C64 Text
The Commodore 64 text screen is 40 characters across by 25 down, drawn from the 8×8 PETSCII character set. Each cell has its own colour, held in colour RAM, over a background colour shared by the whole screen.
The screen
Standard character mode is 40×25 cells of 8×8 pixels. Screen memory holds one character code per cell, and colour RAM holds one colour per cell beside it.
| Detail | Value |
|---|---|
| Screen | 40 × 25 characters |
| Cell | 8 × 8 pixels |
| Attribute model | Per cell |
Attributes
Colour RAM gives each cell its own character colour, one of the sixteen, so the foreground varies cell by cell. The background is one colour for the whole screen, set in a VIC register, along with the border. The attribute takes no cell of its own. The editor lets the paper be set per cell as well, for laying out a coloured screen; on the real machine standard mode keeps one background.
Colours
The C64 shows sixteen colours, the palette Sprites.Platform.C64.Palette. Ink names one of these per cell; paper names the screen background. The default screen is light blue on blue.
In the editor
The C64 text editor opens a 40×25 screen on light blue ink and blue paper. The details come from Sprites.Platform.C64.Text: DefaultWidth 40, DefaultHeight 25, WholeCell false. See the text media page for the model across the machines and Text storage for the saved format.