This week, an early retrospective: a 1985 look at the C64, "the world's most popular computer" and its origin story...

Originally shared by mos6502

This week, an early retrospective: a 1985 look at the C64, "the world's most popular computer" and its origin story - being the "world's greatest video-game chips." See the full article here:
https://spectrum.ieee.org/ns/pdfs/commodore64_mar1985.pdf
There's lots of info in there about the VIC-II and the early production history of the C64, and a few hiccups too. Also "the albatross" - the slow disk drive interface, and the reasons for it, and the likelihood that this killed the C64's chances in business computing.
At the time of writing, the retail price had come down from $595 to an amazing $149 - and the bill of materials is estimated here as under $50.
"Although the machine has its flaws, the designers of the Commodore 64 believe they came up with many significant advances because of the freedom they enjoyed during the early stages of the project. The design team was autonomous—they did their own market research, developed their own specifications, and took their baby right up through production. But as soon as the production bugs were worked out and Commodore knew it had a winner, the corporate bureaucracy, which until then had been on the West Coast dealing with the VIC-20 and the Pet computer, moved in."
"And Jack Tramiel is currently chief executive officer of Atari Corp., the company that was Commodore’s chief competitor in the home-computer market before losing nearly a billion dollars in competing against the C-64. "

(It's not all about the VIC-II - there's an info-box about the SID too.)