Is there any future of 6502?

[Nightmaretony]

Trying out other CPUs is a pain in the rear. Am deisnign a testing system for work, wanted a seperate sub computer to handle some switching. In the interest of time, wanted an off the shelf SBC with certain sets of IO and USB. Called WDC, no dice. And bummer, my fave person Ralph is no longer there Picked up an SBC using an 8051 with basic. The assembly is as you said, hostile on that unit. Basic is a tad strange format to one used to Applesoft. Had to sstruggle a bit with it.

Cant wait to get back to doing the pinball project. Got too many new projects, including a movie soundtrack....

[kc5tja]

What, if I may ask, is your set of requirements that you opted not to go with a 65xx solution? I'm curious, because it seems to me that something like the Kestrel-1 or the SBC-1/2 probably would have fit your needs except for a few key details. What are those key details?

Thanks.

[Nightmaretony]

RS232 communication with routines

basic or machine hooks, but the communication. Originally usb but opted out of it.

several i/o ports to work with

available finished and ready for action.


Already got this one based on the 8051, using basic for it. I still prefer 6502instead. Sigh. Little late now to not use it, already got thingtws going in there... refunding isnt an option since I already began modding into the board...

At least for the pinball and haunted house projects, it will remain 6502 all the way.

[Nightmaretony]

Actually, one other thing it will ened to do is IR command lines sending and recieving. If I cant get the other one to do it, I will switch it over pronto and go back to what I know and love best.

So what it would be:

RS232 i/o

8 or 16 i/o pins
the ability to recieve and send IR command sets such as RC5 or custom sets definable.

The trick was time, so I opted for the off the shelf. I dont know how it will do for the IR. If those iexist for 6502, let me get back to it



NOTHER fun project to keep me busy...
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2158451/

[kc5tja]

Nightmaretony wrote:

RS232 i/o
8 or 16 i/o pins
the ability to recieve and send IR command sets such as RC5 or custom sets definable.

I remember one time reading about how someone was using a VIA chip for a UART. But their approach was quite unique! They used a timer to determine how long to keep the TXD line high or low. So, if you wanted to send 01001100 binary, and u is the bit duration, they'd first program the TXD line low, then tell the timer to expire after 2u. Then they'd simply EOR the TXD bit to toggle it, and tell the timer to expire after 2u again. Toggle, time, toggle, time, etc.

I'm sure that receiving was done a bit more traditionally, but I thought it was kind of interesting, especially since the baud rate was fully programmable within a certain range. However, I'm sure the baud rate wasn't all that great. But it should be able to handle at least 20kbps though, I'd think.

[Nightmaretony]

High baud rate isnt important. The host ocmputer will send out commands to the sub cpu and the sub may return values or send back IR messages. So in a sense, the RS232 monitoring would need to be kept going on a continious basis as an event loop....

[TMorita]

kc5tja wrote:

Nightmaretony wrote:

RS232 i/o
8 or 16 i/o pins
the ability to recieve and send IR command sets such as RC5 or custom sets definable.

I remember one time reading about how someone was using a VIA chip for a UART. But their approach was quite unique! They used a timer to determine how long to keep the TXD line high or low. So, if you wanted to send 01001100 binary, and u is the bit duration, they'd first program the TXD line low, then tell the timer to expire after 2u. Then they'd simply EOR the TXD bit to toggle it, and tell the timer to expire after 2u again. Toggle, time, toggle, time, etc.

I'm sure that receiving was done a bit more traditionally, but I thought it was kind of interesting, especially since the baud rate was fully programmable within a certain range. However, I'm sure the baud rate wasn't all that great. But it should be able to handle at least 20kbps though, I'd think.

This is generally called a software UART.

I've done it on the Hitachi (now Renesas) AE350 series of smartcard chips. They don't have a hardware UART, so you need to do all the serial comms in software. You don't even have a timer, so iot's all done with software timing loops.

Toshi

[kc5tja]

TMorita wrote:

This is generally called a software UART.

I'm quite familiar with what a software UART is, but I've always implemented them using bit-shifts and the like. Never by counting 1s and 0s, and then programming a timer to toggle the output pin.

I was revelling at the unique implementation, not the fact that it was software.

[Nightmaretony]

Plan changed a bit, thankfully. Other guy at work suggested using I2C. This killed off the SBC and each sub board uses an AT89C2051 which supports I2C. Makes life a bit easier.

for the pinball front, been wanting to make a small power suply to test the board out in the bedroom where the main computer is (to get the attract mode going, had beenm running a 50 foot ethernet cable to teh workshop and powering up the cpus there.

at least taxes are done and submitted to our tax accountant, so that is a BIG help for timewise

so now other projects:
2 flat front tires, one for each tractor
cut welds from previous owner to replace bushings on lawn tractor
repair pole position
repair more galagas
get music going for horrorween
finish trademark thing, awaiting printer to finish letterhead
get safety things going as am chairman of said comittee
repair shortwave radio
get music studio up and running entirely
finsh mowing weeds when tractor is running again
replace fuel filter on bigger tractor

The secret involves not watching tv

[BigDumbDinosaur]

Icy wrote:

Yes, PIC's processor is lousy. 65x02 is wonderful. Programming 65x02 feels like vacation, you cannot get tired doing that. It is natural, logical, it doesn't give you headache.
So, why couldn't someone, like WDC, come up with a single chip microcontroller that is at par with PIC or Motorola? WDC's microcontrollers aren't microcontollers of today. WDC lives in past. Microcontroller of today is a one chip, and nothing else is needed to attach.
All of that core stuff will disappear in a few years. And, so will WDC, unfortunately. Unless they come up with something up to date. Who wants to tell them?

The above post was from 10 years ago. WDC is still in business, despite not changing much in their chip lineup.

[GARTHWILSON]

On HackaDay, in the comments on http://hackaday.com/2015/03/13/hacklet- ... -projects/, commenter "that guy" said on March 13, 2015 at 4:52 pm, "I’m a newish developer in the toy industry and holy s*** do alot [sic] of toys still use a 6502 based core…"

[randallmeyer2000]

I am no fan of PIC. I have a BASIC Stamp, and though I am lazy and don't like higher level languages and don't really care because I am really just a biologist, even I know when I am "talking to a machine" in precise and accurate and scientific language and really understanding what I mean, and the alternative. PIC/Stamp is the alternative; I find I am making somewhat intelligible statements to a device that may or may not decide to bug out on me, and anyway, I'll have to roll up my sleeves and read fifty pages of documentation just a to write a few simple lines of code. ARGGGGH!

However, I have made peace with the device. A slight truce, while I regroup and retrench. I am using it because my SpeakJet documentation says it will allow me to program phoneme concatenation in an easy fashion. (I have wired the speakjet, in adequate fashion, but the timing for the serial control is a bit tricky. I might sort it out this week! At the very least, Demo Mode works, and Ready Mode works too--I think?).