I'm thinking here of the rated, specified, speeds of 40 pin DIPs (and similar sized surface mount offerings) available in the open market.

Today we buy '02 and '816 chips rated at 14MHz.
In the early days we had '02 chips rated at 1MHz, later at 2MHz, then at 3MHz and 4MHz.

I'm not sure what the original speed rating of the '816 was - was it perhaps 4MHz, or not even that high?

I'm interested in constructing a timeline of what the fastest official speed was, year by year, in the open market. (I know that overclocking is often possible, and indeed I've done it myself, and I know that TTL remakes and FPGA remakes can go faster, but again that's not my question.)

Any thoughts, findings, or references?

The '816 was developed in conjunction with Apple for the IIgs, so I'd be surprised if it wasn't rated for 4MHz by the time it hit production.

Thanks - so, IIGS introduced 1986, and GTE chip is marked G65SC816P-4

Edit: another datapoint, Acorn's Communicator was introduced 1985 and ran at 2MHz. CPU marked G65SC816P-2.

According to its Wikipedia page, the original Apple IIGS ran at 2.8 MHz, purposely less than the Macintosh at the time. It states however, that the 65C816 ran up to 4 MHz. A link to a webpage in French is given as a source. A not exactly literate google translation of the relevant part is:



However, this doesn't seem like a particularly scholarly source as doesn't appear to include any further references to support this claim.

(Just to note, any discussion of the rights and wrongs, ingenuities and errors in the making of the IIGS belongs in a new thread - which I'd be happy to see. But please, not here.)

Thanks, tmr4, but I think the markings on the chip are the part we're interested in on this thread, more than the speed it's running at.

_________________
http://WilsonMinesCo.com/ lots of 6502 resources
The "second front page" is http://wilsonminesco.com/links.html .
What's an additional VIA among friends, anyhow?

I think there's limited value in the datasheets, unfortunately - they are often aspirational. There's a GTE datasheet from 1985 which mentions '816 speed grades of 2, 4, 6 and 8MHz, but that can't tell us if those speed grades were actually available, or when they were. There's a CMD datasheet from 1996 which mentions grades of 4 and 5MHz.

As very few fast 816 or 02 systems were shipped (and some such as the SuperCPU were overclocked, I think) what I think I'm looking for is recollections of package marking or perhaps advertisements.

We're so used to 14MHz being WDC's offering, but I have no idea when they first offered it, or what their previous offering was.

Edit: I see from a late 2000 archive of the their web site, WDC already offered 14MHz parts at that time. That's the earliest archive I've seen.

Edit: I see indications in a snippet of a 1998 "IC Master" that WDC offered -8 -10 and -14 parts.

Edit: I see in a Feb 2000 post on this forum that -10 parts were available and -14 were offered:

I notice adverts in inCider magazine:
1989-12, $56 for a 65c816 (no speed grade given)
1993-03, $49 for a WDC65C816-7 (DIP)

The oldest W65C816 I have in the parts bin that I can rely on (ie its not a pull) is datestamped 9541 and that's a -8 rated part.

I've got a couple of pulls with earlier datestamps 9540 and 9529 that are probably reliable, as they don't look like they've been re-marked. Those are WDC branded too.

Thanks - that's nice concrete evidence!

Transwarp is an illustrative case:


More about Sanyo's assistance in this late 1992 article, helpfully linked by paulb in this discussion over on Stardot:
"Breaking the 10Mhz barrier", Andrew Roughan, Apple Users' Group, Sydney, Australia.



The gist is that WDC have some '816 parts which can run faster than 7MHz, and will supply on request for $95 plus shipping. Although some parts will run at 14MHz it's not clear if any parts are marked that way or if that's any kind of specified timing. Indeed, apparently WDC insisted on first sending some user group notes on how to upgrade you accelerator before selling you a chip:



The linked article also advises on purchasing faster GALs, cache, and crystal. It mentions crystals from 32MHz to 60MHz, corresponding to 8MHz to 15MHz for the '816.

It also advises on increasing the power supply to 5.5 or even 5.6 volts. Clearly we're in the territory of experimentation and seeing what works, not the territory of works-to-spec. Five examples are quoted for people's results, ranging from 11.5MHz to 14MHz.

From later in that linked compendium, on p533, from 1998, a note that WDC sell PLCC parts rated at -14:


That domain is archived back to June 1997 on the Wayback Machine... both the 'c02 and the '816 are described with timings tabulated for 14MHz and sold as -14 parts. However, the '02 is described as able to run at 0 to 20MHz, the '816 as up to 16MHz. Both are described as 0.8um parts:

'c02 .8u process, 3349 gates, core size 1.67mm x 1.23mm or 66x48 mils
'816 .8u process, 7419 gates, core size 2.76mm x 1.51mm or 109x59 mils

Their price list also shows their '265 microcontroller and 6522 both rated at 8MHz.

The News page has a March 1996 press release, which mentions 16MHz speeds for both '02 and '816. It also mentions the SuperCPU as running at 20MHz although I reckon we've heard before that these used hand-selected parts. (Photo here shows a -14 part in the socket with a '96 datecode.)

WDC's archived site helpfully mentions a 1994 article in Microprocessor Report. No speed numbers, but this snippet is interesting:

Found a July 1992 Usenet post by Jerry Chang mentioning 14MHz '816 Sanyo parts available.
14mhz '816 from Sanyo
A better thread also from July 1992, started by Jawaid Bazyar
High Speed '816s from Sanyo



This page says that prior to the Sanyo parts (datecode starts SA, marked as -14, as far as I can tell) the 816 was not sold above 10MHz.

In this 1990 usenet thread, Dave Haynie says:


Nearby, he adds


The thread has speculation about imminent 12MHz offerings - evidently that would have been a step up. Also speculation about 20MHz.

Backing up a bit, another datapoint:
Apple IIc Plus ; September, 1988; 65C02 @ 4 MHz.