1. Forum
  2. FidoNet
  3. CBM

  • Do C64 Enthusiasts Use 80 Cols?

    From mpower@3:633/10 to All on Mon Jul 27 11:00:02 2026
    Hi folks, I am curious if some people have 80 cols
    setups for their C64. Perhaps that is C128 territory
    only? I've seen some BBSs dedicated to 40 cols and
    PETSCII presentations, so maybe I am missing the
    point entirely. I'm just curious. I love all the
    micros from '77 and up. Thanks!

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Captain Nemo@3:633/10 to All on Mon Jul 27 12:11:49 2026
    On Sun, 26 Jul 2026 22:32:15 -0000 (UTC), mpower wrote:

    Hi folks, I am curious if some people have 80 cols setups for their C64. Perhaps that is C128 territory only? I've seen some BBSs dedicated to 40
    cols and PETSCII presentations, so maybe I am missing the point
    entirely. I'm just curious. I love all the micros from '77 and up.
    Thanks!

    The C64 has no native way to do 80 columns.

    That said, some terminal programs offered an 80 column mode for the C64
    that basically just changed the font.

    IHMO: It looked awful and was hard to read. But YMMV.

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From mpower@3:633/10 to All on Tue Jul 28 13:00:01 2026
    Much appreciated.

    ---- Original Message ----
    Subject: Re: Do C64 Enthusiasts Use 80 Cols?
    From: Captain Nemo <noone@nowhere.com>
    Date: Mon, 27 Jul 2026 12:11:49 +0000
    Newsgroups: comp.sys.cbm
    Article: 19530

    On Sun, 26 Jul 2026 22:32:15 -0000 (UTC), mpower wrote:

    Hi folks, I am curious if some people have 80 cols setups for their C64. Perhaps that is C128 territory only? I've seen some BBSs dedicated to 40
    cols and PETSCII presentations, so maybe I am missing the point
    entirely. I'm just curious. I love all the micros from '77 and up.
    Thanks!

    The C64 has no native way to do 80 columns.

    That said, some terminal programs offered an 80 column mode for the C64
    that basically just changed the font.

    IHMO: It looked awful and was hard to read. But YMMV.

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Kurt Weiske@1:218/700 to Captain Nemo on Tue Jul 28 18:32:08 2026
    Captain Nemo wrote to All <=-

    The C64 has no native way to do 80 columns.

    That said, some terminal programs offered an 80 column mode for the C64 that basically just changed the font.

    IHMO: It looked awful and was hard to read. But YMMV.

    80 columns on a black and white TV, now that was horrid. I did one
    semester of computer science dialed into the university's computers with
    that setup, and got an IBM PC XT shortly afterwards. :)



    ... THE HEXAGONS OF AIM
    --- MultiMail/Win v0.52
    * Origin: http://realitycheckbbs.org | tomorrow's retro tech (1:218/700)
  • From Franklyn Hayek@1:218/860 to mpower on Wed Jul 29 02:52:21 2026
    Hi folks, I am curious if some people have 80 cols
    setups for their C64. Perhaps that is C128 territory

    For BBSing, Novaterm 9.6revC for the C=64 has a pretty workable 80 column setup, plus an approximation of ANSI emulation besides.

    This is what it looks like in 80 columns in VICE.

    https://i.imgur.com/55vvJce.png

    Hope that helps.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Shipwrecks & Shibboleths [San Francisco, CA - USA] (1:218/860)
  • From phigan@3:633/10 to All on Sun Aug 16 12:00:01 2026
    On 2026-07-26, mpower <mpower-codeworks@gmail.com> wrote:
    Hi folks, I am curious if some people have 80 cols
    setups for their C64. Perhaps that is C128 territory

    One person already responded about Novaterm.. and you may have seen my
    other reply suggesting StrikeTerm2014 (a fork of the other), and also
    CCGMS Future v0.2 for PETSCII in 80 cols... but nobody has mentioned
    that there is a replacement for the VIC-II chip called the Kawari. It
    will give you actual hardware 80 columns on the C64. One person I talk
    to on the BBSes loves his, says it looks fantastic for BBSing and
    everything else.

    I just use an SVideo cable out of my C= into an LCD with software 80
    columns.. Looks fine to me. I've put up with worse looking software 80
    columns on the Atari 8bits ;).

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Yeechang Lee@3:633/10 to All on Tue Sep 15 10:30:02 2026
    mpower wrote:
    Hi folks, I am curious if some people have 80 cols
    setups for their C64. Perhaps that is C128 territory
    only?

    The 8-bit Guy has a good video on how to achieve 80 columns on the
    C64, and why doing so is rare.
    <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJzOErvJwZs>

    --
    geo:37.783333,-122.416667

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Daniel@3:633/10 to All on Sun Oct 4 14:30:01 2026
    Yeechang Lee <ylee@columbia.edu> writes:

    mpower wrote:
    Hi folks, I am curious if some people have 80 cols
    setups for their C64. Perhaps that is C128 territory
    only?

    The 8-bit Guy has a good video on how to achieve 80 columns on the
    C64, and why doing so is rare.
    <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJzOErvJwZs>

    I vaguely remember his video on the subject. Wasn't it sort of cheating
    by scrunching the fonts? God that was years ago. I started disliking him
    with that stupid commander x16 project.

    --
    Daniel
    sysop | air & wave bbs
    finger | info@bbs.airandwave.net

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From John Ames@3:633/10 to All on Tue Oct 6 14:00:01 2026
    On Sat, 03 Oct 2026 12:12:14 -0700
    Daniel <me@fuhgitabutit.com> wrote:

    I vaguely remember his video on the subject. Wasn't it sort of
    cheating by scrunching the fonts?

    Yes, it involves running in bitmap mode and rendering text "by hand;"
    there was an article on this in Compute! back in the day. On top of
    being slower, it's hard to come up with a readable font in a 4x8 cell (especially since you need a 1px gutter to separate the characters, so
    it's effectively 3x7,) so it's no surprise that it wasn't very common.

    Might've been more usable if it was 6x8 or even 5x8 (for 53/64 columns)
    but 80 being the Magic Number by general consensus they went with that.


    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Anssi Saari@3:633/10 to All on Tue Oct 6 11:47:45 2026
    John Ames <commodorejohn@gmail.com> writes:

    On Sat, 03 Oct 2026 12:12:14 -0700
    Daniel <me@fuhgitabutit.com> wrote:

    I vaguely remember his video on the subject. Wasn't it sort of
    cheating by scrunching the fonts?

    Yes, it involves running in bitmap mode and rendering text "by hand;"
    there was an article on this in Compute! back in the day. On top of
    being slower, it's hard to come up with a readable font in a 4x8 cell (especially since you need a 1px gutter to separate the characters, so
    it's effectively 3x7,) so it's no surprise that it wasn't very common.

    I've wondered if it could've been done by using character mode. Since
    you can redefine all characters you could stuff two narrow characters
    into one on the go. It feels like it could be an easy thing when
    rendering but there might need to be a lot of character pairs, you'd run
    out of characters to redefine.

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Mortar M.@1:124/5016 to Anssi Saari on Tue Oct 6 09:53:43 2026
    Re: Re: Do C64 Enthusiasts Use 80 Cols?
    By: Anssi Saari to All on Tue Oct 06 2026 11:47:45

    ...there might need to be a lot of character pairs, you'd run
    out of characters to redefine.

    The bigge problem is that in character mode, each key equals one character cell, so you can't type just half a cell.
    --- SBBSecho 3.38-Linux
    * Origin: End Of The Line BBS - endofthelinebbs.com (1:124/5016)