u/GeordieAl

I'm still digging through all my old belongings that I shipped from the UK to Canada and this old Commodore calculator was in there. Sadly teenage me decided to attack the calculator with a ballpoint pen, but amazingly even after all these years as soon as it has some light it turns on and is fully working.

it's a Commodore H801W Solar Film Card Calculator, and I'm struggling to remember how I got it.

I got a C64 in 1985 - I don't remember what bundle, but I do remember that just after I got it they launched the "Commodore 64 Compendium Pack" with Music Maker Keyboard, The Designers Pencil, and The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole game plus Growing Pains of Adrian Mole book.

Being a sneaky teenager, I wanted this improved pack and shorted out my C64 with a paperclip to the serial port. Back to the store with a non working C64 and they replaced it, with the same pack! A few weeks later I tried again, and this time it worked, I came home with the Compendium pack!

I'm sure I must have got this calculator with either the original pack or the compendium pack, but I can't find any references to it online.

Anyone else get this calculator with their C64? or know how I may have received it?

Never expected to see an Amiga question pop up in 2026!

28 years ago I packed all my computers, books, mags and software into a storage unit when I went on a 6 month vacation to Canada... 28 years later I'm still here. Last year I finally managed to ship everything to Canada from the UK.

Yes, there are some non-Commodore titles in there... MSX, Sharp, Atari, Speccy, Dragon, TI99, and Beeb. But the vast majority are for the C64, C16, and Amiga..plus one token VIC 20 title!

The C64 games are nearly all ones I bought back in the 80's, The C16 games all came with a C16 I bought from a mate when he was upgrading to a proper computer (a C64!) Some of the Amiga titles are ones I worked on in my early days as an artist.

Sadly I'm missing all my Speccy games except Scrabble ( I was a Spectrum owner before jumping onto the good ship Commodore )

Spotted a familiar shape in the office scene while watching the official video for Look Mum No Computer's Eurovision song Eins, Zwei, Drei. Then watching the behind the scenes video I spotted a bit more Commodore hardware... three 1702 monitors in his video/synth wall.

When this picture was taken, my dad had been the warden for the Chillingham Wild White Cattle for a bit under 3 years. He had previously been working in a factory, as an Ice Cream Man, on a Fishing Boat, and in the Merchant Navy.

Somehow, at 48 years old he was able to switch from factory life in the urban sprawl of Tyneside to country life in one of the remotest parts of England. My mam, dad, me (not even 1 years old at the time), two brothers and a sister moved from a brick built semi on a busy road, to a small stone cottage surrounded by fields and woodland.

The move gave him and my mam a completely new life, and gave me an amazing childhood.

So during my journey from 400 days to Basement Dweller, 53,048 others have dropped out, almost 4,000 between 700 days and Basement Dweller

My Unlock # at 400 days : 201898

My Unlock # at 700 days : 152799

My # at Basement Dweller : 148850

And in the journey from 700 days to Basement Dweller, 4,000 others didn't make it.

My Unlock # at 700 days : 152799

My # at Basement Dweller : 148850

Picked this up from a local electronics recycler as I was in the market for a multi system or PAL based system. Prior to buying I did a cursory search online but found nothing about it and just figured I needed to dig a bit deeper to find some actual information/manual etc.

They showed me it working and everything looked good - the unit itself is in fantastic condition and has a fully working remote, so I bought it and brought it home. Everything works great - it plays back my 30+year old tapes from back home in the UK no problem and the picture is great even through a cheap capture device into my Mac.

So I started looking again online to see if I could find a manual or any other information about this unit and I'm coming up blank. Lots of info/manuals etc for VC-H982 and H983 which bear no resemblance at all to this unit either visually or spec wise - I ended up finding info on H972, H973, H974, H975, H976, H978, H982, H983, H984, H985, and H986 but they're all pretty much the same 4 head stereo, not multi system, no karaoke, no NICAM.

Anyone had this unit, or have any info or a link to a manual?