I'm a relatve newbie, but have been following the forum here and digging through the site for a couple months now. I've been planning on building my own 6502 microcomputer, but want to follow a "good path" to build it that won't be wrought with disappointment or pain

I have a ton of experience in software development, and think just the emulator side of this will be a great challenge for me, but I think that will help me gain a better understanding of the 6502 and how my computer is going to react in the end.

My basic plan is this:
1. Decide on what functionality I want (I/O, memory requirements)
2. Rough out the hardware design, develop the memory map and the basic component layout to where I have all the info needed for software design.
3. Build an emulator for MY computer, with the ability to simulate the I/O devices where I have them at.
4. Develop a series of test programs on the emulator
5. Build my monitor program
6. Build and test the hardware
7. Run test software on my hardware and debug as necessary
8. Run monitor program and debug as necessary

Any suggestions on anything else that I can do, or any newbie "jumping right into the deepend" mistakes I should watch out for?

Thanks for any help.

See "Tip of the Day", http://www.6502.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=342&start=30 Go down to tips #35, 36, and 37. #41 on the next page applies too. You'll have to go down a little more to get there because there's some other discussion in between.

Thanks for the link, it's exactly the info I was looking for. Reminds me of when I built a Handyboard in college, build in small steps and test as you go, little successes help make the project go a little bit easier.