Creative Micro Designs
Encyclopedia
Creative Micro Designs is a computer
technologies company which today sells PC
s and related equipment, but which started out in 1987 selling self-designed firmware
updates and hardware
for the Commodore 64
and C128
8-bit
home
/personal computer
s.
CMD stopped selling Commodore products in 2001. In July of that year, production and sale of several of their products was taken over by Click Here Software Co. which is no longer fulfilling orders, due to an expired distribution license and his shop roof has a major leak.
Presently, there is a firm named "Creative Micro Designs", a manufacturer of custom electronics, which appears not to have any relation to the company described in this article.
Computer
A computer is a programmable machine designed to sequentially and automatically carry out a sequence of arithmetic or logical operations. The particular sequence of operations can be changed readily, allowing the computer to solve more than one kind of problem...
technologies company which today sells PC
IBM PC compatible
IBM PC compatible computers are those generally similar to the original IBM PC, XT, and AT. Such computers used to be referred to as PC clones, or IBM clones since they almost exactly duplicated all the significant features of the PC architecture, facilitated by various manufacturers' ability to...
s and related equipment, but which started out in 1987 selling self-designed firmware
Firmware
In electronic systems and computing, firmware is a term often used to denote the fixed, usually rather small, programs and/or data structures that internally control various electronic devices...
updates and hardware
Computer hardware
Personal computer hardware are component devices which are typically installed into or peripheral to a computer case to create a personal computer upon which system software is installed including a firmware interface such as a BIOS and an operating system which supports application software that...
for the Commodore 64
Commodore 64
The Commodore 64 is an 8-bit home computer introduced by Commodore International in January 1982.Volume production started in the spring of 1982, with machines being released on to the market in August at a price of US$595...
and C128
Commodore 128
The Commodore 128 home/personal computer was the last 8-bit machine commercially released by Commodore Business Machines...
8-bit
8-bit
The first widely adopted 8-bit microprocessor was the Intel 8080, being used in many hobbyist computers of the late 1970s and early 1980s, often running the CP/M operating system. The Zilog Z80 and the Motorola 6800 were also used in similar computers...
home
Home computer
Home computers were a class of microcomputers entering the market in 1977, and becoming increasingly common during the 1980s. They were marketed to consumers as affordable and accessible computers that, for the first time, were intended for the use of a single nontechnical user...
/personal computer
Personal computer
A personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...
s.
CMD stopped selling Commodore products in 2001. In July of that year, production and sale of several of their products was taken over by Click Here Software Co. which is no longer fulfilling orders, due to an expired distribution license and his shop roof has a major leak.
Presently, there is a firm named "Creative Micro Designs", a manufacturer of custom electronics, which appears not to have any relation to the company described in this article.
Products for Commodore's C64 and C128
- JiffyDOS – ROMRead-only memoryRead-only memory is a class of storage medium used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be modified, or can be modified only slowly or with difficulty, so it is mainly used to distribute firmware .In its strictest sense, ROM refers only...
chip replacement for C64/128 computers and floppy diskFloppy diskA floppy disk is a disk storage medium composed of a disk of thin and flexible magnetic storage medium, sealed in a rectangular plastic carrier lined with fabric that removes dust particles...
drives (such as 1541sCommodore 1541The Commodore 1541 , made by Commodore International, was the best-known floppy disk drive for the Commodore 64 home computer. The 1541 was a single-sided 170 kilobyte drive for 5¼" disks...
), greatly increasing disk drive transfer speeds - FD seriesCMD FD seriesThe CMD FD series was Creative Micro Designs 's range of third-party floppy disk drives for the Commodore 8-bit line of home computers. Using 3½" floppy disks, they provided a significantly larger storage capacity than Commodore-produced drives; the FD-2000 offered 1600KB of storage using standard...
– Floppy diskFloppy diskA floppy disk is a disk storage medium composed of a disk of thin and flexible magnetic storage medium, sealed in a rectangular plastic carrier lined with fabric that removes dust particles...
drives - HD Series – Hard diskHard diskA hard disk drive is a non-volatile, random access digital magnetic data storage device. It features rotating rigid platters on a motor-driven spindle within a protective enclosure. Data is magnetically read from and written to the platter by read/write heads that float on a film of air above the...
drives - RAMLinkCMD RAMLinkThe RAMLink was one of several RAM expansion products made by Creative Micro Designs for Commodore's C64/128 home computers. The RAMLink was intended as a third-party alternative, successor and optionally companion to Commodore's own 17xx-series REU RAM expansion cartridges.Unlike the REU, the...
– RAMRandom-access memoryRandom access memory is a form of computer data storage. Today, it takes the form of integrated circuits that allow stored data to be accessed in any order with a worst case performance of constant time. Strictly speaking, modern types of DRAM are therefore not random access, as data is read in...
upgrade for C64/128, essentially a RAM diskRAM diskA RAM disk or RAM drive is a block of RAM that a computer's software is treating as if the memory were a disk drive...
with battery backup; used 1-MBMegabyteThe megabyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information storage or transmission with two different values depending on context: bytes generally for computer memory; and one million bytes generally for computer storage. The IEEE Standards Board has decided that "Mega will mean 1 000...
and 4-MB 30-pin SIMMSIMMA SIMM, or single in-line memory module, is a type of memory module containing random access memory used in computers from the early 1980s to the late 1990s. It differs from a dual in-line memory module , the most predominant form of memory module today, in that the contacts on a SIMM are redundant...
memory modules - 1750 XL – A 2 MB RAM Expansion Unit for the C64/128, compatible with the Commodore REUCommodore REUCommodore's RAM Expansion Unit range of external RAM add-ons for their Commodore 64/128 home computers was announced at the same time as the C128. The REUs came in three models, initially the 1700 and 1750 , and later the 1764...
s. - SuperCPU – CPUCentral processing unitThe central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...
upgrade boxes to plug into the expansion port of the C64/128; with a 16-bit WDC 65816 CPU @ ~20 MHz - SuperRAMCard – Fast RAM expansion card to fit inside a SuperCPU
External links
- The Unofficial CMD Homepage
- JiffyDOS at Brain Innovations officially licensed JiffyDOS products