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> Dozens? I would assume that there are millions on the internet that grew up with these 8-bit computers or even punch cards. They mean not many people will ha

> Dozens? I would assume that there are millions on the internet that grew up with these 8-bit computers or even punch cards. They mean not many people will have recorded the sound from this record and then loaded it on to their C64. I doubt there are that many people who've even heard of this group[0], let alone owned anything anything by them. While this article is interesting, and something most people, including me, didn't know about, it's not something that was just discovered. The group's own label told people to look for a "hidden message", and gave a new computer to the guy who found it first.[1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prodigal_(band) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prodigal_(band) [1] http://popdose.com/dw-dunphy-on-prodigal/ http://popdose.com/dw-dunphy-on-prodigal/

7thaccount 6y ago
Ah lol. Ok I understand now. My apologies and thanks for correcting!
jandrese 6y ago
It should be noted that although it was terribly designed the Commodore 1541 disk drive was by far the most common peripheral sold with the machine. It was fairly uncommon for C64 owners to load off of tape unlike other 8 bit systems. Loading off of vinyl requires even more hardware hackery (building the adapter cable) so I wouldn't be surprised if you're right that only a few dozen people have ever done it. As terrible as the 1541 was, it was still better than the touchy unreliable tape drives of the day, which were generally just cheaply built audiocassette players. It was a factor in making the C64 so dominant in its era.
- ptrincr 6y ago
  > It should be noted that although it was terribly designed the Commodore 1541 disk drive was by far the most common peripheral sold with the machine. It was fairly uncommon for C64 owners to load off of tape unlike other 8 bit systems I think this was true for the American market. However in Europe (and I believe in Australia as well) tape was the main medium people would have used. Certainly when the C64 was being marketed towards children as late as the early 90s, it was being sold as a cheap games machine and came with the trusty datasette. I don't think that it was until the Amiga 500(and of course the Atari st) where the disk format really took off for the home market this side of the pond.
- stonogo 6y ago
  Do you have sales figures on this claim? The only person I knew with a 1541 was a college professor; most Commodore owners in my area didn't start getting floppy drives until they got extremely cheap on the secondhand market. The Commodore tape format was miles better than its competitors, since it had parity operations.
  - abiogenesis 6y ago
    I wouldn't say "miles better" as it was the slowest of all, despite the custom manufactured player/recorder (C2N Datasette). ZX Spectrum, for example, was able to save and load ~4 times faster using any cassette player with stock ROM routines.
- lb1lf 6y ago
  Anecdata alert - I grew up on the C64 in (reasonably affluent) Norway. Everybody and their dog had the C64. For quite a while, I only knew of one household in addition to mine which had a 1541 to go along with it - when I wanted to, ahem, exchange evaluation copies of software with friends, I had to copy it onto tape. IIRC, a 1541 retailed at 2/3 of the price of a C64. You could buy an awful lot of tape for the money you saved on going with a tape drive instead.
- webmaven 6y ago
  > It should be noted that although it was terribly designed the Commodore 1541 disk drive was by far the most common peripheral sold with the machine. It was fairly uncommon for C64 owners to load off of tape unlike other 8 bit systems. That doesn't match my experience. Fewer than half of the C64 systems I encountered had disk drives, and all of them had tape drives. Turbo Tape was the most common software in use.

7thaccount 6y ago

Ah lol. Ok I understand now. My apologies and thanks for correcting!

jandrese 6y ago

It should be noted that although it was terribly designed the Commodore 1541 disk drive was by far the most common peripheral sold with the machine. It was fairly uncommon for C64 owners to load off of tape unlike other 8 bit systems. Loading off of vinyl requires even more hardware hackery (building the adapter cable) so I wouldn't be surprised if you're right that only a few dozen people have ever done it. As terrible as the 1541 was, it was still better than the touchy unreliable tape drives of the day, which were generally just cheaply built audiocassette players. It was a factor in making the C64 so dominant in its era.

ptrincr 6y ago
> It should be noted that although it was terribly designed the Commodore 1541 disk drive was by far the most common peripheral sold with the machine. It was fairly uncommon for C64 owners to load off of tape unlike other 8 bit systems I think this was true for the American market. However in Europe (and I believe in Australia as well) tape was the main medium people would have used. Certainly when the C64 was being marketed towards children as late as the early 90s, it was being sold as a cheap games machine and came with the trusty datasette. I don't think that it was until the Amiga 500(and of course the Atari st) where the disk format really took off for the home market this side of the pond.
stonogo 6y ago
Do you have sales figures on this claim? The only person I knew with a 1541 was a college professor; most Commodore owners in my area didn't start getting floppy drives until they got extremely cheap on the secondhand market. The Commodore tape format was miles better than its competitors, since it had parity operations.
- abiogenesis 6y ago
  I wouldn't say "miles better" as it was the slowest of all, despite the custom manufactured player/recorder (C2N Datasette). ZX Spectrum, for example, was able to save and load ~4 times faster using any cassette player with stock ROM routines.
lb1lf 6y ago
Anecdata alert - I grew up on the C64 in (reasonably affluent) Norway. Everybody and their dog had the C64. For quite a while, I only knew of one household in addition to mine which had a 1541 to go along with it - when I wanted to, ahem, exchange evaluation copies of software with friends, I had to copy it onto tape. IIRC, a 1541 retailed at 2/3 of the price of a C64. You could buy an awful lot of tape for the money you saved on going with a tape drive instead.
webmaven 6y ago
> It should be noted that although it was terribly designed the Commodore 1541 disk drive was by far the most common peripheral sold with the machine. It was fairly uncommon for C64 owners to load off of tape unlike other 8 bit systems. That doesn't match my experience. Fewer than half of the C64 systems I encountered had disk drives, and all of them had tape drives. Turbo Tape was the most common software in use.