PET News

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Here you will find the latest news about the first affordable, mass-produced personal computer for private households: the Commodore PET. This ticker contains news about new game and hardware releases, latest video and podcast uploads, trivia and product information. All freshly fished from the web. RSS feed available!

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All C64 Amiga C128 Plus/4 VIC-20 PET

14.09.2022 - Multi format text adventure 'Silk Dust - Collector's Edition' is ready for pre-order
Silk Dust - the latest text adventure by Davide Bucci is now available for pre-order as a physical release. 'Silk Dust' is the third chapter of the adventures of Emilia Vittorini, after 'Two Days to the Race' and 'The Queen's Footsteps'. Silk Dust is available for the following computers: C64, VIC20+32K, C128, Plus/4, PET models with at least 32K of RAM, Amiga,CPC 664 or CPC6128, MSX, ZX Spectrum 48K, MS-DOS, Macintosh 68k, CP/M, Olivetti M20, RC2014, Atari 800, Apple II, Atari ST.

15.08.2022 - Building a beautiful Acrylic Commodore PET - new video from 'The 8-Bit Guy'
In a previous video 'The 8-Bit Guy' has reviewed the Mini PET. And while he did build a keyboard for it, he didn't really had a good way to mount it all together. And one the things he liked to do, was building a case with acrylic. In this video we see, how he achieved it...

22.07.2022 - Pet2001 core for MIST Board released
The MIST board was designed to implement classic computers like Amiga and C64 (and other 16 or 8 bis systems) as System-on-a-Chip using modern hardware. PET2001 for MiSTer is the port of pet2001fpga to emulate the famous Commodore PET line. Suitable ROMs can be found in the VICE emulator package and should be concatenated into a single file called PET2001.ROM

16.05.2022 - 'TrekWar' - game for Commodore PET released and free for download
TrekWar - A Star Trek action game for the Commodore PET. Shoot those pesky Klingon ships, and gather dilithium crystals to drop them at their storage facilities .. all while making sure you don't run out of energy or have your shields breached.

27.04.2022 - The New MiniPET 4080D, reviewed! - new video from 'The 8-Bit Guy'
In a previous episode 'The 8-Bit Guy' reviewed the miniPET by Tynemouth Software. Now they sent him an updated version of the MiniPET, the New MiniPET 4080D...

21.04.2022 - Video: Happy Birthday Commodore 64, with Bil Herd
The Commodore 64 is the best-selling home computer of all time -- it's the box that launched a million geeks. And it's turning 40 this year. Bil Herd walks us through the evolution of 8-bit home computers at his old employer Commodore in the late 1970's to 1980's. If you don't know your PET from your VIC-20, this is required watching!

22.03.2022 - 1979 Home Computer Buyer's Guide: Apple II, Commodore PET, TRS-80, and The Very Obscure! - new Video from '8-Bit Show And Tell'
Let's take a close look at the Home Computer Buyer's Guide that Popular Science published in their March 1979 issue. Their top concerns were: what programming language did each computer ship with, did they have enough RAM (you need more if you're loading the language from cassette or disk rather than running it from ROM!), and did it allow for later add-ons via ports and slots? Computers considered include the well-known "trinity" of Apple II, Commodore PET, and TRS-80, and many more machines that range from rare to completely forgotten: Compucolor, VideoBrain, Sol, Heath, Interact, Bally, Sorcerer, RCA VIP, PeCos One, Challenger. Which one would you purchase?

12.03.2022 - I found and fixed the fault on the "fractional RAM" PET - new video from 'Adrian's Digital Basement'
Fractional free RAM no more! Let's dig into figuring out what is causing the PET to misbehave so Adrian can figure out exactly which chip is bad to get this great machine up and running again.

05.03.2022 - This Commodore PET has 3096.01066 bytes free! That can't be right. - new video from 'Adrian's Digital Basement'
It's time for a Commodore PET repair. This machine has an impossible amount off free RAM and some unusual problems. Let's try to figure out what's wrong so I can figure out how to find the exact problem with this machine.

26.12.2021 - 'Doomball' for Plus/4 released
Like for the C64, also the Plus/4 got it's port of DoomBall, a Commodore PET conversion of 'POLF: the game of balls and holes' by David Given. Search the maze for the ball and move it into the hole. The game is free for download.

26.12.2021 - C64 game 'Doomball' released
DoomBall is a conversion of POLF: the game of balls and holes for the Commodore PET by David Given. Search the maze for the ball and move it into the hole. The game is free for download.

14.12.2021 - New Commodore PET game ''Cheese and Chive'' released
Mr Misfit has done it again! This time in 80 col PETSCII. As I kinda spin-off to 'Cheese & Onion' (VIC20), tfw8b.com is proud to bring you 'Cheese & Chive' for the 80 Column Commodore PET (or MiniPET 40/80 obvs). Grab yourself a physical copy here.

02.12.2021 - One-Line PET Emulator for Commodore 64 - new video from '8-Bit Show And Tell'
We take a look at a single line of BASIC from Jim Butterfield, published in The Transactor magazine in 1984, that re-configures the Commodore 64 to be able to run some Commodore PET software. We type it in, test it out with a few PET games, and figure out how it works.

30.11.2021 - C64 port of 'PETSCII Portal' released
After the port for Plsus/4, we now also have the C64 version. 'PETSCII Portal' was originally coded by Jim Orlando for Commodore PET as a tribute to the Flash game 'Portal2d', which itself was a tribute to the Valve game Portal. Also the C64 version is available as free download.

28.11.2021 - Plus/4 port of 'PETSCII Portal' released
'PETSCII Portal' was originally coded by Jim Orlando for Commodore PET as a tribute to the Flash game 'Portal2d', which itself was a tribute to the Valve game Portal. Now it was ported to Plus/4 and is available as free download.