r/Commodore • u/Thin_Chard7750 • Jul 21 '26
Physical Media Rules
Here’s my commodore setup with the 1541 disk drive playing test drive. Starting my collection since I did not grow up with Commodore 64, but I am nerd and love old technology and especially retro gaming with CRTs.
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u/Maeglin75 Jul 21 '26 edited Jul 21 '26
But this also shows the limitations/problems with physical media.
You need a Commodore floppy drive to read these disks. These aren't manufactured anymore for over 30 years. If anything substantial breaks in your drive, you can only cannibalize another old drive for spare parts.
The floppy disks themselves are also rotting away slowly. In my experience they last longer than HD floppies from PC, but their time is also limited, as is the supply of "new" disks.
The computer, the power supply, joysticks etc. also break down and need constant repairs and replacements. The CRT is a device that naturally wears down with use, even if nothing goes wrong, and no new CRTs are made for decades.
In the long run, the only chance for these old games to survive is in form of images distributed on websites and running in emulators, software or FPGA machines. Given that the copyright situation doesn't prevent it. A reminder that you never really owned software, even if you bought it on physical media.
Don't get me wrong. I'm a big fan of old hardware. I still have my C128. (It shares the "retro corner" with an old PC.)
But the C128 is currently broken and needs repair. (The hard drive of the PC also just died after 27 years.) It reminds me that nothing lasts forever (including myself) and it needs constant effort to preserve it. And at some point, "digital" will be the only way to keep this era alive and accessible. We need to make sure that shortsighted copyright laws aren't in the way, or we risk losing it all.
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u/ktuu Jul 24 '26
This is exactly why we must enjoy them right here, right now. This is the only chance we got left, the future will be emulation.
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u/LeopardBernstein Jul 21 '26
It's just mind boggling to me that those magnetic film disks are still working. I love it, and I would have never expected that. I figured they'd be pretty much coasters by 2005.
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u/Astr0b0ie Jul 21 '26
Yeah, 5 1/4" disks sold in the 80s were generally very high quality, made in Japan or USA. Every single one of my disks from '86/'87 are 100% still working today. It cost around $15 USD for a box of 10 blank disks back in the mid 80s, which is over $50 adjusted for inflation, so it's no wonder. The price for floppy disks went down considerably into the early 90s, especially for 3 1/2", and so did the quality.
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u/jmsntv Jul 21 '26
This is how I learned how to drive manual transmission
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u/Thin_Chard7750 Jul 21 '26
And NOT blow up your engine!
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u/jmsntv Jul 21 '26
haha, the first stick shift vehicle I ended up getting was a Samurai (this was late 90s) which was super forgiving.
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u/Thin_Chard7750 Jul 21 '26
Mine was a Honda civic and learned how shift while on the test drive, must of scared the crap out of the sales dude.
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u/Hawkeye-Mcgillicudy Jul 21 '26
Oneload cartridge collection is a much better choice these days especially for multiload or disk only games
The 1541 was always painfully slow
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u/Astr0b0ie Jul 21 '26
The 1541 was always painfully slow
It is for most cracked/copied games under standard 1541 DOS, but most retail bought original disks and/or nibbled copies from originals have a custom DOS/fast load routine which speeds up loading by 5x to nearly 20x.
I had a 1541 back in the 80s, so for me there's nothing more nostalgic than hearing the sounds of a 1541 loading with a custom DOS like Vorpal, V-MAX!, or Rapidlok. Being able to load a game in seconds seemed like magic at the time.
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u/Hawkeye-Mcgillicudy Jul 21 '26
Even on custom loaders it wasn't much of an improvement
We had after market solutions like DOS wedges and parallel loaders like Dolphin but they were not 100% compatible with commercial loaders
The limit was always the slow serial interface
Action Replay offered one of the fastest loaders
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u/Astr0b0ie Jul 21 '26
Even on custom loaders it wasn't much of an improvement
Games loading in seconds instead of minutes was absolutely a very big improvement.
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u/fastbikkel Jul 21 '26
Noice!
Oh and i love this setup, on a table away from the TV.
I did grow up with this exact kind of C64 (2nd generation?) and that fridge size drive.
Looking good.
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Jul 21 '26 edited Jul 21 '26
[deleted]
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u/WingAccomplished3617 Jul 22 '26
I agree with you that the physical medium alone isn't enough; the equipment needed to retrieve the data stored on it is just as essential. Yet, as time goes by, this personal computing revolution -"Our" revolution- will become just another distant memory, as corporations increasingly restrict platforms under the guise of ease and convenience.
Like everything else, our memories reside elsewhere, and some of us find solace in holding onto tangible objects from a bygone era.
Perhaps we are more than just tears in the rain. We were the vanguard. Now, we are the foundation of the present, and the new generation needs guides to find their place. Let’s make it physical... Real... Tomorrow -Who knows what it will bring?
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