Mr SQL wrote:
Thank you for the explanation. I'm curious how do illegal opcodes manage to add extra functions without extra hardware.
If you're curious about how any particular illegal instruction works, punch it into the RAM and step through it!
My understanding of illegal instructions is that they have the bit pattern xxxxxx11 and perform both the instructions xxxxxx01 and xxxxxx10 at the same time if they're "compatible enough". The reason they do something instead of nothing (like on the 65c02 where they are all nop) is because it takes fewer transistors to make it a "don't care" operation. This optimization is inside the decode rom, which unfortunately my tool doesn't show you right now.