Hoping to trade in on the tremendous goodwill felt towards the Commodore brand from old school gamers, the relaunched brand has returned with an awesomely retro ‘Commodore 64’ computer, freshly rebooted for 2011.
It’s a net-top inside
Although the form factor may look the same – a chunky keyboard cast adrift in a sea of beige – inside lurks a thoroughly modern set of net-top components, in the shape of a NVIDIA Ion 2 chipset, 1.8 GHz Dual Core 525 Intel Atom processor, HDMI and DVI ports, along with the usual USB, ethernet, and audio connections.
Claimed to be “as close to the original in design as humanly possible,” the new Commodore 64 also comes with a slot or tray loading DVD R/W (Blu-Ray optional) and 2 GB of DDR3 memory, expandable to 4 GB.
Key-fu prowess
The keyboard comes with ‘genuine Cherry brand key switches’ with a ‘lovely IBM classic mechanism and click sound,’ which, apparently, makes it the “ultimate hackers keyboard on which to wield your key-fu”.
HD capable
“The new Commodore 64 can be connected to the latest televisions and monitors, and can deliver 1080p HD quality video playback and six-channel high-definition audio for an excellent home theater experience,” said the company.
Commodore says that the device will run on the Ubuntu 10.04 LTS OS with the Commodore OS 1.0, emulation functionality and classic game package being delivered later,
The nostalgia-infused machine is available in five different configurations, with the barebones version retailing for $250, while the top of the range C64x Ultimate model will come with a 1TB HD, Blu-Ray, 4GB RAM and Wi-Fi and retail for $795,
Specs:
MODEL: Commodore 64x
PROCESSOR: Intel® Atom D525 1.80GHz (Formerly Pineview-D)
CHIPSET: Intel NM10 (Formerly Tiger Point)
Next-Generation NVIDIA ION Graphics (ION2)
MEMORY: 2 x DDR2 667/800 Single Channel DIMM slots (up to 4 GB)
GRAPHICS: Next-Generation NVIDIA ION Graphics Processor
AUDIO: Realtek ALC662 6-CH HD Audio
Nvidia L-PCM digital audio (HDMI 1.3) can support 7.1 output with external decoder
LAN: Realtek RTL8111DL PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet
STORAGE: Intel NM10
2 SATA2 3Gb/s ports
JMicron® JMB362 SATA controller
2 Internal SATA2 3.0Gb/s port with RAID 0, 1, JBOD.
FEATURES: – ACPI S3 Compliant
– ECO-design for EuP Standard
– 12 VDC jack on back panel for external power supply
– Dedicated DDR3 512MB Graphics Memory Onboard
– Premium DirectX 10 graphics with advanced digital display connectivity
– PureVideo™ Full 1080p HD video and Blu-ray playback
– NVIDIA® CUDA™ technology to accelerate the most demanding applications
– Premium Windows experience with Windows Vista and Windows 7
ONBOARD CONNECTORS:
1 mini PCI Express x1 Slot
1 Serial header (RS232)
4 SATA2 3Gb/s Connectors with RAID 0, 1, JBOD functions (SATA#3,#4)
2 USB Pin Headers for up to 3 additional USB 2.0 Ports
1 8 bit GPIO header
1 CIR header
1 9-pin Audio Connector
1 Front Panel Connector
3 Fan Headers
1 4-pin Power Connector
