My First Computer: The Commodore PET 2001
Posted: Tue Sep 07, 2010 2:59 pm
http://www.vintage-computer.com/pet2001.shtml
This was the first computer I owned. Well technically I built a COSMAC ELF from a kit before that in 1978, but it didn't do much - no keyboard just front panel switches and you had to program it in assembler. The PET 2001 was the first REAL computer I owned. I bought it for $895 in 1979 at Focus Scientific in the Omni Mall in Miami, Florida. I almost bought a TRS-80 instead, and actually placed the order, and then canceled it.
Focus sold both the PET 2001 and the Apple II but the Apple II was much more expensive and didn't come with a monitor. Both used the 6502 processor and came with a BASIC interpreter on ROM.
The PET was the direct predecessor of the Commodore C64. They used identical memory layouts, and the same cassette interface. You could run any PET 2001 program on a C64 and it would work without modification. They were totally reverse compatible.
I've found a lot of photos of the 2nd Gen PET 2001 (renamed the CBM 2001) which replaced the chicklet-style keyboard with a real keyboard and used an external cassette drive since the full keyboard took up all the space of the old keyboard and cassette, but was otherwise identical inside. However it's hard to find photos of the original PET with chicklet keyboard. I hated that keyboard and, like many PET owners, built my own external keyboard (as shown in these photos). I also built my own 16K expansion memory board (similar to the one in these photos). However my memory board I designed myself - I adapted it from an S-100 memory board and built my own interface from schematics I obtained from Commodore of their 16Mb expansion board (for a while I worked as a salesman and repair tech at Focus and as such I had access to factory schematics).
I loved my PET 2001. I wrote a database program in BASIC for the company I worked for at the time (Bauer Audio Visual) and we used my computer along with that database program to manage inventory. A rep from the main office visited once and I demonstrated the computer running the database for him and he took that info back to the corporate offices. However corporate notified me that they thought personal computers were a passing fad and it wouldn't be practical to implement this at all their offices. They preferred staying with the tried and true paper method. LOL!
I hung on to that PET until sometime around 1988 when I gave it away (still working!) to a friend.
This was the first computer I owned. Well technically I built a COSMAC ELF from a kit before that in 1978, but it didn't do much - no keyboard just front panel switches and you had to program it in assembler. The PET 2001 was the first REAL computer I owned. I bought it for $895 in 1979 at Focus Scientific in the Omni Mall in Miami, Florida. I almost bought a TRS-80 instead, and actually placed the order, and then canceled it.
Focus sold both the PET 2001 and the Apple II but the Apple II was much more expensive and didn't come with a monitor. Both used the 6502 processor and came with a BASIC interpreter on ROM.
The PET was the direct predecessor of the Commodore C64. They used identical memory layouts, and the same cassette interface. You could run any PET 2001 program on a C64 and it would work without modification. They were totally reverse compatible.
I've found a lot of photos of the 2nd Gen PET 2001 (renamed the CBM 2001) which replaced the chicklet-style keyboard with a real keyboard and used an external cassette drive since the full keyboard took up all the space of the old keyboard and cassette, but was otherwise identical inside. However it's hard to find photos of the original PET with chicklet keyboard. I hated that keyboard and, like many PET owners, built my own external keyboard (as shown in these photos). I also built my own 16K expansion memory board (similar to the one in these photos). However my memory board I designed myself - I adapted it from an S-100 memory board and built my own interface from schematics I obtained from Commodore of their 16Mb expansion board (for a while I worked as a salesman and repair tech at Focus and as such I had access to factory schematics).
I loved my PET 2001. I wrote a database program in BASIC for the company I worked for at the time (Bauer Audio Visual) and we used my computer along with that database program to manage inventory. A rep from the main office visited once and I demonstrated the computer running the database for him and he took that info back to the corporate offices. However corporate notified me that they thought personal computers were a passing fad and it wouldn't be practical to implement this at all their offices. They preferred staying with the tried and true paper method. LOL!
I hung on to that PET until sometime around 1988 when I gave it away (still working!) to a friend.
