Re: incorrect C64 wikipedia page?

From: William Levak <wlevak_at_SDF.ORG>
Date: Fri, 9 Nov 2018 21:59:31 +0000 (UTC)
Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.4.64.1811092140280.11326@sdf.lonestar.org>
I have 901226-01 and 901227-01 original ROMs
        901226-01 and 901227-02 revised kernal ROM
        901226-01 and 901246-01 4064
        901226-01 and 251104-04 SX-64
        901226-01 and 901227-03 second revision kernal ROM
        251913-01               above ROMs combined

As far as I know 901227-01, 901227-02, and 901227-03 are interchangeable.

Commodore did not necerssarily change the ROMs and system boards at the 
same time. In addition, many older C64s were upgraded when new ROMs became 
available.

On Fri, 9 Nov 2018, Francesco Messineo wrote:

> Hi all,
> I've been reading the C64 wikipedia entry and I believe there're some
> incorrect statements:
>
> "The Kernal ROM went through three separate revisions, mostly designed
> to fix bugs. The initial version is only found on 326298 motherboards,
> used in the first production models, and cannot detect if an NTSC or
> PAL VIC-II is present. The second revision is found on all C64s made
> from late 1982 through 1985. The third and last Kernal ROM revision
> was introduced on the 250466 motherboard (late breadbin models with
> 41464 RAM) and is found in all C64Cs."
>
> ---
>
> My comments:
>
> 1) yes, mostly there're three revisions if we exclude the slightly
> modified ones in the SX64, PET64, different keyboard models etc...
> this would be 901227-01 and yes, probably only present in 326298 PCBs
> and in the very early ones. I've never seen one in real life.
> 2) The second revision would be 901227-02 and that, in my experience,
> is present only in the 1982-1983 period PCBs. All 901227-02 I've seen
> have 83xx date codes anyway.
> 3) The third revision would be 901227-03 and it was introduced
> somewhere between 1983 and 1984, as all 1984 and later C64 that I've
> seen have the -03.
> 4) The C64C just "condensed" basic and kernel ROMs into one single
> 16Kbyte ROM instead of the 2 x 8Kbytes of the previous PCB revisions.
> It still uses the 901227-03 image, even if obviously the part number
> of this new ROM changed. So we can't really speak about a "revision"
> here.
>
> What do you think? At least some parts of that wikipedia entry should
> be rectified imho
>
> Frank IZ8DWF
>
>

wlevak@sdf.lonestar.org
SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org
Received on 2018-11-10 00:00:02

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