6502 Made out of discrete components

[roland p]

This is really cool!

 

A 6502 made out of discrete components.

 

http://monster6502.com

 

 

The MOnSter 6502

 

A new dis-integrated circuit project to make a complete, working transistor-scale replica of the classic MOS 6502 microprocessor. We'll be showing off our progress at the 2016 Bay Area Maker Faire!

[Clint Thompson]

That is too cool! =D

[7800fan]

But what computer can use it? It can only do a few hundred hz at best and nearly everything that uses the CPU is 1MHz minimum.

 

I am pretty sure it can't be used in C64, too many timing issues with IEC, video, etc to make this work. What about NES? There are some guide about overclocking NES by cutting the clock line to CPU while leaving PPU intact. If it can be underclocked, how about running that huge CPU on NES?

[Osgeld]

That's not the point of the project

[danwinslow]

holy CRAP I want one.

[atarifanboi]

Coooooool

[roland p]

It must be beautiful to run it at 1Hz and see the lights blinking.

[Keatah]

Now all we need is other support chips like 6551, 4116, and many others. Including the 74LS series. Collect them all!

[Emehr]

That is really awesome. It'd be a cool learning tool for kids or anyone that wants to learn how processors work. I'd love to have one myself.

[BillyHW]

OMG, I want one.

[RevEng]

Pfffft... wake me up when they have a through-hole version.

 

Kidding. It is totally beautiful, and I wish I could afford to splash out for it. I'd create a diode-matrix ROM board for it to run from, and display it all in a frame.

[DanBoris]

This is a very cool project!

 

Ok, who's up for designing a vacuum tube 6502?

[7800fan]

Get a case of firework sparklers. Light it on fire. Same effect but a lot cheaper.

 

Those tube will blow and when you need 50,000 tubes to emulate one CPU, the heat and power requirement will be staggering plus you'd be running around a lot replacing a blown tube every few seconds.

[nanochess]

It must be beautiful to run it at 1Hz and see the lights blinking.

 

Here you go

 

https://twitter.com/TubeTimeUS/status/733476018598510592/video/1

[jdgabbard]

Man, that's cool. I like seeing projects like this. As for what it can be used for, I could go on, but mostly DIY computer systems. Lots of people build 4-8 bit computers out of discrete components. Hell, I even have an ALU that I hand coded on an EPROM. That was fun doing all 4K of calculations by hand...

[amiman99]

It is cool, I stumbled on it just yesterday. Very impressed.

[+Ksarul]

This project looks like it was a lot of fun! That's what makes the hobby interesting--lots of fun (but crazy) things to do with electricity. . .