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CharPad 2.8 User Manual - Subchrist Software, 2021.

Does Anyone Still Use a Commodore 64?

For anything serious?... unlikely.

The Commodore 64 was a very popular computer in the 1980's and despite attempts by Commodore to market it as a business machine, thanks to it's (then) advanced audio/visual hardware, it quickly gained great popularity as a games machine.

In recent years, interest in the Commodore 64 has seen a resurgence, why?, perhaps some combination of these things...

Hardware Nostalgia.

As our computer technology has advanced, our ability as users, to fully comprehend and control it has massively declined, the home computers of the 1980's may represent the very last generation of machines that actually came with a programming manual and a thrilling sense of some enormous potential that, with learning and effort, might be unlocked.

Technical limitations can act as a highly motivating force for the creative mind and the home computers of the 1980's provided exactly that.

Emulators.

Commodore 64 emulators are software packages that run on modern computers and can accurately reproduce (in software) the inner workings and experience of using the real machine.

The most popular ones (at the time of writing) are probably VICE (x64) and CCS64.

Software Nostalgia.

Literally thousands of the old classic games and demos can now be found quite easily on the internet as free digital downloads.

These can be run inside emulators or transferred to physical media and played on the real thing.

Over the last 20+ years, a great many people have devoted their time and energy to create high quality digital reproductions of most of the old disks, tapes, and cartridges and even a large volume of high-resolution colour scans of the original packaging, artwork and manuals can now be found with minimal effort.

New software.

The Commodore 64 has a devoted community of fans, developers and artists who enjoy making new games and demos for the old hardware, they often come equipped with modern tools and fresh new ideas.

CharPad is for them.