Ok, firstly, apologies for the lateness of this post. The stuff below was actually done a couple of weeks ago, but time has just got away from me. Hence this is being written up 2 days past the closing date for RC2017/4. Sorry Anyway, this part of my challenge involves investigating a rack that came as […]
After a visual check of the keyboards (see this post), I had a couple of questions, which were do the keyboards work? and how do the keyboards work? On the basis that neither of the Alphameric had their EPROM windows covered, and that one of the Cherry keyboards had already been modified, I chose the […]
Next up on the things to investigate is the 4 keyboards Judging by the connectors, it was obvious that these aren’t modern (PS2, USB or even 5 pin DIN) keyboards. Likely either a raw matrix or maybe parallel ASCII. Lets open them up and have a poke around!
I decided the easiest thing to tackle first would be the three ICE (In-Circuit Emulators) as they’re quite bulky things to get out of the way early. There are two non-identical versions of the same model Adtek ICE Engine BX and a Zax ICD278 – all with manuals!
So, once again Retro Challenge is upon us, and, yes, the timing is offset , but an April challenge should mean that more people are able to participate. To try and stay ahead of the curve this time, I thought I’d get in early and give my excuses for why I failed to complete the […]
So, you may well remember that I entered Retro Challenge 18 months ago, and what a fun crazy busy time that was! Well, the January Retro Challenge competition is about to kick off in just over 2 weeks. If you’re not familiar with Retro Challenge, shame on you! But you can de-shame yourself by heading […]
So, the RC2014 is great. I can run Microsoft BASIC and program it from there, and as long as I am using a terminal emulator, I can copy & paste to save and load programs. Alternatively, I can write Z80 code using an online compiler then download it, copy it to USB stick, move it […]
My original plan had never been to design and build my own computer. I had, however, planned to build a clone of the Sinclair ZX80, which has been on my bucket list of things to own for year, and which I had found plans for online. Whilst collecting the parts and reading up on simple […]
I guess this is kind of a follow up to my Retro Challenge posts, as it was thoughts that stemmed from teaching myself Assembly Language for my Z80 project. Essentially it is a comparison between programming in the 70’s and today against building with Lego in the 70s and today. But before I get stuck in, can […]
Wow! What an awesome month July has been. The whole Retro Challenge thing has been great, and despite moments of stress or despair, I have thoroughly enjoyed taking part and seeing what everyone else has been up to. Before I sum up my project, I should make a few honourable mentions. Retro Challenge – A […]
With over 24 hours to go before the end of July deadline the final piece of the puzzle fell in to place! But, first, a quick catchup from the last blog post;
Despite a late start today, things have gone well so I actually feel like I’m ahead of the game right now. Certainly not finished, but with most of the major hurdles now behind me, the only thing left is writing a bit of Z80 assembler code. And even that is starting to look manageable.
So, exactly 3 weeks after they were ordered, the PCBs from OSHPark arrived today. It’s just as well, as I was running low on things to do without them, and with just 6 days left of the Retro Challenge I would have struggled to finish in time. Well, that’s my weekend planned out for me […]
Just a little update as I’ve only done a little bit of work on the Z80 this evening; The LED matrix board now plugs in to my Z80 backplane!
Sorry I’ve not made any updates for a couple of days, but there’s not been much of significance to report of late. Until today, that is. Although, as far as the PCBs I’m waiting for are concerned, the only news to report there is that there is no news to report. I will report tomorrow […]
The 5 matrix board has now been finished. And no one could be more relieved than me. There’s a LOT of soldering going on in there!
The mounting of the LED matrix has probably caused me the biggest turmoil so far on the Retro Challenge. First, I was going to design a custom PCB for them, but I missed the window of opportunity to get it manufactured at a reasonable price. So, for simplicity, I decided to use breadboard until I […]
just a quick update about my Z80 development environment. If you look down a couple of blogs, you’ll see that I found an online Z80 emulator and I’d written a couple of bits that executed in it, so I was going to do my Z80 learning and development on that. However, there were two issues. […]
We’re at the halfway mark of the Retro Challenge, and there’s a slight lull in activity, so this seems like a good chance to catch up on what’s been done so far, and what’s still to come. Firstly, a quick review of the challenge I set myself; write my name in LED lights. These must, […]
I knew there would be some stumbling blocks with this Retro Challenge, but, hey, it wouldn’t be a challenge if everything was just nice and simple. However, I seem to be beset by little stupid technical issues that aren’t necessarily retro in nature. However, the fact that you’re reading this does at least mean that my […]