'Clear disclaimer, free experimentation, just no free support/replacement for bricked modded units' becomes the new policy.
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Last week we said we were considering restricting non-Commodore FPGA firmware on the Commodore 64 Ultimate, to avoid Commodore covering free support or replacements for machines damaged by unsupported mods – basically our version of a bricked jailbroken iPhone.We listened. We… pic.twitter.com/gCMk9vNEof April 23, 2026
It is evident that the FPGA firmware gatekeeping decision had been a tricky one for the new Commodore. And telegraphing a change “preventing firmware not released by Commodore from being loaded onto the hardware,” split the user base, but we think most comments were on the side of user freedom. As social media and forum discussions heated up on the topic, Commodore published a detailed blog with a point–by-point defense of its new policy.
You may like Commodore fans split over C64 Ultimate FPGA firmware lockdown Denuvo promises countermeasures against the recent hypervisor-based DRM bypasses Jim Keller's Tenstorrent is downgrading Blackhole p150 cards from 140 to 120 tensor cores via firmware update The new Commodore “values freedom of choice the most.” The official blog post update from Commodore regarding firmware is pretty clear about the change in policy. “We will not prevent you from installing other firmware on your Commodore 64 Ultimate,” states a key highlighted phrase in the post.
It goes on to say it remains worried about users bricking their C64U machines and then putting in return and replacement requests (under warranty, we guess). However, it admits “that's 'Ultimately' an "us" problem, not a "you" problem.”
In the firmware block policy's place, there will instead be a stern disclaimer. Commodore will insist that “community-installed firmware, patches, or other modifications are used at the owner’s own risk, and Commodore cannot provide free support, free warranty service, or free replacement for units bricked or damaged as a result.” Most retro gaming community and tinkerer folks will probably be pleased with Commodore gracefully bowing to popular pressure on this. It will be interesting to see how the new policy affects the warranty returns process.
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- https://www.tomshardware.com/video-games/retro-gaming/commodore-backs-down-over-fpga-firmware-lockdown-it-wont-now-try-and-block-third-party-firmware-installs-but-will-stand-firm-against-bricked-modded-units#main
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