Hackaday 68k: So You Want A Kit?

March 27, 2014 by Brian Benchoff 67 Comments

68000

It’s yet another update to the Hackaday 68k, the wire-wrapped backplane computer that will eventually be serving up our retro site.

This is also a demo of Hackaday Projects, our new, fancy online documentation tool for all your adventures in making and tinkering. Did you know we’re having a contest on Hackaday Projects? Make something sci-fi, and you’re in the running for some really good prizes. There’s soldering stations, o-scopes, and a lot of other prizes being thrown at the winners. It’s awesome. First one to build a working Mr. Fusion wins.

In this update, I’m going to go over the beginnings of the video board, why Hammond enclosures are awesome and terrible at the same time, and some thoughts on turning this into a kit or product of some type. Click that, ‘Read more…’ link.

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Hackaday 68k: Gluing Architecture Buffer Maps

March 13, 2014 by Brian Benchoff 24 Comments

It’s time for more blatant advertising for Hackaday Projects, the best project hosting site on the Internet. Did we tell you it’s collaborative? That you and your friends can work on projects together? Want more encouragement to join? How about a contest with prizes that include oscilloscopes, FPGA dev boards, soldering and rework stations, Beaglebones and Raspberries and Spark Cores? Oh my!

Oh. We’re also developing a retrocomputer to show off the features of Hackaday Projects. This is the latest update, showing off the architecture of the entire system, the memory map, and the logic glue and buffers. The plan for this project is to have it host another awesome Hackaday site, our retro version, a small off-shoot of the main Hackaday site that’s specifically designed to be loaded by computers built before 1993. There haven’t been many retro successes in the Hackaday tip line recently, so if you manage to get a vintage computer to pull the retro site up, snap a pic and send it in.

For those of you wanting to catch up on the Hackaday 68k project, here’s the Hackaday Projects page, and here’s all the front page updates. Click that ‘Read more…’ link for the update.

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Hackaday 68k: Blinking An LED

March 5, 2014 by Brian Benchoff 47 Comments

Time for another update for the Hackaday 68k, the 16-bit retrocomputer developed on Hackaday to show off both our love for vintage hardware and our new project hosting site. There’s still invites to be had, people. Get ’em while they’re hot.

This post is going to cover exactly how complex a simple 68000 system is. The answer is, “not very.” A simple 68k system is at least as simple to design than some other homebrew systems we’ve seen around here. Yes, a 16-bit data bus means there’s more wires going everywhere, but like she said, just because it’s bigger doesn’t mean it’s harder.

There is some progress to report on the construction of the Hackaday 68k. The processor has been verified as working with a blinking LED. It’s the ‘Hello World’ of computer design, and it’s at least as complex as blinking a LED with an Arduino.

You’re gonna want to click that ‘Read more’ link.

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Hackaday 68k: Enclosure, Backplane, And Power

February 26, 2014 by Brian Benchoff 46 Comments

It’s about time for an update for Hackaday’s latest project – a modern retrocomputer based on the Motorola 68000 CPU. In this update, we’ll be taking a look at the enclosure, the backplane itself, and how we’re going to power this thing.

This is only an update to the project; you can check out the current status over on Hackaday Projects. It’s Hackaday’s new collaborative project hosting site where you (and your friends) can design, build, or document anything you have in mind. Request an invite for the alpha release of Hackaday Projects and you can give this project a skull! Seriously, this project is only the third ‘most skulled’ one on Hackaday Projects.

Now that the completely transparent pitch for Hackaday Projects is over with, we can get on to the update for the Hackaday 68k. Click that ‘Read More…’ link.

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Hackaday 68k: A New Hackaday Project

February 20, 2014 by Brian Benchoff 151 Comments

It’s no secret Hackaday loves retrocomputers, classic hardware, and vintage tech. Now that we have a great way to present long-form projects, it only makes sense that we combine our loves with a new build. Over the next few months, I’ll be developing a homebrew computer based on the Motorola 68000 CPU, documenting everything along the way, and building a very capable piece of hardware that will end up hosting a few Hackaday webpages. I already have a solid start on the project and will be posting on our front page to discuss the major parts already in progress, and those yet to come.

There are a few reasons we’re taking on this project. With few exceptions, most of the homebrew projects we see are based around 8-bit micros – specifically the 6502 and Z80. 16 and 32-bit CPUs really aren’t that much more difficult to work with, and if we can spearhead a renaissance of the 68k, 65816, or even a 386 (!), we’re all for that. Also, it’s been suggested that we host the Hackaday Retro site on retro hardware, and what better way to do that by documenting a build on our new project hosting site?

That’s a very brief introduction to this project. Let’s take a closer look at what hardware we’ll be using, what software we’ll get running, and what you can do to help.

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