My first computer was an original
Commodore 64 with a 1541 II hooked up to my 13" color TV. I had to share the RF adapter with my Atari 2600. Loved the 2600 controllers working with it too.

When I built my first PC, a 286-16 with CGA graphics and no sound, I was so disappointed in it compared to my C64. CGA should have never been a thing.

ptr1ck wrote on 2022-04-21, 16:22:

My first computer was an original
Commodore 64 with a 1541 II hooked up to my 13" color TV. I had to share the RF adapter with my Atari 2600. Loved the 2600 controllers working with it too.

Cool! 😃 I remember the days when TV sets merely had an RF jack and no SCART yet.
Also modded a few Atari 2600s for Composite/CVBS.
The mod essentially was just bypassing the RF modulator and doing a bit of amplifying.

ptr1ck wrote on 2022-04-21, 16:22:

When I built my first PC, a 286-16 with CGA graphics and no sound, I was so disappointed in it compared to my C64. CGA should have never been a thing.

Understandable. Personally, I can relate to that.
I've got kind of a love/hate-relationship with CGA myself.
But it's more because of missed opportunities. Long story short. IBM f*cked things up.

If CGA was correctly implemented, it could have done 640x200 in 4 colours.
Or at least 640x400 - like the graphics card of certain AT&T computer models.
Or many, many colours like the Plantronics card.

Unfortunately, the CGA was developed under time constraints.
Just like the IBM PC 5150 it was murks, a hack if you will. However, contemporary solutions often last the longest. 😉

The EGA was much better, but also limited by its backwards compatibility with CGA monitors.
The 640x350 mode really is native EGA, with full palette available etc etc.
Alas, games rarely used it - because CGA monitors weren't killed of yet.
And because 320x200 pels made porting from/to other low-end systems more easy..

VGA, finally, was different. It required proper monitors and defined a new standard: 640x480 @31KHz/60Hz (just like the old IBM PGC).
(The theoretical maximum resolution of NTSC color TV sets, if they use interlacing.)
Because of this breakthrough, computers like the Amiga got their flicker-fixers/scan-doublers.
- Atari STs, by comparison, didn't need it. They had the SM124 and compatible CRTs.
The hi-res mode in 640x400 @35KHz/72Hz was surpassing even VGA a bit, perhaps.

Edit: Small edit.
Edit: Composite CGA is excepted, though. It's hacked text-mode and the NTSC artifacts allow for pretty, uhm, organic graphics.
It's essentially still low-res, but with a kind of texturing added.
On a CRT or an LCD with blur/bilinear filtering, it looks acceptable.

Edit: Everyone feel free to tell your C64 stories.
Or, if you like, tell about interesting C64 things. Games, demoscene, etc. ^^

C64 is one of the main reason why I started loving retro computers.
My story doesn't mean so much, but I'd like to share it anyway.

My father bought the "biscottone" in 1986 after a C16. He used it mostly for its games, but he also tried doing simple things in BASIC. Then he bought his first PC and stored his C64, together with the floppy drive (a 1541C) and some floppy disks in a basement because it wasn't used anymore.
Some years ago, due to my rising interest in computer history, I asked him what were his first computers and then he talked about his C64, almost abandoned in that basement for years. I was happy to see that he didn't threw it away, so we brought it and cleaned from dust, in order to test it, and... it worked! Nobody expected that: we were almost astonished!
It isn't obviously in perfect shape, since it is yellowed and has some video issues, for example some characters/pixels with wrong colours, but it can run games. I also fixed its floppy drive with some cleaning and grease on its guide rails.

I was (and I am still) fascinated by its capabilities, games, graphics, chiptunes, and amazed by its longevity.
My father always defeats me at International Karate, one of his favourite games!
I am aware that I can't truly understand what a C64 means for people who lived that era, but I can appreciate its importance and value in computer and also videogame history.