COREi64 Changes coming soon...

[COREi64]

Starting in September 2024, I'm going to be changing the product distribution model I've been operating my business under. These changes pertain to all of the 3D models I sell, as well as all of the electronics projects (with the exception of the CMD products).

3D Printed Products:
I'm going to begin transitioning all of the 3D printed products from my shop to my shared projects site on PCBWay.com as well as my COREi64 Shapeways account. This will allow customers to select their preferred colors, materials and even the type of print (Resin, FDM...).

Furthermore, commercial reselling of my products will be permitted. All that will be required is attribution to COREi64. This means that any person or retro shop may bulk purchased any of my 3D printed products and resell them in their shop. PCBWay for example offers really great discounts on bulk orders.

With this decision, retro shops around the world will now be able to bulk purchase my 3D printed products at those discounted rates and offer them for sale. No compensation for the use of my products will need to be paid. The only restriction is that my products will need to be ordered through either PCBWay Shared Projects or Shapeways.

So I will no longer be producing any of my 3D printable designs (other than those related to my CMD product line).

Electronics Projects:
All of my electronics products will be accessible through PCBWay Shared Projects. As is with the 3D printable products, there will be no restrictions for bulk ordering and reselling. The only requirement will be attribution of the product to COREi64.

Going forward, I will no longer be producting any of the NON-CMD products myself. PCBWay offers a service to build boards for you from my projects so those that want assembled boards will have that option available to them.

CMD Product Line:
All of the CMD product line (FD-Series Drives, HD Drives, RAMLink, SuperCPU related etc) I will personally continue to provide to the community.

WHY am I doing this?
I've been running my shop for a decade now. The number of products that I've developed has become unmanageable for me. I furthermore what to do something to make my products more readily available to the enthusiasts across the ocean for better pricing and lower shipping costs. AND, I want higher quality print options available as well.

These are all things that would be impossible for me to achieve on my own. As such, I'm shifting production away from me.

And lastly, I want more time for myself that will allow me to continue to develop more new products.

Moving Forward:
I will continue to develop not only the CMD line, but will also continue with other products both electronic based and 3D printable.
New (non-CMD) products, upon completion will be made available in the same manner as all of my other products. That being, through PCBWay or Shapeways.
I accept that this decision may not be favorably accepted by some members of the community, however I did not make this decision lightly. My overarching goal is to provide all of my products to the community, while trying to make them as attainable as possible.
It is my hope that there will be some retro shops at various locations that will pick up some of these products for their shops.

Of course, all orders received before the change over will be processed and shipped by myself, so there's no need for concern for outstanding shipments.

COREi64

[Bulletdust]

Sadly, exchange rates make retro purchasing simply unrealistic at times - Meaning many people outside the US tend to prioritize, meaning they miss out on retro goodness available in the US.

Which is unfortunate.

May I say COREi64, this is heartfelt news - Now the idea of a beautiful CMD FD/HD hardware product sitting alongside my pride and joy C64 is a step closer to being a reality. As a long term retro enthusiast, thank you.

[obitus1990]

That’s very generous of you!

[intric8]

Meaning many people outside the US tend to prioritize, meaning they miss out on retro goodness available in the US.

Corei64 is in Canada, so US folks have to pay international shipping rates, too (sometimes greatly increasing the original spend). We could feel it.

This must have been a very difficult decision, but it makes a ton of sense as the store has expanded its offerings. And If it brings the added bonus of Thomas freeing up time to continue to innovate in the 8-bit space I'm 100% behind it!

Thank you for being so transparent around your plans.

[COREi64]

Thanks for your comments.

What I would love to see is some of the Retro shops in the US and around the world picking up some of these products of mine and selling them to people in their own countries. Would be a real boon to those that could then pay domestic shipping rates instead. And PCBWay has great pricing on bulk orders too, so resellers could then make some money at the endeavor as well.

We'll see how it goes in that regard. Areas like the EU, UK and AU could also benefit from this I would imagine.

COREi64

[COREi64]

Doesn't seem like I can edit my posts here. There's one exception to the electronic products. The CMD products won't be going to my shared projects site. Those I will retain and produce myself.

COREi64

[intric8]

Doesn't seem like I can edit my posts here.

Sorry about that. Spammers were creating normal-looking posts, then a couple days later coming back and embedding invisible spam links into the previous posts. It took me days to clear all of that out (I think I did, anyway) so I had to remove editing capabilities for now.

[Bulletdust]

Doesn't seem like I can edit my posts here. There's one exception to the electronic products. The CMD products won't be going to my shared projects site. Those I will retain and produce myself.

COREi64

Well that is unfortunate. Considering the COREi64 shop is in $US, the price in places like Australia simply can't be justified.

Corei64 is in Canada, so US folks have to pay international shipping rates, too (sometimes greatly increasing the original spend). We could feel it.

Yet here in AU the shop is specifically quoted as being in $US, which changes things considerably. Considering the SD2IEC essentially has the same capabilities, it just isn't compatible with CMD configuration software, I'll stick with my SD2IEC.

[Zippy Zapp]

Yet here in AU the shop is specifically quoted as being in $US, which changes things considerably.

There are a few retro indy stores selling C64 stuff. I know Mark from The Retro Channel has a decent selection of stuff he makes and sells on Tindie. That would be a good place to offer products provided you can buy them low enough.

Considering the SD2IEC essentially has the same capabilities, it just isn't compatible with CMD configuration software, I'll stick with my SD2IEC.

I used to think that too but it is simply not accurate. The CMD HDs have more capabilities and compatibility then the SD2IEC can ever hope to provide. True the SD2IEC uses CMD style commands and similar partitions, and supports JiffyDOS but is also missing plenty that the CMD HD supports. I don't want to derail this topic so if you are interested in knowing more, feel free to create a new topic we can discuss it in.

[Bulletdust]

The SD2IEC supports almost every single CMD extended command and a couple of commands specific to the SD2IEC. I've been right through the CMD manual, and there's very few extended commands that don't work perfectly on the SD2IEC running JiffyDOS - You can even run separate partitions using identical commands to the CMD HD - Although partitions have to be made on your PC, but you can swap partitions and list partitions using commands identical to the CMD HD.

The SD2IEC can't run partitions with 1541 emulation, but that's really not a huge requirement anymore. Furthermore, the SD2IEC uses conventional FAT formatting, so you can plug the the SD card into your PC to add/remove/rename files if you wish.

I wish you luck, you've created a really nice product - But paying 50% more over retail considering the exchange rate for a reproduction retro device is killer for me.