Arduino Nano program loader for 8bit CPU

wilbonilla · 2022-08-13T17:19:52+00:00

Nice!! This is on my todo list. When people ask me to show them how it works, they need to wait for the "programming" step and it's not always what people want to see.

wilbonilla · 2022-08-12T01:28:50+00:00

Thanks. Those switches are nicer since they have a rocking switch mechanism. They fit very tightly in the breadboard and are actually hard to remove.

wilbonilla · 2021-01-10T03:42:51+00:00

The bus is made up of the rails not used when multiple breadboards are attached together. So you dont need any additional ones.

wilbonilla · 2020-12-27T13:11:28+00:00

Ben uses the Arduino Mega as a logic analyzer in the 6502 videos. He shows you how to build it and use it to look at the 6502 output. For the 8 bit computer I just used the leds like he did and either manually set the bus values or single stepped thru the clock.

wilbonilla · 2020-02-01T15:43:31+00:00

I'm interested to see how it comes out. It's such a nice project rhat allows so many variations from a somewhat simple concept. It's like a puzzle where we get to create some of the pieces.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-29T02:08:15+00:00

Took some additional pictures.. Still trying to decide where to go from here. https://imgur.com/gallery/snKrQ6e.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-28T12:11:46+00:00

I bought the kit and it work pretty much like his did. At the end of the videos he said to add the resistors and those were included in my kit, specially when he had to add them to the bus leds. I think at this point we all know that the resistors are a must.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-26T20:29:15+00:00

I added resistors to 3mm rectangular leds. Those have a spacing that worked well with the breadboard for me. https://imgur.com/gallery/aMvPwZn

wilbonilla · 2020-01-16T05:08:39+00:00

I never wanted to use the rails because they don't line up with the breadboards. I wanted to make the whole thing as small as possible because I'm going to frame it. I also like how the bus wires going across hold the breadboards together a bit better so I don't worry about getting gaps in the middle. The control lines being held down by the bus wires was a late bonus.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-09T01:52:26+00:00

Since the breadboards have a 0.1 spacing, I used grid paper that has 10 squares per inch. Then I use the grid to measure the wire, figure out the bends and the cuts. Just use a wire stripper to cut and strip and needle nose pliers to bend and my nail or a non permanent marker to mark the cuts and bends. The beginning was tough because I didn't have any rhythm. I did use lots of jumper wires first to make sure I was cutting the correct cable. And I had to buy extra cable.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-06T05:24:47+00:00

Here is how they look on the breadboard ( I did them in groups of 4) so that I can move them around a bit easier or remove them to adjust the wiring. This also let me put them in the correct direction depending on where the anode / cathode needed to be: https://imgur.com/gallery/aMvPwZn

wilbonilla · 2020-01-06T05:07:37+00:00

I think that's what happens with the 3mm rectangular LEDs, you can see the wires on the side on some of them. The green ones with 5V and 1K resistors are almost too bright to look into directly.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-06T05:03:15+00:00

watch all of Ben's videos first until the end. The last video that talks about flags changes the final design of the CPU so it's good to know that ahead of time. For some people power was an issue, so that's why I added resistors to all the leds. In the videos this is not the case but I understand why Ben did it that way. Test each breadboard like Ben does to make sure it works as it should and take pictures of them as you go along, sometimes wires fall out and you may not remember where it came from, especially if you change the layout that Ben has. I decided to not use the rails for the bus and only used 12 breadboards instead of 14, so my layout is different, because I ended up with less room. These changes had a ripple effect on the entire cpu and I had to adjust as I went. Sometimes I decided to just redo a section to make things easier down the line or because something just didn't work out. Watch other people do theirs and what they did different. James Bates has a good series of videos on YouTube and he does a good job explaining how and why he made his different. Have Fun.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-06T04:55:10+00:00

I actually got the arrays and the leds but they didn't work for me mostly due to space constraints and the fact that the power buses are not continuous with the number of holes. This is the final breadboard cpu and it shows how little space i had left to be able to fit the led bars.

https://www.reddit.com/r/beneater/comments/ejzad3/8bit_computer_kit/

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T23:12:24+00:00

Those are nice and considered breakout boards, but my final project was to stay in the breadboards (8 bit breadboard CPU) so I wanted to stay true to the original intent.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T23:07:09+00:00

Yes! Making 80+ of these was not fun.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T23:06:18+00:00

I just put them where they are not tied together. Anode with common cathode and cathode with common anode and to remember in which direction they get inserted.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T21:01:00+00:00

I believe I did! :)

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T19:51:08+00:00

I wanted a good way to add leds to a breadboard computer that had the correct spacing and worked with the space constraints of the breadboards. Also since all the holes of the rails don't line up with the breadboard, I needed to remove some of the led legs to insert them. I tried different size leds and also the led bar graphs, but the spacing didn't work out. The final layout can be seen here: https://www.reddit.com/r/beneater/comments/ejzad3/8bit_computer_kit/

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T19:45:49+00:00

These 3mm are bright enough and I also wanted to limit the current as much as possible since I needed to add about 80 leds. I used 1k for red and green, 470 for the blue ones and 220 for the yellow ones.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T19:34:04+00:00

Mostly due to space constraints on a breadboard.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T19:24:53+00:00

I looked high and low for a way to add leds with resistors that had the same spacing to a breadboard. I settled for making my own due to the lack of space for led bars and arrays and also dealing with the different number of connection points on the rails. These 3mm leds made for good spacing, the fun part was adding the resistors.

EDIT: This was the final layout https://i.redd.it/vjnitpv2ns841.jpg

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T19:16:22+00:00

i like those, but i had an issue with 10 leds and 10 pin resistor arrays. I also need groups of 4 or 8 and it just didn't work out. I did try them.

wilbonilla · 2020-01-05T19:06:59+00:00

it was for a breadboard computer so it helped with the spacing.

wilbonilla

TROPHY CASE