A64 is a

Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness ...

emulator for the

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers introduced by Commodore in 1985. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16- or 32-bit processors, 256 KB or more of RAM, mouse-based GUIs, and significantly improved graphi ...

. It was developed and published by QuesTronix and distributed as

shareware Shareware is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer ...

. The non-registered is limited to ten minutes of use at a time. The registered version removes the time limit and comes with a hardware adapter to connect a Commodore 1541 disk drive to the Amiga's

parallel port In computing, a parallel port is a type of interface found on early computers (personal and otherwise) for connecting peripherals. The name refers to the way the data is sent; parallel ports send multiple bits of data at once ( parallel ...

. A64 has some extras that a real Commodore 64 is inherently unable to provide. The most useful of these is an integrated

MOS 6510 300px, Image of the internals of a Commodore 64 showing the 6510 CPU (40-pin DIP, lower left). The chip on the right is the 6581 SID. The production week/year (WWYY) of each chip is given below its name. The MOS Technology 6510 is an 8-bit mic ...

machine language In computer programming, machine code is any low-level programming language, consisting of machine language instructions, which are used to control a computer's central processing unit (CPU). Each instruction causes the CPU to perform a very ...

monitor, which can be invoked at any time during the emulation. While in the monitor, the emulated Commodore 64 is frozen in place, giving the user full reign over its internal memory and registers. The emulator also allows machine language program input through 6510

mnemonic A mnemonic ( ) device, or memory device, is any learning technique that aids information retention or retrieval (remembering) in the human memory for better understanding. Mnemonics make use of elaborative encoding, retrieval cues, and imag ...

codes, rather than raw numeric values. Another extra feature is that the 16-colour palette of the Commodore 64 is fully customisable from the Amiga's palette of 4096 hues. A64 supports Commodore 64 disk drives as the devices 8 through 11, just like a real Commodore 64. These drives can be either simulated, mapped onto directories on the Amiga's filesystem, or real 1541 compatible drives accessed through the hardware adapter. A64 does not support the Commodore Datasette.

References

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Amiga Hardware Database
{{Portal bar, Amiga, 1980s, 1990s Amiga emulation software Commodore 64 emulators Shareware