Commodore 64 Ultimate Review: An Amazing Remake

Photography: Matt Kamen

Boot up the C64U and you’re greeted by a recreation of the C64’s menu. Here you can enter operation commands as you would back then, using the BASIC programming language. Problem: I don’t have a clue about BASIC. However, in what is perhaps the biggest throwback of all, the C64U comes with a spiral binding, 273-page user guide. It’s an absolute tome. Surprisingly, this isn’t a reprint of everything that came with the original, but rather a tailor-made guide explaining what the C64U does, how it differs from the C64, and how to get to grips with the computer’s capabilities. Equal parts history book and instruction manual, it starts by teaching you a few simple commands and expands to teach you how to code. I’m still working hard on this, but this tactile approach – referencing the book, trying something on the computer, going back and forth – is a wonderful touch.

Hidden Upgrades

If you don’t feel like having to do your homework, the C64U’s default menu, accessible at any time with a simple press of the multifunction power button on the right side of the device, is a simple list of options and settings. Press BACK to navigate to any section, for example ‘Video Setup’ to adjust whether the C64U outputs in the original resolution, in PAL or NTSC modes (surprisingly important, given that some games only work with one display standard or the other), or a crystal clear 1080p with scanlines removed – and go back to save any changes to the system’s flash memory. This is still a minimalist approach, but one that feels quite intuitive.

This is also where you can start playing around with some of the C64U’s other modern touches, like how to take advantage of its much greater power. Well, “bigger” compared to 1982. Specs-wise it won’t threaten any more modern machine, but running on an AMD Xilinx Artix-7 FPGA chip and packing 128MB of DDR2 RAM – compared to the C64’s 64KB – it blows its inspiration out of the water. While at its core it replicates the performance of 1982 hardware, meaning it works as if there were only the original 64KB, you can navigate the menu to enable a virtualized RAM expansion unit, or enable a “Turbo Boost” to boost the clock speed to a blazing (in this particular context) 64MHz.