Setting The Commodore 64 Competitive Trend
When the C64 was introduced in the year 1982 in the month of August, competition with other home computers was faced with a lot of vengeance. Price of the C64 was very impressive considering the flexible hardware that was used in it which helped in increasing sales due to real value offered to the last dollar, as compared to many competitors out there in the market. The Atari 8 bit 400 as well as the Atari 800 was the two main competitors of the C64 in the United States of America, besides Apple II. In terms of hardware both the Atari 400 and 800 proved to be very similar.
However the only issue with them was that building them was an expensive affair, considering the features - graphics as well as the sound custom chips that were used. In the Apple II lineup that was aging, the Apple IIe had graphic modes at resolutions that were extremely high as compared to C64. These graphic modes were not used very frequently though, due to the color support that was poor. For the expansion of the bus there was just one single cartridge port present externally in the C64, while the Apple II had its capability upgraded by expansion slots present internally.
In the case of Apple, for a convenient interface with peripherals that were common, expansion slots were popularly used. In the case of the C64, different kinds of ports were well integrated into the C64 motherboard which helped in keeping the cartridge free. Tactics used in marketing the C64 were very aggressive which led to the success of the C64 at a faster rate. After the C64 was launched in the later half of the year 1982 via commercials on television price as well as performance became a bone of contention for competitors.
Not only were authorized dealers used for selling the C64 but retail stores like the toy stores, department stores as well as discount stores were used to popularize the C64. It also flaunted a RF modulator that was built in. This facility enabled plugging into television sets comfortably. The C64 was able to also compete with other kinds of gaming consoles for playing video games like the Atari 2600 only because of the ongoing stance for upgrade. In the year 1983 in the video game crash in Northern America and the C64's aggressive pricing proved to be a major catalyst.
A rebate of US $100 was offered by Commodore in the year 1983 to anyone who purchased the C64, if they had a video gaming console or a computer to trade in. This rebate was taken advantage of by some of the dealers as well as retailers dealing in mail orders who offered a Timex Sinclair 1000 for a small amount of ten US dollars with every purchase of the C64. Even till today, due to the constant demand of the C64 continues to be in the limelight. The competitive trend is null and void when the Commodore is displayed because it isn't here to modify and fit into the modern scheme of things but continues to amaze in its iconic form.