stereo output. Either the 6581 or the 8580 are supported and can be mixed and matched. They can also work in tandem with the two simulated SIDs in the system. No jumpers are required to be changed to set the proper SID type.
Making sure the SIDs are enabled beyond the default configuration requires a certain knowledge of memory addressing in the C64. The SID configuration screens, of which there are many, are rather obtuse. In the 6510's memory addressing the SID officially resides at $D400-$D419. The SID takes up 32 sequential memory addresses. Adding more SIDs requires finding 32 more unique memory locations for each chip. The SID is mirrored every 32 bytes from $D420-D7FF, theoretically you could have 32 SIDs in the system if the memory mapping was sufficiently discrete. If you have two SIDs at $D400, you will only hear 3 voices of sound instead of the 6 voices intended. The program should tell you where it expects the 2nd SID address to be if it supports more than one.
Audio output can be obtained from three sources, the HDMI output, the AV connector and a 3.5mm mini-jack. The mini-jack is both a combination analog and optical SPDIF output, so you can obtain clean digital audio from that source if the HDMI port does not work for you with a mini TOSlink cable.
Going Beyond the Stock C64
While the C64U does not simulate a C128, it does have built-in CPU acceleration. The 6510 CPU simulated by the C64 can be overclocked from 2MHz to 64MHz. I have read reports that the SuperCPU, which plugs into the cartridge port, does not work with the C64U but that is a very complex piece of hardware. The C64U has CPU acceleration functions which can address most of the functionality provided by the SuperCPU. The SuperCPU used a 65816, so the C64U cannot execute the additional instructions provided by the 65816.
The C64 had a RAM Expansion Unit (REU) which could plug into the cartridge port to allow access to extra memory through bankswitching. Not many programs outside of GEOS took advantage of this at the time, but Wizardry I-III & V can use an REU to load more assets into memory and reduce disk drive accesses. The C64U can support from 128KiB to 16MiB of additional RAM through its REU simulation.
Getting Online
The C64U has not only an Ethernet jack but is Wi-Fi capable. Connecting to the home network was easy enough thanks to DHCP support and can be helpful to keep the battery-backed built-in Real Time Clock in sync with current time. Entering your Wi-Fi password is something you have to be careful about because the screen shows the password instead of displaying a character like *. With online access you can log into BBSs (terminal emulator programs are included on the included USB cassette drive), use Contiki to search the web (with FrogFind), chat on IRC, transfer files via FTP and use other "Internet 1.0" type services. File transfer speedss are reported a bit slow for modern Ethernet at 150KiB/sec. I was tempted to try the revival of Lucasfilm's original C64 online experience, Habitat, which exists as NeoHabitat. NeoHabitat has been reported not to work but Q-Link Reloaded can work.
The CommoServe file search will connect to New Commodore's servers to allow you to run and download Apps, Demos, Games, Graphics and Music. It only loads one page's worth of directories, so you cannot browse the server completely via this method (or any other) unless the category only has one page worth of directories. There is an exclusive game called Jupiter Lander II which is not present on the included USB stick and must be downloaded through this service. I tried the game and it is a pretty nice Lunar Lander clone. Unfortunately the CRT file size is too large to be copied off the server apparently. There is not a ton of software available on the server but I was able to browse application and file types as well as search for titles by name.
The C64U has the ability to stream video and audio over a network and by extension onto the Internet. There is an OBS plugin called c64stream designed to receive the packets broadcast from the C64U over ethernet. Getting the plug-in to receive the stream is not the easiest thing if you have not brushed up on your network skills recently. I found this video very helpful in getting it working. It is highly advisable to use the wired ethernet port over Wi-Fi for this. You must know your C64U's IP, your OBS PC's IP and the system's DNS. You must also make sure that the video and audio ports match in both the C64U's configuration and the OBS plugin's configuration. The chief benefit to me is that I can capture the C64U's video output losslessly. The plugin defaults to a 384x240 (NTSC) or 384x272 (PAL) resolution which means the pixels output are not filtered in any way, unlike an HDMI capture. An RGB capture would have some noise in the signal and S-Video/Composite captures are inherently lossy when it comes to color. Streaming audio is a separate setting but is handled in the same way.
Homebrew Ports
In addition to playing with games as they were distributed on their original media, I have a particular interest in running unofficial ports of games to the C64 by the homebrew community. I tried the following:
Bubble Bobble C64 Remastered, Commando Arcade: Special Edition, The Empire Strikes Back, Galaga, Ghost 'n Goblins Arcade and Prince of Persia worked well without any special settings.
Super Mario Bros. runs best in NTSC mode with a 2nd SID at $D420 and the Turbo Control set to TurboEnable Bit, CPU Speed 2MHz, and SuperCPU Detect (D0BC) Enabled.
Sonic the Hedgehog runs best with the above CPU settings (it does not use a 2nd SID) with NTSC mode. It requires the RAM Expansion Unit to be Enabled and at least a Size of 256KiB. 512KiB will give you the option to load the whole game into the REU and eliminate disk accesses. There are .D64 and .D81 images of this game, choose the .D81 image and set Built-in Drive A to Drive Type 1581. The speech sample for "SEGA" at the intro sounded very garbled regardless of the settings I tried compared to WinVICE or a real PAL C64.
Donkey Kong Jr. has the "HIGH SCORE" partially cut off in NTSC mode but fully visible in PAL mode. It is based off the NES port, so it plays best in NTSC. A real NTSC C64 will not display "HIGH SCORE" at all. Frogger Arcade will not run on an NTSC machine, it works well otherwise without any special settings.
Eye of the Beholder only has a proper aspect ratio in PAL mode. As the C64U does not simulate a Commodore 128 you will not be able to show the map on a second monitor (the C128 supported Composite/S-Video with the VIC-II and RGBI with the VDC). The port runs faster on the C128 but I am not sure whether it supports C64 accelerators. The port supports a 1351 Mouse to move the cursor. Alternatively the cursor keys can be used to move the cursor to hotspots on the screen but as there are only two cursor keys on the C64 this does not work especially well. (If there was any element of the new product's design that could have departed from its rigorous adherence to the original design it would have been the cursor keys.) The USB ports only support storage devices at present, but there could be a firmware update that can add USB mouse support. This would be awesome of course but at present only the launch firmware (v3.14) is available. The Ultimate 64 Elite II mainboard, whose features mirror that of the C64U's, has a recent firmware update which adds USB mouse support but that firmware cannot be safely flashed onto the C64U's mainboard.
Apparently there is an issue where the Flash drive, where the systems ROMs are stored, can just disappear. At this point the disk drive simulation will stop working because CBM DOS for the 1541, 1751 and 1581 reside on that storage drive and will become inaccessible. At that point the disks will no longer work. This issue can be worked around by reflashing the firmware, even if it is not newer than the existing firmware.
Replacing a C64?
What if, as a friend, asked, if you have a C64 and an Ultimate II+ cartridge? Is the C64U worth it then? If your C64 is in good working order and you are happy with it as-is, then you may wish to direct your discretionary funds elsewhere. But C64s are notorious for having unreliable components, especially the 6581 SID, the PLA any any generic IC with the MOS branding. The original power supplies can eventually generate killer voltages. Electronics do not age like fine wine and even the most recent C64 is over thirty years old. Preventive maintenance to maintain a working C64 eventually becomes a costly endeavor. Diagnosing faults is a specialized skill possessed by few. Digital video upgrades can get you HDMI output but they are expensive (Kawari, HD-64) or require soldering (Lumacode + RGB2HDMI). While these days you can replace almost every component in the C64 with something community sourced, a "Ship of Theseus" approach will be far more expensive than buying a C64U.
Other Early Commodore Simulation
The C64U only simulates a C64, but the Commodore 8-bit system had several common qualities. All the 8-bit machines used 6502 or 6502-based CPUs. MOS Technology had developed the 6502 and Commodore bought MOS in 1976. They tended to use similar support chips, many of which were developed by MOS, keyboards, bus connectors and of course, the PETSCII character set. There is potential for the C64U to simulate more than a C64, and this is what would be required.
The C64's enclosure was nearly identical to the one used for its predecessor, the Commodore VIC-20, and the keyboard was identical. The hardware could simulate a VIC-20 and present full port functionality of the earlier system apart from the cartridge slot. The VIC-20 has a much wider cartridge slot but uses 44 pins like the C64's, so with the reconfigurability of the FPGA these cartridges could be supported via a slot adapter.
The Commodore 16 also shares the C64 enclosure and keyboard and the keyboards for the C116 and Plus/4 are similar enough that a user could adapt to them without too much difficulty. The hardware is overall less sophisticated than the C64, so the FPGA would not be taxed supporting it. Only the cartridge ports would need an adapter as they are 50 pins, but there were only less than a dozen C16/Plus4 cartridges made because the system did not sell well.
The Commodore 128 could doubtless also be run on this hardware, although in this case the C128 has 26 extra keys over the C64. The C128 also has a Z80 as a coprocessor and the VDC graphics chip, so the scale of C128 overclocking might have to be scaled back a bit to accommodate these chips. These keys are unique to the C128 and the C64's enclosure cannot encompass them. They also have unique positions in an expanded keyboard matrix, so a program must know about them to support them. I imagine New Commodore could release a USB keyboard to add support for the additional keys if they wished to market a C128 upgrade for the system.
The oldest Commodore computers, the PET series, would require more work to adapt. Their keyboards not only use a significantly different layout than any of the more consumer-oriented Commodore computers but they also have support for two datasette ports and an IEEE-488 port.
It must be acknowledged that all these other computers are generally footnotes in the mind of the general retro computing public compared to the one which has not been previously mentioned: Amiga. The Commodore Amiga was Commodore's true successor to the C64 and was the last line of its computers to make any kind of impact in the market. The architecture is completely different and far more advanced. There is not much in the way of cross-compatibility between the two lines beyond joysticks. There has been a mini Amiga plug 'n play console, the A500, from the same people who released the C64 mini. There is also a high quality FPGA core for the Amiga for MiST and MiSTer known as Minimig. The Amiga's keyboard is far more PC-like than the C64's (at least the US's version is). The rights to the firmware and OS for the Amiga, known as Kickstart and Workbench, are held by Cloanto. Rights would have to be negotiated and agreements would have to be made before we could see a true FPGA Commodore Amiga.
Conclusion
Is the C64 Ultimate a perfect FPGA clone of the C64? No, but given the vast amount of hardware and software made for the C64, that is to be expected. Even some models of the C64 can be incompatible with software (the earliest U.S. C64s often break with later homebrew and intros). It is a highly capable clone and easy to use. The build quality of the Beige model is top notch and the experience was easy to adapt. While there are a few irksome incompatibilities, the experience for most will be exceptionally smooth once they have mastered the labyrinthine menu and the basic configuration options.
$400 is a lot of money to throw at an 8-bit retro computer but these things cost a lot of money to develop and manufacture. The Ultimate 64 Elite II mainboard cost almost 250€ and it needed an enclosure and keyboard. This is not a casual purchase or meant for the same crowd that barely uses their C64 Mini. While WinVICE can do everything the C64U can do and more for free, good luck trying to output that to a 15KHz CRT, playing your cartridges with it or mapping an ideal keyboard layout to it.
The whole experience of the C64U has an authentic feel to it, something I have not felt from many a project. New Commodore is not Old Commodore and cannot be but there is passion behind the project and respect for its legacy. Most of the people associated with New Commodore grew up with their C64s, worked at Commodore when it was making C64s or developed their own projects before joining New Commodore. I wanted to support the C64U as soon as it proved itself and I am quite satisfied with my purchase. I hope the product will improve and address some of the issues I have pointed out in this review but the C64U can be bought today is definitely the best way to experience a C64 for those without an original working system.
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