VCF Montréal 2026

calendar Tuesday, January 27, 2026 · 4 min read · Retro VCF  ·
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Overview

The Vintage Computer Federation hosted the VCF Montréal event on January 24th and 25th, 2026. This was the first time that I have ever attended this type of event, and it has been something that I have wanted to do for a long time. I was originally planning on attending the VCF Midwest event in September of 2025, but recent events changed my plans. I had a great time, but unfortunately it was cut short due to circumstances beyond my control.

I was originally planning on attending the VCF Midwest event in Chicago back in September, but due the current political climate in the United States I decided against attending. When I found out that VCF was going to be hosting an event in Montréal in early 2026, I immediately bought tickets and booked a hotel.

VCF Montréal 2026 Background

Theme: Canadian Computing
Location: Royal Military College Saint-Jean (15 Rue Jacques-Cartier N, Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, J3B 8R8)
Dates: January 24 to 25, 2026
Hours: 9:00am to 5:00pm Saturday, 9:00am to 3:00pm Sunday

This was the first time that VCF has hosted an event in Montréal, and as far as I know the first time in Canada. Similar to the other events that they host, the mission statement is virtually the same:

VCF Montréal is a one-of-a-kind celebration of computing heritage: a gathering where enthusiasts, collectors, and the curious come together to discover, restore, and share the stories of the legendary machines that shaped our digital world.

The VCF organizers were able to arrange for several speakers to attend the event, as well as multiple exhibitors that also setup in the main hall during the event.

VCF Montréal Speakers

There were several speakers who attended the event. The topics in bold were the talks that I attended.

Saturday January 24, 2026

Start End Speaker Topic
9:30am 10:20am Peter Cherna From Montreal to Amiga
10:30am 11:20am Jim Gerrie Canadian BASIC Retro Game Archeology
1:00pm 1:50pm Zbigniew Stachniak The MCM/70 PC Preservation Project
2:00pm 2:50pm Fabian Rodriguez From CoCo to Community
3:00pm 3:50pm Gregory Nacu Supercharge Your C64 with C64 OS
4:00pm 4:50pm Jacques Gagnon Retrospective of 6 Years Working on BlueRetro

Sunday January 25, 2026

Start End Speaker Topic
9:30am 10:20am Leo Binkowski The NABU Network - A Canadian Retro Saga (Part 1)
10:35am 11:20am Leo Binkowski Modern Magic on Vintage NABU Hardware (Part 2)
12:30pm 1:20pm Ashley Hakker Starting a LAN Party Group in 2025
1:30pm 3:00pm Marc Verdiell Restoring NASA Apollo Hardware

My Experience

Overall, I enjoyed my time at VCF Montréal, and I will definitely attend it in the future if the organizers were to host it again. It was nice to see the exhibits, attend the talks, and talk with other enthusiasts in person. I also picked up a few items while I was there, because getting those in person is definitely easier than online.

There were many highlights from attending the event (in no particular order):

  • I purchased a game, Angry Robots!, which was created by a developer from Nova Scotia. I already have games for my Macintosh Plus, but it was nice to buy a new game from an indie developer.
  • I talked to the creator of the GameTank, which is an open source 8-bit console.
  • I talked with the creator of C64 OS, which is an alternative operating system for the Commodore 64. I found this to be an interesting project, and I appreciated the effort that he put into it. I attended the talk that was hosted by the creator, and it clearly demonstrated the capabilities of the operating system. I also purchased a copy, and I will try it out for myself on my Commodore 64.
  • I talked to the TPUG (Toronto Pet Users Group) members who had an exhibit setup. I am probably going to attend the World of Commodore in December 2026, as it is local for me.
  • The Type-in Mania: An Interactive Archive of Early BASIC Programs talk hosted by Jim Gerrie was particularly interesting. I had never considered how many BASIC games were lost to time, and how many were created by Canadian developers.
  • The Relay Computer was interesting, and getting an in-depth explanation on how it worked from the creator was informative.

The only bad thing that happened while I was at the event was the weather. I was not able to attend VCF Montréal on the second day due to an incoming winter storm in southern Ontario and Quebec, and it would have been irresponsible of me to attempt the drive home during a storm.