The Amstrad CPC 464 was an 8-bit home computer produced by Amstrad in the 1980s. CPC was an acronym for 'Colour Personal Computer', although it was possible to purchase a CPC with a green screen (GT65/66) as well as with the standard colour screen (CTM640).

The machine was designed to be a direct competitor to the Commodore 64 and Sinclair ZX Spectrum systems. Outwardly, the most distinguishing features of Amstrad's offering were the matt black console case with sharp corners and narrowly rectangular form factor (the latter due to the built-in cassette tape deck), the keyboard's distinctly coloured special keys (all the non-typewriter-standard keys), and the unique power supply hookup with one lead going from the console to the monitor (or RF modulator) and one lead going the other way.

The CPC 464 featured a Zilog Z80 processor, 64 KB of RAM, a palette of 27 colours (quite extensive for its time, most competitors having 8 or 16 colours), and an integrated cassette tape deck for program and data storage. Like most home computers at the time, the 464 had its OS and a BASIC interpreter built in (i.e. in ROM). Locomotive BASIC was faster and more powerful than the commonly used Microsoft BASIC of the time.

Because the CPC 464 shared the Z80 processor with the ZX Spectrum, some games manufacturers developed games for the two systems partly in parallel, or ported older Spectrum games to the 464. This practice was often criticised, as resulting products were often not optimized to take advantage of the CPC 464's speed and more advanced capabilities.

Successor models in the CPC series were the Amstrad CPC 664 and Amstrad CPC 6128, both of which featured a 3-inch floppy disk drive in place of the 464's tape player (among other differences). External disk drives were available for the 464 (and its successors, for that matter), such as the DDI-1/FD-1 set (interface module and disk drive). With a disk drive in place the 464 could run CP/M 2.2, and some adaptations of CP/M software were done for the machine. The later CPC 6128 would run CP/M Plus (CP/M 3.0).

The CPC model names were structured as follows: The first digit was a code for the main storage system; '4' denoted a tape deck and '6' a 3-inch floppy disk drive. The remaining digits described the RAM capacity. Thus:

CPC 464 - Colour Personal Computer, Tape Deck, 64K RAM

CPC 664 - Colour Personal Computer, 3" Floppy Disk Drive, 64K RAM

CPC 6128 - Colour Personal Computer, 3" Floppy Disk Drive, 128K RAM

Some later models had extra functions built into BASIC, an enhanced colour palette and a read-only cartridge system. Extra BASIC functions was also built into the DDI-1 disk drive interface, allowing the CPC 464 user to access the AMSDOS disk operating system, and thus the disk drive(s), through BASIC. The final CPC offerings, known as the 'Plus' ('+') range*, also included the GX4000 video game console, and was a massive commercial failure, not least due to limited game releases from other companies (in-house software division Amsoft couldn't fill the need).

(* The Plus range was only available for the CPC 464 and CPC 6128 models. )

Magazines available for the system (at various times) included Amtix, Computing With The Amstrad, Amstrad Computer User (Amstrad official publication), Amstrad Action, and CPC Attack. Notable games include Bloodwych, the Rick Dangerous, Turrican and Dizzy series, and Head over Heels.

See also: Amstrad PCW