I agree that we start simply, with mainstream microprocessors from the 70s up to 1990 (486, 68040) and then expand over time. On Tue, Feb 11, 2020 at 12:21 PM Ethan Dicks via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sun, Feb 9, 2020 at 12:47 PM David Gesswein via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sun, Feb 09, 2020 at 11:45:37AM -0500, Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
VCF is working on a historical exhibit of CPUs (not really support chips at this point). Literally just the CPUs.
What should we have at the bare minimum? 4004, 8008, 8088, 8086, 6502, Z80, 6800, 6809...?
Without your criteria hard to say. A lot were intended for embedded applications.
Agreed.
Some more 8 bits 1802, F8, TMS 1000, 8048/8051, PIC, 8x300.
Yep.
greater than 8 bit: 68000 family, TMS 9900, 6100 (PDP-8 on a chip)
Yep. I was going to mention the 6100 and 6120, but you already did...
Interested in bit slice such as AM2901?
As covered elsewhere, that's a nice chip, but it's in the category of CPU building blocks (with the 74181 and others)...
What should we have if we have more space? 80x86, 680x0, Sparc, MIPS, Power, Alpha, ARM, Itanium...?
If you are going to that level, there's also the CVAX chip, the first implementation of the VAX architecture on a single chip (previously done on multiple ASICs or Am2901 bit slice or gate arrays...)
There's the F-11 and J-11 and T-11 implementations of the PDP-11. Besides just "a PDP-11 CPU", the T-11 showed up as a microcontroller on peripherals and in multiple arcade games (Atari System 2 platform, games like Paperboy and others).
AVR since popular with hobbiest and continuation of old microcontroller.
There are a few million of those in people's hands. It's also interesting for being Harvard Architecture (along with PIC and MCS-51 (8051 and variants))
It really comes down to what the point of the display it - you've mentioned pointing out the rise in complexity/Moore's Law, but there's also the time aspect (decade by decade) or product tiers (embedded, home desktops, industrial-class machines...) So many ways to slice the pie.
-ethan