He went through all of that trouble to get a friggin C64 in HDMI! WHY? Native gaming resolution of 160x200! A total waste of money which significantly harms the graphics the way they were meant to be seen. ALL of the C64's games were developed on and meant to be played on a TV or a 1702 monitor. I personally had my 64 attached to a B&W TV over RF with a lousy tuner.
@@tarstarkusz because not everyone can have a CRT to connect their C64 to. HDMI out makes connectivity to modern displays a lot easier. But you know, you do you
@@TheBatNaz First, why can't they? Anyone with the room and money to be into a real C64 has the room and certainly the money for a TV. Second, there are plenty of ATSC flat screen TVs with analog NTSC tuners, not to mention composite and svideo in them.
@@tarstarkusz I'm glad you have the space to have a massive CRT on your desk along with the rest of your equipment. However not all of us are so lucky. In the UK CRT TVs are few a far between and most modern LCD TVs introduce a load of lag with over composite/Svideo/scart converting the analogue signal to digital (i know this from trying to run various 80/90s consoles on a modern TV) Anyway like i said, you do you. Me however, i have limited space with a modern gaming/streaming setup and not to mention working from home so i have my work PC as well.
Wow! The output was amazing! What a great upgrade to an old system. I know it takes away the whole nostalgia aspect, but to be able to use these on new TVs/monitors just gives them so much more life. Love it!
I recall always blurred my image as much as I could back in the day because of the chunky resolution. The results were better for me because the pixels were softer and more natural looking. This is great though of course for those wanting a super sharp look
@@RetroHackShack oh right that's bloody amazing then. I miss my C64 but the worry of it dying on me was too much so I turned to emulation. And the only solution I found decent for it back in 2005 was xbox and a crt. Since moved over to BMC64 on raspberry pi which is just about perfect. It's vital the C64 is around in some form
You can actually keep the output mode to whatever your monitor needs while reprogramming the palette. Toggling the switch is only necessary to unlock the palette registers (this is a kind of pretection against malware and against cheating at demo-competitions). It makes no difference on which position the switch then is for palette programming. And there is also only one palette overall.
Interesting way to go about HDMI output. Better modern solution is VIC-II Kawari which already has HDMI output and allows switching between PAL and NTSC on any C64 including NTSC/50 (unfortunately no PAL/60 yet) and analog RGB so it can be used on all sorts of displays the way one likes. Might be good topic for video :)
@Bee Eff Yep I am aware of the project, I am going to be one of the early adopters, Once Randy announces it in the next few weeks. He already finalized a PCB design.
I enjoyed your video, just subbed to your channel. I am always very interested in how Commodore users are connecting the video to the newer monitors. I want to go from the Commodore 64 S-Video to VGA input on my large flat screen monitor. I already have the VGA Cable going to a gender changer, but I can’t seem to find a 5 Pin or 8 pin S-Video to VGA cable; in the configuration I need. Would you have any suggestions? Anyway, after I obtain a Commodore 64 to work on, I’ll research it later.
Thanks for the video. I couldn't find one about a 250407 board installation. I was curious on both the potentiometer interference and the timing glitches. I think I will stick with installing it in a 466 board instead.
Did I hear correctly that you were still able to use your C64's A/V output? I installed the component mod board in my 250466 board and the A/V port's output is no longer detected by an S-Video to VGA adapter I have. Could be a slight deviation with the chroma/luma output now, that my adapter is having trouble with. c0pperdragon says the signals should be the same though. I did try moving the slider switch to 240/288p. It did not help.
@@RetroHackShack Thanks for confirming. I am hearing it should work from other sources as well. Not sure what is going on yet as I have continuity with all of the pins going from the PCB to the A/V port. I know my cable is good and the computer had a working RF mod installed previously
I've no idea about the WHY? You put a FPGA in a C64, which is massively overpowered, and a quite expensive IC. You could everybit as well rip out the entire PCB, stick a Pi Pico 2350 in it for 6€, and bit bang the HDMI heck out of it using its PIO by emulating a C64 on its RISC core. It even can produce RGB SCART output at the same time. Even that is weird, as the Pico 2350 is as well 100 times as powerfull as a 6502. Another benefit of the Pico-route is that you can power the modded C64 with one of your 20 old phone chargers in your kitchen drawer, instead of keeping the achilles heel of the C64 in place: its brick-of-death. So I would say: embrace the diahrea that the C64 is SUPPOSED to output on RF, and hook up a vintage TV that can be found for 10 bucks. OR just run an C64 emulator on a modern computer, so you can really do stuff for C64 code and use a decent keyboard instead of a shitty one.
9:10 I think this weird horseshoe alignment is to prevent users from accidentally plugging power supply cable into the video output and frying the computer. C64 PSU cable has the "normal" alignment. In later computers (C+4, C128, Amiga) Commodore used a square plug for power, so there was less room for "creativity". Unless someone owned an Amiga and a C128 and grabbed the wrong PSU.
Back in the day I had a clapped out CRT TV for my C64. So ultra crisp pixels don't fit my experience. The visual imperfections are part of the "charm" of the C64.
Adrian sent me, interesting vid. After watching this vid, I gotta wonder why not just grab the data and screen refresh signal going to the computers video modulator in the first place?
So much easier and cheaper to Emulate these day's, i run a Pi400 with Pimiga which is a variant of (Amibian/Amiberry) And they seem to be coming out with Retro PC, like the Mini A500, the Mini C64, ect
I am not sure if you know what banding actually is, but a tech channel should use the right wording, IMHO. Besides that, with all that black artefacts, you need to check your HDMI connection.
The RGBtoHDMI board I sell might be made to work with that although it is not listed as supported. I am not familiar enough with that video chip to tell you, but it seems similar to the mod I did on my TRS-80 Color Computer 1. You might want to ask in the forums. stardot.org.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=14430%5D
You can sometimes find them at the following link. I will be selling them on my website soonish for North American orders. stardot.org.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=20404
@@natethefighter The problem is that with the chip shortage going on, the CPLDs are not available. As soon as they are available again, I can have a batch made up.
i wish i can get The Commodore 64 my other died i don't want pay $300 or more on eBay , if i did but what it end of dyeing in few days or so its so old. however i do have c64 mini . its not same as real thing. few months ago i saw one at use store they charge a lot
Got a nice surprise watching the video to see my GitHub post featured at 37:12. Nice to see that the discussion there has helped others. One other issue I had installing mine was with the provided connection headers being way too short. This meant I couldn't solder the board high enough and ended up buying these which are much longer - www.digikey.ca/en/products/detail/samtec-inc/TSW-120-15-G-S/6679097.
@@RetroHackShack Yep, mine was a "fat" breadbin and the supplied headers were just too short. I also made little temporary standoffs to lift the component board up and keep it horizontal for soldering. In my case I found that 9.6mm high standoffs was ideal for getting the 3.5mm socket in the perfect position.
Hello Aaron, I am interested in the 3D model for the case standoffs.
I have added the link to the description.
Quite the effort to get it all working! Well done!
Thanks. I can't believe the quality of the output.
He went through all of that trouble to get a friggin C64 in HDMI! WHY? Native gaming resolution of 160x200! A total waste of money which significantly harms the graphics the way they were meant to be seen.
ALL of the C64's games were developed on and meant to be played on a TV or a 1702 monitor. I personally had my 64 attached to a B&W TV over RF with a lousy tuner.
@@tarstarkusz because not everyone can have a CRT to connect their C64 to. HDMI out makes connectivity to modern displays a lot easier. But you know, you do you
@@TheBatNaz First, why can't they? Anyone with the room and money to be into a real C64 has the room and certainly the money for a TV.
Second, there are plenty of ATSC flat screen TVs with analog NTSC tuners, not to mention composite and svideo in them.
@@tarstarkusz I'm glad you have the space to have a massive CRT on your desk along with the rest of your equipment. However not all of us are so lucky. In the UK CRT TVs are few a far between and most modern LCD TVs introduce a load of lag with over composite/Svideo/scart converting the analogue signal to digital (i know this from trying to run various 80/90s consoles on a modern TV) Anyway like i said, you do you. Me however, i have limited space with a modern gaming/streaming setup and not to mention working from home so i have my work PC as well.
Wow! The output was amazing! What a great upgrade to an old system. I know it takes away the whole nostalgia aspect, but to be able to use these on new TVs/monitors just gives them so much more life. Love it!
I didn't even know about your surgery, but glad the recovery went well.
Thanks
I've been binging on c64 videos lately, i just ordered myself a c64 maxi, i am super excited.
Hope your healing and recovery is swift and successful!
Thank you
Glad you are feeling better, Aaron!
I recall always blurred my image as much as I could back in the day because of the chunky resolution. The results were better for me because the pixels were softer and more natural looking. This is great though of course for those wanting a super sharp look
It is also highly configurable. So you can add scanlines or fuzzy pixels if you really want to.
@@RetroHackShack oh right that's bloody amazing then. I miss my C64 but the worry of it dying on me was too much so I turned to emulation. And the only solution I found decent for it back in 2005 was xbox and a crt. Since moved over to BMC64 on raspberry pi which is just about perfect. It's vital the C64 is around in some form
You can actually keep the output mode to whatever your monitor needs while reprogramming the palette. Toggling the switch is only necessary to unlock the palette registers (this is a kind of pretection against malware and against cheating at demo-competitions). It makes no difference on which position the switch then is for palette programming. And there is also only one palette overall.
Awesome. Thanks for clarifying!
Fantastic mod and upgrade of the C64 !
Thanks!
I would love to see a video on the rpi 1541. Looks cool!
Interesting way to go about HDMI output. Better modern solution is VIC-II Kawari which already has HDMI output and allows switching between PAL and NTSC on any C64 including NTSC/50 (unfortunately no PAL/60 yet) and analog RGB so it can be used on all sorts of displays the way one likes. Might be good topic for video :)
Fascinating video. I've got several C64 boxes laying around, I must try this. I'd love to see a video on the Rpi 1541 as well.
You should!
Hi from Sydney, Australia. I found your channel via Adrian.
Welcome
Great video mate. going to have a go at this.
Thanks
What a great video with detail and awesome work and great editing. Thank you!
I would like to see a fully internal mod adding the RGB2HDMI as internally mounted device. But I am also looking forward to Kawari.
I am too looking at that project!!!!
@Bee Eff Yep I am aware of the project, I am going to be one of the early adopters, Once Randy announces it in the next few weeks. He already finalized a PCB design.
This is awesome
I enjoyed your video, just subbed to your channel. I am always very interested in how Commodore users are connecting the video to the newer monitors.
I want to go from the Commodore 64 S-Video to VGA input on my large flat screen monitor. I already have the VGA Cable going to a gender changer, but I can’t seem to find a 5 Pin or 8 pin S-Video to VGA cable; in the configuration I need. Would you have any suggestions? Anyway, after I obtain a Commodore 64 to work on, I’ll research it later.
I would like to see the video on the RPI 1541
I always remember this LOADING NOT READY bug! It was just text over text
Why not using the S-Video output? Should have been easier for the device to process.
Thanks for the video. I couldn't find one about a 250407 board installation. I was curious on both the potentiometer interference and the timing glitches. I think I will stick with installing it in a 466 board instead.
You are most welcome. I will admit I was quite confused at first myself.
Did I hear correctly that you were still able to use your C64's A/V output? I installed the component mod board in my 250466 board and the A/V port's output is no longer detected by an S-Video to VGA adapter I have. Could be a slight deviation with the chroma/luma output now, that my adapter is having trouble with. c0pperdragon says the signals should be the same though. I did try moving the slider switch to 240/288p. It did not help.
Yes. I still have my AV outputs on my video port.
@@RetroHackShack Thanks for confirming. I am hearing it should work from other sources as well. Not sure what is going on yet as I have continuity with all of the pins going from the PCB to the A/V port. I know my cable is good and the computer had a working RF mod installed previously
Awesome.
I've no idea about the WHY? You put a FPGA in a C64, which is massively overpowered, and a quite expensive IC. You could everybit as well rip out the entire PCB, stick a Pi Pico 2350 in it for 6€, and bit bang the HDMI heck out of it using its PIO by emulating a C64 on its RISC core. It even can produce RGB SCART output at the same time. Even that is weird, as the Pico 2350 is as well 100 times as powerfull as a 6502. Another benefit of the Pico-route is that you can power the modded C64 with one of your 20 old phone chargers in your kitchen drawer, instead of keeping the achilles heel of the C64 in place: its brick-of-death.
So I would say: embrace the diahrea that the C64 is SUPPOSED to output on RF, and hook up a vintage TV that can be found for 10 bucks. OR just run an C64 emulator on a modern computer, so you can really do stuff for C64 code and use a decent keyboard instead of a shitty one.
9:10 I think this weird horseshoe alignment is to prevent users from accidentally plugging power supply cable into the video output and frying the computer. C64 PSU cable has the "normal" alignment. In later computers (C+4, C128, Amiga) Commodore used a square plug for power, so there was less room for "creativity". Unless someone owned an Amiga and a C128 and grabbed the wrong PSU.
Yeah. I think so too.
You should have kept the original music for that demo. For a while I thought it was generated by the Commodore 64.
Yeah. That was a bummer. The content match was bogus.
@@RetroHackShack There was a content match for a _demo?_
Yes. The music in the demo was incorrectly matched. I didn't have time or energy to dispute it.
The music @ 43:28 - please tell me that is not the SID chip...
@22:08 what happened to all your text looks like I am looking a Mirror? (See shirt and back wall)
I mirror the webcam. Otherwise it looks like I am looking away from the screen.
I'd be curious if the RGB2HDMI would cope with Luma/Chrominance (SVideo)? I have a couple of systems (C64, VIC20, Atari 800XL) that output SVideo.
Unlikely.
I just put a Sophia 2 DVI solution in my Atari 800 XL. A pure digital signal that looks amazing. And easy to convert to HDMI because it is digital.
@@cbmeeks definitely something I'll do one day.
Is there something wrong with the 64's S-video outputs? I'm wondering why they don't use those instead.
Sitting at home in your Pajamas? So basically just like 2020? :)
LOL. Yeah. Not as unusual as it used to be.
Back in the day I had a clapped out CRT TV for my C64. So ultra crisp pixels don't fit my experience. The visual imperfections are part of the "charm" of the C64.
I like original hardware when possible. Sometimes it's not. So it's nice to have alternatives, too.
Adrian sent me, interesting vid. After watching this vid, I gotta wonder why not just grab the data and screen refresh signal going to the computers video modulator in the first place?
Yes. That's exactly what the c0pperdragon board does.
Hi Can I buy a cable for HDMI for my Commodore 128 in 40 and 80 columns RGBI??? it is possible to have it ready assembled
Any thing can be done like this 80 column C128 yes the CGAI video some older computers also? I thought the COCO 1-3 are CGAI
Hi, where can i buy the C0pperdragon board kit?
Try this Google search www.google.com/search?q=c0pperdragon+c64
So much easier and cheaper to Emulate these day's, i run a Pi400 with Pimiga which is a variant of (Amibian/Amiberry)
And they seem to be coming out with Retro PC, like the Mini A500, the Mini C64, ect
Hi where i can find this hdmi module its just awesome :) i finish my power supply mod and it work like a charm!!!
We are working on building some more. I will soon be selling them on my website for North America buyers.
@@RetroHackShack perfect im in Canada :)
I am not sure if you know what banding actually is, but a tech channel should use the right wording, IMHO. Besides that, with all that black artefacts, you need to check your HDMI connection.
Adrian sent me :D
Were can we buy these dongles
Thanks
Are something similar for MSX VG8020?
The RGBtoHDMI board I sell might be made to work with that although it is not listed as supported. I am not familiar enough with that video chip to tell you, but it seems similar to the mod I did on my TRS-80 Color Computer 1. You might want to ask in the forums. stardot.org.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=14430%5D
Hi, Please share the model. I need to repair my c64. Thanks!
It's in the description.
Is there anywhere to buy this RGB to HDMI solution ready-made?
You can sometimes find them at the following link. I will be selling them on my website soonish for North American orders. stardot.org.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=20404
@@RetroHackShack I'll definitely keep my ear to the ground for that!
@@natethefighter The problem is that with the chip shortage going on, the CPLDs are not available. As soon as they are available again, I can have a batch made up.
How do order the rgb to hdmi converter?
I will be selling them on my website soon. Or you will be able to order them again in the UK soon as well.
Thank you for the fast reply. Need some for my Coco 2 and Coco 3.
ground the RF has to have a good earth or ground
i wish i can get The Commodore 64 my other died i don't want pay $300 or more on eBay , if i did but what it end of dyeing in few days or so its so old. however i do have c64 mini . its not same as real thing. few months ago i saw one at use store they charge a lot
can you just buy the pcb ? i rather build it my self -thanks
The gerbers are available on the GitHub page. That's what I did.
@@RetroHackShack
cool thanks !
31:00 is that an emulator
No. That is direct video capture from the C64.
@@RetroHackShack looks to good to be real
What is the technical difference between this solution and connecting C0pperdragon component mod to OSSC?
lipstick?
Ha ha. Nope. Just red I guess.
You say "Er" too much, which renders this unwatchable.
Absolutely ridiculous. This a 240p screen which, in games, is 160 pixels wide. You get native S-Video, that is more than good enough.
Got a nice surprise watching the video to see my GitHub post featured at 37:12. Nice to see that the discussion there has helped others. One other issue I had installing mine was with the provided connection headers being way too short. This meant I couldn't solder the board high enough and ended up buying these which are much longer - www.digikey.ca/en/products/detail/samtec-inc/TSW-120-15-G-S/6679097.
I was wondering about that. The cases that were a bit deeper would definitely be a problem.
@@RetroHackShack Yep, mine was a "fat" breadbin and the supplied headers were just too short. I also made little temporary standoffs to lift the component board up and keep it horizontal for soldering. In my case I found that 9.6mm high standoffs was ideal for getting the 3.5mm socket in the perfect position.
Great channel btw. You've got a new subscriber :)