BBC News reports the Commodore 64 celebrates its 30th anniversary this week. The machines were released in August 1982 for $595, significantly less than the $1,200 price tag of the Apple II.
The machine was hugely successful for its time, helping to encourage personal computing, popularise video games and pioneer homemade computer-created music.
The $595 (£399) device took its name from its US maker, Commodore International, and the fact it had 64 kilobytes of RAM memory.
The firm noted that made it substantially cheaper than other personal computers on the market offered by IBM, Apple and Atari.
Commodore highlighted the fact that since it had designed and manufactured its own chips it had been able keep costs down - and the advantage helped it become the best-selling model in North America.
