For the very few who don't know it's a suitcase built by commodore with the commodore 64 computer, a monitor and a 1541 5.25' floppy drive all contained inside. The Commodore 64, also known as the C64 or the CBM 64, is an 8-bit home computer.I recently got a Commodore SX-64. I have now realized that making new keyboards is by far the biggest Commodore 64 project that I have ever gotten myself into… I completely underestimated the amount of time that I had to put into the project before the first working prototype was made.Download emulators for Commodore 64 on Android, iOS, PC, Mac devices. The SID chip is basically a three voice synthesizer on a chip.It has been almost two years since I boldly announced that I would make new keyboards ( link) for my C64 Reloaded boards ( link). The sound chip of the C64 is called the 'Sound Interface Device' or SID, and therefore this music is known as SID music. It emulates the sound chip and other internals of the Commodore 64 home computer to play back music that was originally written on it.Then I scanned the original C64 keyboard PCB and colorized each of the copper traces to see what was connected to what.Next up was making the PCB and align all the components perfectly. This is how the first protoype was created!I started out by measuring the physical locations of the keys to ensure that everything would line up nicely and fit in both types of Commodore 64 cases (breadboxes and the newer C64C cases). So quite a few components went into the project along with a looong list of parts and ideas that were eventually discarded before final decisions were made. The keyboard consists of a PCB, plastic spacers, a 20 pin ribbon cable, custom made keyboard stabilizers, Costar stabs, 3D printed keycap adapters, some resistors, a few capacitors, two IC’s, a heap of microswitches and a black acrylic board for mounting everything. The current version emulates the C64, the C64DTV, the C128.The keyboard is a drop-in replacement for the original keyboard and it should therefore work on all Commodore 64’s, including the C64 Reloaded ( link) and the upcoming Ultimate 64 ( link). Unfortunately, it can't read disks.x, Amiga, Syllable or Mac OS X machine and executes programs intended for the old 8-bit computers.
![]() Commador 64 Emulator Download Emulators ForIn order to get a visual indication of the state of the switch (on or off) a 3 mm LED is placed underneath the keycap and lights up whenever the switch is activated. This way a standard non-latching Cherry mx switch can be used to turn on the Shift Lock and when pressed again, turn it off. I therefore made a small circuit which adds a push on push off functionality. This 5V line is not used on the original Commodore 64 keyboards, so it came in handy for powering the Shift Lock circuit on my keyboard.I used SMD components only, so that the assembly could be done retrospectively if needed. On the final keyboard PCB, the circuit is powered using the 5V line going to the keyboard. The circuit draws about 90 mW when the Shift Lock is activated so this should not put too much strain on the old C64 power supplies.Before transferring the circuit onto the keyboard PCB, the push on push off circuit was tested with a simple breadboard connected to a C64. The laser cutter simply cannot cut 3-5 mm holes for the spacers and the rectangular holes for the Costar stabs would also be problematic. Furthermore, laser cutting in metal gives rise to issues with the size of the holes (according to the local laser cutter guy). A bend metal plate will be very stiff, but would call for special tools that I do not have direct access to. This makes the entire keyboard very stiff.Below are some images of the laser cutter that was used to make the keyboard frame as well as the plates for the Spacebar and the Return keys. To this end, almost 20 holes have been made to the PCB and the acrylic keyboard frame to securely attach the PCB and the acryllic frame to each other. I therefore made some small rectangular mounts that will be placed on the upper side of the keyboard frame and attached with some plastic spacers. I am currently waiting for a special tool, a Du-Bro E/Z bender dub480, that will make the job pretty straightforward.Furthermore, the stabilizers are going to be attached to Costar stabs. This material also allows engraving stuff on top of it to make a nice professional finish – it’s all about the looks, right?I also had to come up with a solution for stabilizing the spacebar and the return bar. The spacebar is 9 units long so the stabilizers (the piano wire thingy underneath it that makes it more stable) have to be custom made. I also have to find some black plastic spacers in the right size before I can assemble everything. The rectangular Spacebar and Return mounts have to be re-made using an acrylic plate of 1.5mm in thickness in order to make the Costar stabs snap into the material correctly. It really works! All the copper traces have been connected correctly, the Shift Lock circuit works with the LED and swapping it with a locking type switch also works.So what is left to do before the new Commodore 64 Cherry keyboard is finally done? Well, I have updated the PCB with some minor improvements and is currently waiting for the next batch being produced in China. There is not much to report other than the C64 keyboard prototype works. I think the black acryllic material looks pretty sweet and will visually look nice underneath the black keyboard PCB. The China stuff is to keep the cost as low as possible for a keyboard.I’ve spend quite some time weeding out the obvious mistakes I did on the first prototype. The long wait is primarily for parts needed for assembling the keyboard (screws, plastic spacers, pin headers, pin caps) and some of the electronic parts (resistors, LED’s). I expect those parts to arrive in late April early May. Thanks a lot guys □Currently I’m waiting for parts to come in from around the world (China, US and England) to make the next prototype. These will be swapped with some nice black ones in the final edition.I’m a bit overwhelmed by the interest in my mechanical Commodore 64 keyboards. I used some spare spacers in white nylon to adjust the height of the keyboard. All I have to do is to remove the keycap of the Shift Lock and exchange the LED by hand. This way the color of the LED can be swapped to match the color of the power LED of the machine. The next version will use clear polycarbonate plates which are ridiculously stronger compared to plexi glass.I have also added SIP sockets to the Shift Lock LED for an easy exchange of LED color. Furthermore, the material I used in the first prototype was black acrylic glass (plexi) which shatters way too easy. The 1.5u keys (Shift, CTRL, Function and RESTORE) also have support underneath to make them as stable as possible. Furthermore, I designed a completely different mount for the stabilizers of the spacebar and the Return key. Fiji software free download for mac os sierraI contacted in the US (I’m in Canada) and they said they could make them for about $65 each, but the tooling/development would likely cost at least $250,000 on top of that. I therefore have high hopes for the next prototype! The results will be posted as soon as I have build and tested it!This is awesome and a testament to the old adage, “no idea is a new idea”! A few months ago I looked into creating a drop in replacement for VIC20/C64 computers using mechanical key switches and new keycaps.
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