Commodore 64 and modem

[Thelion78]

I remember seeing in a second hand shop years ago (in the mid 90's) a modem that could be connected to the C64 via the serial port. Does anybody remember what kind of (if any) modems there were to the C64 and what they could be used for. I mean, the speed must have been fairly low then....:D

 

[carlsson]

A modem connects to the userport on the back left side. There were both 75/1200 split speed modems and 300 baud modems. The C64 hardware has an upper limit at 2400 bps, or perhaps 4800 bps in some revisions. However using an external RS232 interface such as SwiftLink, you could get even higher transfer rates.

What they could be used for? Well, 75/1200 was the Videotex speed for connecting to various Videotex systems. 300/300 was popular among BBS:es, and if you used an external interface and went higher, more BBS:es were available, even some ISPs with shell access for reading e-mail and so on.

Maybe you're not aware that nowadays there exists at least two or three commercial network interfaces for the C64, which can be used with applications and special operating systems (i.e. Contiki) to browse the internet using a semi-graphical web browser, IRC, even text mode VNC!

 

[Druid6900]

Was it the Pocket Modem you were thinking of? Small black box with a white label about 4 inches by 2.5 inches and a modular phone jack on the end?

They initially came in 300 baud then then 1200 baud, and I think they may have even made a 2400 before they stopped making then.

They were made by BOT Engineering not too many miles away from here.

 

[Unknown_K]

I have a commodore modem (300 baud) that looks like it plugs in the back of a c64, never used it.

 

[wiskow]

Was it the Pocket Modem you were thinking of? Small black box with a white label about 4 inches by 2.5 inches and a modular phone jack on the end?

They initially came in 300 baud then then 1200 baud, and I think they may have even made a 2400 before they stopped making then.

They were made by BOT Engineering not too many miles away from here.

The only direct-connect 2400 baud modem ever made for Commodore computers was the Aprotek Minimodem-24C. The fastest modem that Commodore themselves ever made was the Commodore 1670 (1200 baud).

-Andrew

 

[Kaptain Skitzo]

True, but third party mftrs made modems up to 9600 baud to work with the C=64. I believe, though, that someone upp'd the anty to 14.4, but its been so long, I can't be sure on that. IIRC, you did need special hardware add-ons to achieve the higher speeds.

 

[wiskow]

True, but third party mftrs made modems up to 9600 baud to work with the C=64. I believe, though, that someone upp'd the anty to 14.4, but its been so long, I can't be sure on that. IIRC, you did need special hardware add-ons to achieve the higher speeds.

Again, like I said before, the fastest modem that was ever designed for the Commodore, meaning that it connected directly to the user port, was the Aprotek Minimodem-C24 at 2400 baud. True, faster modems could be used, but these were standard RS-232 external modems, and to use these with a Commodore, you need an RS-232 interface. With an RS-232 interface that connects to the user port, you can achieve speeds as fast as 2400 baud on a Commodore 64 or 9600 baud on a Commodore 128. With a special RS-232 interface that connects to the expansion port, you can get speeds even faster. The Swiftlink is capable of speeds as fast as 38400 baud, and the Turbo232 is capable of speeds as fast as 230Kbps! Of course, to actually achieve these speeds, you need a CPU accelerator to allow your computer to actually run this fast, such as a SuperCPU.

-Andrew