037 - Commodore & MiSTer Updates, and John's Japan Experience

In this episode, Dave leads off on the revived Commodore: the C64C Ultimate and the story of the original 1986 injection molds, and the brand-new "Made For U(ltimate)" software initiative. The block closes on the Callback flip phone, its wildly unstable pricing, and Dave's argument that nobody agrees on what a "dumb phone" actually means.

John brings a MiSTer update — DreamSTer, running Dreamcast on a DE10-Nano by putting the PowerVR2 on the FPGA and everything else on the ARM cores, plus MiSTer Monitor, an ESP32 companion display for artwork and system stats.

John also unpacks his recent travel experiences to Japan, including Nintendo, Super Potato and other fun places he visited.

Dave signs off with the 486 he rescued from his parents' house, and a plea for a keyboard with a five-pin DIN connector.

Topics discussed in this episode

• Commodore announces the C64C Ultimate using the rediscovered original 1986 injection moldshttps://commodore.net/c-you-soon-commodore-64-ultimate-line-up-expands-with-c64c-edition-later-this-year/
• Time Extension: the revived Commodore's next FPGA recreation, complete with the original 1986 imperfectionshttps://www.timeextension.com/news/2026/04/the-revived-commodore-just-announced-its-next-fpga-recreation-complete-with-the-original-1986-imperfections
• Time Extension: Commodore celebrates its first birthday with the "Made For U(ltimate)" game initiativehttps://www.timeextension.com/news/2026/08/what-a-year-its-been-commodore-celebrates-its-birthday-with-a-new-game-initiative-for-the-c64-ultimate
• Commodore gets transparent on the Callback flip phone pricinghttps://commodore.net/commodore-gets-transparent-on-callback-flip-phone/
• Tom's Hardware: Callback drops to $399 by defaulting to recycled memory chipshttps://www.tomshardware.com/phones/commodore-drops-callback-flip-ohine-to-399-by-defaulting-to-recycled-memory-chips
• Time Extension: the "impossible" Dreamcast core comes to MiSTer, but it's very early dayshttps://www.timeextension.com/news/2026/07/the-impossible-dreamcast-core-comes-to-mister-but-its-very-early-days
• DreamSTer on GitHub — skmp's Dreamcast project for the DE10-Nanohttps://github.com/skmp/DreamSTer
• MiSTer Monitor — ESP32 companion display for artwork, system stats and RetroAchievementshttps://github.com/chipster6502/MiSTer_monitor
• Super Potato, Akihabarahttps://www.superpotato.com/