Talk:Commodore BASIC

Information on memory copy timing incorrect?

"Test results have shown that copying 16 kilobytes of memory from ROM to RAM takes less than a second in machine code, but over 10 minutes in BASIC."

Actually takes 5 minutes, running the program below on the VIC. And that's even using number literals.

10 TI$="000000"
20 FORI=1TO16384:POKE7680,PEEK(65535):NEXT
30 PRINT TI$

--Jquarry 06:34, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

You copied 16 KB on a VIC? The VIC-20 had only 5 KB of RAM! Please explain. SJ2571 (talk) 12:17, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

Interesting. I distinctly remember copying the BASIC interpreter from ROM to RAM, in two 8-kilobyte blocks of POKE I,PEEK(I) takes ten minutes. Unfortunately I don't have a real C64 any more to test it on. — JIP | Talk 06:37, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

I read something somewhere about this 10 minute delay, too. I have all my old C64 books in my garage so I'll pull them out and mull them over this weekend to see what I can find. Also, regarding the code snippets tested here: are they all on REAL physical machines as opposed to emulators? SJ2571 (talk) 12:17, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

I ran the following program on a Commodore 64:

10 TI$="000000"
20 FORI=40960TO49151:POKEI,PEEK(I):NEXT
30 FORI=57344TO65535:POKEI,PEEK(I):NEXT
40 PRINTINT(TI/6)/10

According to the last line, it takes a total of 69.3 seconds to run - a long time, yes, but the "10 minute" estimate is off by an order of magnitude. Unfortunately, I can't include this original research in the article - but the information there now is clearly wrong. Crotalus horridus (TALK • CONTRIBS) 04:22, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Hmm. How can plain program runs like the above, performed in order to establish a simple(?) fact, be construed as "original research"? I'd say there should be no problem fixing the article---as long as we could agree on the correct time. --Wernher 15:35, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, if you read WP:OR it says under "Expert editors":

"No original research" does not prohibit experts on a specific topic from adding their knowledge to Wikipedia. On the contrary, Wikipedia welcomes the contributions of experts, as long as their knowledge is verifiable.

Since the information is verifiable I will add it. - DNewhall 17:32, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Easter Egg

Seeing as this is an encyclopedia, 'type X and see what happens...' just doesn't seem to fit properly in. Does anyone know what happens, as my C=64 died years ago? Empaler 14:04, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Microsoft Amiga Basic, C128 V7.0 Basic Deal?

I owned both an Amiga 1000 and Commodore 128 back in the mid-80s. I half-remember reading that in order to get Microsoft to agree to do a Basic for the Amiga, Commodore would have to relent and place a Microsoft copyright on its 6502 Basic for the Commodore 128. Ah, just found a reference: Biggest Deal in Computer History. Is this information worth adding to the Wiki article? 2*6 20:53, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Sure, add it. Dexter Nextnumber (talk) 05:41, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

PEEK command on BASIC 1.0 explicitly disabled

Not being able to read the BASIC ROM in V 1.0 basic is explicitly disabled by Commodore basic, which I believe was an early form of DRM.

PEEK and POKE to locations around $EXXX were allowed for access to I/O registers, e.g.

poke 59468,14

to set lowercase characters

I can't find a reference to this yet, but I remember this from looking at the BASIC disassembly a long time ago cojoco (talk) 05:04, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Where can I find a disassembly of BASIC 1.0 for the PET? If that is unavailable, I would settle for a binary image and a hexdump. I have noticed that binaries stored on Commodore Disk drives often include that pesky 2 byte leading pointer, or load address, something that really shouldn't be there. That's why I wanted both a binary image, and a hexdump - so I can look for erroneous disassemblies that have to be corrected before they lead to a phase error. The main article could be improved by linking it to a website where I could download it. Dexter Nextnumber (talk) 05:48, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

List of BASIC 2.0 Tokens needed

The main article could be improved if there were a link at a bottom telling users where they locate a list of BASIC 2.0 Tokens. Maybe there is already a list to that effect in Wikipedia, but I haven't noticed where it is. Could somebody add a link to the bottom of the main article so I could examine the hexadecimal values to the BASIC 2.0 Tokens? 198.177.27.25 (talk) 02:22, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Version used in VIC-20

The source dump available on Zimmers states that the BASIC version number used in the VIC-1001 and VIC-20 is 2.1. Is this source reliable enough to cite? Thu (talk) 12:20, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Missing machines and versions

Hi

The "Published Versions" section makes no mention of the PET/CBM 3000 series or BASIC 3.0 which I used at school; I was using a CBM 3032 and the annunciator on boot said:

### COMMODORE BASIC ### 31743 BYTES FREE READY. However checking version numbers internally showed up version 3.0 as did all the manuals. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Stonelaughter (talk • contribs) 08:41, 29 December 2020 (UTC)