Hi, You mentioned another video about converting your old floppies over to the USB drive. I would really really like to see how this is done. I have been waiting for a product I felt comfortable doing that with and would love to see how the set up changes especially the connections to your 1541 or 1571 drive and how you use the software to do the copying. I noticed that you said at the time of your two videos that the built in ultra copy was not working; Has that changed? And also I noticed you had Fast Hackem (lol) ah so many memories.... Anyway VERY EAGER to see (even a quick video of how to set it up and copy). I am guessing like you I have a variety of discs (some that have many many games on a single side while I have others that are multi-sided games and would be grateful to see how it works. I believe I still have a working C128 + 1571 dual drives and possibly 1 or 2 - 1541 drives. I always used fans which helped prolong the lives on my equipment but i lost my C64 to a bad power supply. P.S. In case all my disks (I have at least 8 different 50-100ct cases of games) turn out to be F.U.B.A.R. and really so I can limit the wear and tear on my original equipment --> I also noticed you using what seemed to be a nice emulator (VICE?) on a windows 10 pc. I would be eternally grateful for your list of what you think are the best Commodore 64 emulators to use on a modern day PC (windows). I could create a linux box as well if there is a particularly good or better version for that. And also the best places to download games and program files. I have spent the last couple of days researching the current state of commodore replacement parts, add-on cards etc. but it is a lot to catch up on and I'm feeling overwhelmed. - HUGE TIA for any and all help

MetalJesusRocks Hey Metal Jesus! Thanks for stopping by! I enjoy your channel quite a bit!

How about a Kelsey REACT video, see her play a few C=64 classics, or would she scoff? (Fine Bros joke) -not sure I would use the Epyx fastloader - MULE took ages to load with it

I actually am already a member at AtariAge, but admittedly I haven't been as active there for a while. I suppose I could go drop an invite to visit my new channel in their forum now. :) I am working on editing a video of a repair of a dodgy cartridge slot on an Atari XEGS that might be of interest to Atari fans, along with a clean up and restoration on a 130XE with an unknown mod switch on the back (Maybe a Pill mod?) So, yeah, I think AtariAge members might be interested in some things I am working on! ;)

Yeah, I could just have used the reset button, but I also got used to unloading cart images using the Reboot option because when you hit reset with a cart image, it just restarts the cart.

That's true - which is also what you want if you have a fastload cartridge attached. Of course not so much if it is a game cartridge. ;-)

I am not up on the current compatibility with JiffyDos. I seem to recall there was some incompatibility, but I can't say for sure. You might want to post that question to the Facebook page, as that's the most active community there.

Thanks for the clarification, e5frog! They make sense. I also thought maybe the 4 unpopulated solder pads might be more for debug use as well, and it does make sense that the internal connector is probably for programming the FPGA. As far as the G64 issue goes, I tested it to great length, and if you insert a blank unlinked disk image and copy the floppy disk to it over IEC, the image loads just fine from the Ultimate II+. When you write that image to D64 format, the D64 image no longer works, but that is expected because the D64 only allows for standard format disks. When you try to write it to a G64 image (keep in mind there is no IEC access during that write), it still hangs up when flushing out that in-memory image to the USB stick, so I am pretty convinced that the issue is between the UII+ and the USB stick, and not the 1541 drive to the UII+. I will go into a little more detail about it in an upcoming floppy copy demonstration video. Also, thanks for the simultaneous button press tip! That's great! :)

That is an excellent question! It is so the Ultimate II+ can receive supplemental power. Why would you need this? Simple, it is so you can run it as a stand alone drive without using up the cartridge port on your 64. If you control it over Ethernet, it can work without being plugged into the cartridge port. This also means you can actually use the II+ with other Commodore computers, like the VIC-20, for instance. The main thing to remember is to use the UII+ this way, is you must control it via Ethernet.

mr. Markus Yes, if you have the optional cassette adapter. It's and additional purchase when you order.

tarstarkusz Yes, you can daisy chain with a real 1541 drive and copy disks between a real 1541 and the ultimate. I actually am planning a video to demo this.

As I recall, that was an unintended noise, but functionally not a problem. I do believe Gideon fixed on the next revision, so ones purchased now should not do that.

@@seansretroverse9082 Cheers , Now I know the cause , It will not bother me as much.

That is a fair question. The short answer is no (I think?) As I recall, I do not think it has any type of instant save state like you have in an emulator (I could be wrong). That being said, it does support freezer cartridges such as super snapshot. While you could use this for saving a state during gameplay, you still have to dump it to disk and reload it from disk. This was mostly used for beaking copy protection, i.e. freeze right when the game finished loading and save that to disk. Where I could be wrong here is I think it is likely to technically be somewhat possible, as the Ultimate II Plus supports a lot of RAM expansion options, so I think utilities could be written to swap the main system memory in and out. Where the problems occur is some of the hardware like the SID and maybe the VIC-II cannot be save stated perfectly, so it would probably be glitchy.

Yeah, at the time, that was what was readily available, and it held up reasonable well. Still, nowadays I might be tempted to build something out of arcade joystick parts. Just out of curiosity, what joystick do you recommend, 8penguin?

I use this:www.richardlagendijk.nl/foto/cip/joystick_elite_2002_01.jpg I had one of those back in the days and bought it again two years ago. My problem is that I need the stick in the right hand and nearly all arcade sticks which you can buy have the stick on the left hand. The only one I found is the qamba q2 (static1.1.sqspcdn.com/static/f/271672/20592804/1349933153583/q2_standard_large1.jpg?token=g9%2FXidxi9pYtnaXJH7FVLxXWH3Q%3D) I love it for mame games but it is not good enough for C64 jump&runs. The buttons trigger to easily and as you know old school games are unforgiving and they need a perfect timing. So I guess building one by myself might also be a good idea. Make a video when you create your arcade stick! I enjoyed the style of this video.

Love the Joystick. I think my favorite joystick for the c64 is the Slickstick for most games, and a Wico boss for Gunship / F14 / Top Gun.

Thanks, joerhorton! I know when dealing with the C64 a lot of my viewers are across the Atlantic, and so I appreciate the kind words! :) Cheers!

You have to order it from Gideon. It's worth a mention that you need to explicitly order the cassette adapter if you want it.

Thanks, I emailed him and I’m waiting to hear back. If you happen to know anyone who has a spare, please let me know. I’m really kicking myself for not ordering it along with the rest of the kit!

Es wird Morgen Webradio Absolutely, its a fairly easy process to copy back and forth with a real 1541. In fact, I am planning to review the newest firmware and also cover copying as well. Stay tuned!

Great, thank you for this information :-)

Lots of questions! I believe the answer to most of these is currently no*: CMD hard drive: I don't think so c128 or CP/M friendly: not really per se. It can be used without being plugged into the cartridge port as a stand alone 1541 drive, but I think you will not get the 1571 double sided drive support, so yea, it's pretty limited as a C128 device. I believe if you put it in the cartridge port on a 128, it will boot into 64 mode. wifi stick: I know this was not originally supported, but I know some people were I think working on support for it. I do not know the current status for wifi support. Turbo/JiffyDOS: maybe. I know soft kernal replacements can be done via cartridges, but I have not personally tried this. would suggest researching Gideon's site and forums for the true answers to most of these questions. My take is this is really intended primarily as a virtual 1541 disk drive, tape drive, cartridge, and REU. I otherwise do not have a quick answer for you on this one, as I currently have my c64 in storage. Sorry I can't be of more use on this question - these are all great questions.

Allow me to refer you to a recent video posted by retrobits. This video is very well done and covers many of the advanced and more recently developed features that my video here does not cover! kzfaq.info/get/bejne/gpl6qqSetbuteas.html

SGT Dave Just keep in mind that Gideon is just one guy, and you probably waiting for the next time he ships another batch of them. I know he's been busy on the new C64 Utlimate boards (a full modern board replacement for the C64 itself). When you order from Gideon directly, it requires a bit of patience because he does shipping batches every 2 or 3 months, when he has enough orders to fulfill in one shot. If you want a unit a bit quicker, then you may want to check eBay. You may pay a little mark up, but you will get it in short order. Don't worry though, it's not just you, everyone has to wait to get theirs.

Also, your best bet for communications on when he's doing orders is Facebook. Look for the "1541 Ultimate" page there, as that tends to be where the most active group is for these.

James Valvis I had preordered it a month or two ahead. But when it shipped, I think it was about a week to receive it. I think others here may be able to tell more. Might check with the guys on the Facebook page for the Ultimate II.

Thanks, Sean. I'm trying to decide between getting the Ultimate II and the SD2IEC and am a little scared off by the Ultimate II saying it might take "months" to get it. I realize he's just a one-man gig, but I don't want to wait that long, especially when paying over twice as much. By the way, were the games pre-loaded on the stick provided or did you need to download them? Pretty cool to get a Metal Jesus comment on your first vid. Score! Subscribing...

James Valvis Yeah, I guess it all depends on how backlogged he is. It is just a one man operation. No games come preloaded, so you do need to provide your own roms, same as the SD2IEC. I haven't used the SD2IEC, but I think it does not have quite as many features as the ultimate. For instance, no cartridge support I believe.

Well, I guess I'll need to learn how to do that then. I'm just getting back into it after not using my C64 since about 1987-- life intervened. The learning curve on some of this stuff is greater than I expected. Minus a few Basic commands, I've forgotten pretty much everything I knew, and there's a bunch of new stuff to learn. But I'm having fun with it and videos like yours are really helping. Thanks, Sean.

Yea we roll 20% faster, sing in higher pitches, drive on the wrong side of the road for miles and not kilometers LOL! Oh and none of the cool PAL demos! (I tried, trust me!) Cheers!