Repair : Bad C64 Colour RAM

One of my first C64C Ebay purchases was a complete "working" C64C with a 1541II and a number of games.

When I got it, it was great but it just looked washed out.  It wasn't until I tried a few more games that I realized that something was actually wrong.

. . .

To the Internet

. . .

Everything we need these days is a quick search on Google.  I found two fantastic site right away.

Ray Carlsen's amazing website : http://personalpages.tds.net/~rcarlsen/

Pictorial C64 Fault Guide website : https://derbian.webs.com/c64diag/

The first thing I did was order a C64 power supply from Ray.  I really did not want to damage my C64 any further.

The second thing I did was buy a cheap desoldering gun and some DIP sockets.  Get the right tools and do it right the first time.

The last thing I did was get a couple of colour RAM chips.

. . .

So the process was pretty simple.

Add a little solder and use the desoldering gun to free all of the pins
Use some solder wick to remove the remaining solder with your soldering iron.
Solder on a DIP socket ( always put in a socket . . . always ).
Push the chip in.

Behold . . . real colour . . .

My 8 bit dark age

When I was 13 my brother and I pooled all of our Christmas Money and with the help of our mother ( who gave us half ) bought our first ever computer . . . a Commodore 64c.

It came with a ridiculous geography book instead of the 4 programming books it was meant to come with. 5 Carts, International Soccer, Wizard of War, Visible Solar System, Magic Desk and Financial Advisor and the c64 manual.

That was it.  No tape drive, not Disk drive, nothing.

I sat down and read every single page of that book and typed in all of the examples, even the assembler ones which I couldn't get to work because you needed a Machine Language Monitor ( I had no idea what that was.

Eventually we got a 1541II, a proper Commodore Monitor and a Commodore Dot Matrix Printer.

Life was grand . . .  I got a C64 Programmers Reference manual and taught myself Assembler.

Eventually the c64 died, it died twice in fact.  Both times it was the terrible epoxy power supply that killed it.  We had it repaired twice but it was never really the same.

Eventually I went to University and started a Computer Science Degree and along with it a IBM Compatible 386.

The C64 went in the cupboard, then to a friend and then to the dump never to be seen again.

. . .

About 4 years ago I discovered the Mist, a FPGA based hardware emulator that could do all sorts of wonderful machines.  Even the Amiga I so wanted but could never afford to buy.

It was Open Source, it was awesome, but it wasn't perfect.  I thought, hey it'd be wonderful if I could get a real C64 again and use it as a reference machine and try to write some VHDL.

Soon I had ( from EBAY ) 4 C64s and and two 1541 II's.  I didn't write any code.  I really wanted to try to hook up a 1541 II to my Mist but it only had two free pins, so it was impossible.

The the MiSTer appeared,  it had free pins everywhere.  I set to the task and behold it was pretty easy to get it going.

. . .

Some of the C64's and 1541 II's weren't in great shape so I had to do some fixes and ditches the crappy power supplies that were the real demise of my original C64.

I started to learn to SMD solder for the MiSTer and stared to fix my ancient computers.

. . .

Then I bought two untested C128's. One worked and one just needed a poke.

. . . 

Then I bought two non working Amiga 600's . . . . yes the holy grail.

Why non working, because working ones are really expensive and I wanted to insert my MiSTer into a broken one ( not a working one ).

. . .

This blog will be all about my adventures as I actually fix everything and restore the huge amount of Commodore History I dreamed of owning as a kid.

I have the parts but not so much time as I juggle work, home and family life.