This is a reminder that my charity auction for a refurbished early Commodore 64 “silver label” from Christmas 1982 – just before the release of the Commodore 64 in Europe in early 1983 – ends today, 18:00 GMT on Sunday 14th December 2025.
The auction is no-reserve with 50% automatically taken via eBay for Cancer Research UK, who are doing incredible work to improve lives through their core mission: to beat cancer by funding research to prevent, control, and cure all types of cancer, aiming for a world where people live longer, better lives, free from cancer’s fear.
This machine could make a very nice Christmas present for a loved one, or for yourself! I would be grateful if you could share the auction link with anyone who might be interested, and help me to raise some money for charity. Silver label machines don’t come up for sale all that often, so I’m hoping that we’ll be able to raise a decent bit of money together. At the time of writing, it’s already at around £300, which is fantastic! Thank you everyone!
The Commodore 64 “silver label” was a limited edition of the C64, which is popular with collectors due to its rarity – these machines are very early examples of the Commodore 64, featuring silver case labels as seen on the C64 box artwork (hence their nickname).
Silver case labels were typically fitted to early Commodore 64s manufactured between early 1982 and early 1983 – in the US these labels were made from metal, and in the UK these were plastic (which lifts up with age).
These early machines were typically fitted with the first C64 board revision, the rare ASSY 326298 “buggy” board – this had all kinds of manufacturing problems and was usually replaced with the later ASSY 250407 board under warranty, then scrapped. In Europe, some machines were fitted with the rare ASSY KU-14194HB transition board.
Due to their limited availability for the time, “silver label” machines can be tricky to find, but not impossible – there are usually a couple up on eBay at any one time, but they often command high sale prices even in poor condition.
This one is so early that the serial number (WGB28406) is only five digits long, as though they expected to produce less than 99999 units per factory – the C64 is rumoured to have sold between 12,500,000 and 17,000,000 units whilst it was in production between 1983 and 1994. It also has the rare Europe-only KU-14194HB transition mainboard.
The unit is in very good physical condition albeit with a noticeable yellowed patina from UV exposure over the years, but I wouldn’t want to change this because that’s part of its story. It even has fully intact rear case clips, which is quite rare in any breadbin C64, let alone a silver label.
