I know I was off the forum for a couple of years and I recently got back on only to disappear so I thought I would let everyone know what is up.
When Covid hit the supply chain I noticed electronics getting expensive, Amazon was selling Pi Zeros for about $80! Also a lot of my collection, Propeller Boards and Arduino variants were becoming obsolete so I shifted to other interests. One of those interests is coin collecting and I found a large local club. I always thought my coin collecting as an investment so I decided to focused on that. I also am more involved in my church so my time is more limited. I'm still interested in electronics but I now will use what I already have since I have quite a few boards and components to work with.
Right now I just blew the dust off my DE0-Nano and DE10-Lite fpga boards to work on. I've dabbled with them from time to time and I really want to get knowledgeable of them. I am going to research them more and ultimately I would like to make a 1802 or Z80 softcore in Verilog. With my schedule it'll probably be a year or so before I get close to that goal. In the meantime I'll share my research and insights and welcome any advice on the subject.
Quote from: MicroNut on Apr 27, 2025, 08:35 PMI am going to research them more and ultimately I would like to make a 1802 or Z80 softcore in Verilog. With my schedule it'll probably be a year or so before I get close to that goal. In the meantime I'll share my research and insights and welcome any advice on the subject.
Welcome back, again. ;)
Well, I will be looking forward to what you come up with in regards to the Z80, which has been and always will be my favorite platform. It will always hold a special place in my heart. I continue to work with it to this day.
I will. The Z80 is my favorite too. I learned 6502 assembly in college but didn't really appreciate assembly untile I got my Timex Sinclair. It let me go beyond the restrictions of basic. Knowing the Z80 later helped me get a job. I have quite a few Z80 chips, most I got from that job when they "cleaned house" one day and was throwing out a box with many used Z80 ICs.
Quote from: MicroNut on Apr 27, 2025, 10:42 PMI will. The Z80 is my favorite too. I learned 6502 assembly in college but didn't really appreciate assembly untile I got my Timex Sinclair. It let me go beyond the restrictions of basic. Knowing the Z80 later helped me get a job. I have quite a few Z80 chips, most I got from that job when they "cleaned house" one day and was throwing out a box with many used Z80 ICs.
That's interesting, because I also started out with the 6502 on the Apple II and the VIC-20. On the VIC-20 I had a cartridge-based assembler. Of course, back then everything was stored on cassette tape. ::)
I do have a Ben Eater 6502 Computer Kit (https://savagecircuits.com/6502-computer-kit/) that I built, but still recovering that article from archives.
Over the years, I have lost much of the stuff from my Z80 days, but I was able to list a
few projects on Savage///Circuits, including:
An old Z80 Control (https://savagecircuits.com/z80-control-board/) Board that was a prototype for a car ECM.
An RC2014 Pro Homebrew Z80 Computer Kit (https://savagecircuits.com/rc2014-pro-homebrew-z80-computer-kit/) I bought to play around with assembly AND CP/M.
An updated version of one of my Z80 Retro Computer (https://savagecircuits.com/z80-retro-computer/), still in progress.
Sadly, I never owned a Timex Sinclair. Thinking about getting one of the
modern (https://savagechats.com/index.php?topic=304) ones though.