Commodore VIC-20 Worth Owning?

[CRTGAMER]

Hard to tell from the angle of the Vic20, based on the metal label plate, the earlier two pong power input?

The Datasette is the newer more compact model. I have both, the older model is longer and looks more like a traditional portable cassette recorder/player of the day. Just cosmetic differences, neither could play music tapes, both have the same data/power cable made specifically for the Vic20 and C64. There is a ground wire too, for RF shielding. Have care if you hook this up or zip tie away from the cart slot.

SHIFT RUNSTOP loads a cassette program.

Nice to see a vintage computer gone thru and fixed! Once you start really diving into to it, you'll be surprised how huge the Commodore libary is, especially when you also add a C64 to the video switch box.

Vic20 Game List - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Co ... C-20_games

I only picked up Avenger for the time being, but Omega Race was there so I may go pick that up later.

Avenger a good Space Invaders clone with color aliens. The Vic20 Omega Race plays beautiful (a better size ship compared to C64)) with the 2600 paddle! The Function Keys bring back the original arcade yellowish "vector line draw" as well as all the colors the Vic20 supports. The game is ridiculously fast, too quick for the joystick, plays best with a "Spinner" just like the original Arcade cabinet.

Now that I think about it, Serpentine also looks better on the Vic20. Another game that is unique to the older systems. Many of the games appear larger due to the lower resolution of the 22 character column screen.

Look for the now rare UMI cart Cloudburst if you want to try a very rapid bottom SHMUP with bonus side shooting as well. A sort of Robotron frenzied mix to it, but with one joystick. I was fortunate enough to grab a few UMI titles direct from the manufacturer back in the day.

Speaking of Robotron, try Cross Fire for a different take using a shoot around corner maze and playing with the "twinstick" keyboard. This is another game that looks better with the larger graphics on the Vic20. I was tempted to modify my Vic20 back then to work with two joysticks matching the keys of this game.

Never did that mod, but I did add video and audio jacks to my SX64 5 inch CRT screen and a better speaker to my Educator 64. Both are pretty rare computers, each having their own built in CRT.

Digital Press Vic20 Cart List - http://www.digitpress.com/the_digs/vic2 ... c-rare.htm

@ BoneSnapDeez - The C64 also has SVideo capability for improved video of Chroma and Luma separation. There are specialty 3rd party cables that can be used if your TV has Svideo.

So many Commodores out there, even some rare versions!

[Ghudda]

Hard to tell from the angle of the Vic20, based on the metal label plate, the earlier two pong power input?

Yup that'd be the one. I also learned that during the consoles revisions, they changed the keyswitches, such as the plungers and keycaps. I ordered the older, original keys/plungers on accident and had to cancel my order and order the correct ones.

Tons of great information, CRT, I appreciate it. The cleaning process is going pretty well. I scrubbed most of the dirt/grime off the chassis and have been going over the board with q-tips and alcohol by hand (I still feel uncomfortable spraying down an entire board with liquid). I've added all of the recommended games to the want section of my collection spreadsheet so i'll keep my eyes peeled. I also noticed the ground connection on the cassette deck so i'll make sure to watch for that.

There was also a cassette game called Blue Meanies From Outer Space ($4) that I looked up and is supposedly pretty good. Has anyone played that? Also other games K-Star Patrol and Voodoo Castle which were $20/ea.

[Ghudda]

Quick question, I need to get this keyboard cleaned up and i'm trying to think of the best way to do it. Basically, the plungers seem to be a bit too delicate to successfully pull off each one (I just broke my second plunger). This leads to part of the broken plunger getting stuck in the key itself and near impossible to get out.

Would it work if I just washed the whole board itself with soap and water, rinsed it real well, and let it dry for a few days? Maybe with a spray bottle, I can get between and underneath the caps real well. I just don't think pulling off all of the caps is the ideal solution here.

[CRTGAMER]

Quick question, I need to get this keyboard cleaned up and i'm trying to think of the best way to do it. Basically, the plungers seem to be a bit too delicate to successfully pull off each one (I just broke my second plunger). This leads to part of the broken plunger getting stuck in the key itself and near impossible to get out.

Would it work if I just washed the whole board itself with soap and water, rinsed it real well, and let it dry for a few days? Maybe with a spray bottle, I can get between and underneath the caps real well. I just don't think pulling off all of the caps is the ideal solution here.

A risk of damaging the keyboard if not fully dried out. Even though a decades old computer, might be best not to go that far down in the cleaning as long as the keys do not stick. Just wipe out underneath with a few Qtips lightly dampened with alcohol. Also too risky pulling keys due to the brittle old plastic.

Did you notice the real lock function on the SHIFT LOCK key? That is something you do not see on modern PCs, a real FULL sized keyboard simulating typewriter keys instead of the now common flat variety. The graphic symbols really work for a rudimentary text draw of the screen. Hold either the C= or SHIFT key or together to change font to upper lower case. Hold the CTRL and press variuos Number keys to change the text color.

Throw in full control of the text cursor anywhere on the screen. I was spoiled by this when I moved on to DOS 6.22 PC, hated the minimal cursor movement at the C:\ prompt.

[Ghudda]

CRT, you're on point! Thanks for all the useful information. Though tedious, i'll see what I can do by hand. Sounds like I have a lot to learn about retro computing.

[CRTGAMER]

CRT, you're on point! Thanks for all the useful information. Though tedious, i'll see what I can do by hand. Sounds like I have a lot to learn about retro computing.

A 1541 disk drive is a nice addition, but mainly needed for the huge library of C64 disk games. I doubt if you will do much saving of files to justify the floppy drive. Still, its a nice addition if you can get one on the cheap. It takes the low density floppies only.

The Commodore line has Basic built right in, great for learning simple programs. There are programs you can even type in from magazines such as Compute Gazette and Run (found today online), look for ELIZA as one of the early artificial intellegence basic programs that runs in 8 bit home computers. Then of course the classic Super Star Trek famous from the main frame computers that used a dot matrix printer for the screen.

For me it was a great stepping stone to later learn all the insides of the newer PC DOS commands. "Programming" the PC Config.sys, Autoexec.bat and various Windows.ini files became a breeze.

[BoneSnapDeez]

Are there disk games for the VIC-20? I've only seen cassette and cartridge.

[Ghudda]

Yeah, I had no idea the VIC-20 could use a disk drive, either. I'll look into it. Where's the best place to get a supply of 5.25" floppies these days?

[BoneSnapDeez]

Like, blank ones?

You can find sealed boxes on eBay.

[Ghudda]

Spent an hour or so working on the keyboard and have it pretty clean. The entire chassis was caked in grime with clumps of hair and other "fibrous matter". Since the space is a bit to tight for q-tips, I used paper towel bits soaked in rubbing alcohol and used the sharp file of finger nail clippers to guide it in between the keys. After like 50 runs, it's looking pretty good. I also got the motherboard cleaned up as much as possible with qtips