Working on a historical microprocessor exhibt
Hi Everyone, 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...? What should we have if we have more space? 80x86, 680x0, Sparc, MIPS, Power, Alpha, ARM, Itanium...? Modern CPUs (to some degree) aren't out of the question, either, as we're hoping to show the progression of Moore's Law from the 4004 (2,300 transistors) to present day maybe, for example, a AMD Ryzen 9 3900X (at 9,890,000,000 transistors). Thoughts? I'm sure I'm forgetting plenty of important CPUs. -Adam
On Sun, Feb 09, 2020 at 11:45:37AM -0500, Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Hi Everyone,
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. Some more 8 bits 1802, F8, TMS 1000, 8048/8051, PIC, 8x300. greater than 8 bit: 68000 family, TMS 9900, 6100 (PDP-8 on a chip) Interested in bit slice such as AM2901? More to choose from https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/teaching/2006/CompArch/documents/all/trends/cpu_his...
What should we have if we have more space? 80x86, 680x0, Sparc, MIPS, Power, Alpha, ARM, Itanium...?
Modern CPUs (to some degree) aren't out of the question, either, as we're hoping to show the progression of Moore's Law from the 4004 (2,300 transistors) to present day maybe, for example, a AMD Ryzen 9 3900X (at 9,890,000,000 transistors).
AVR since popular with hobbiest and continuation of old microcontroller.
Thoughts? I'm sure I'm forgetting plenty of important CPUs.
Ooo.. how could I forget Fairchild? Thanks! We're kind of in the "perfect world" phase right now. Reality will settle in soon about what we have and do not have and what people are willing to loan/donate. But reality is no fun! The AMD bit slice is new to me. Am I understanding correctly that it is not a discrete CPU but rather parts of a CPU that could be used together? Probably not a candidate for this exhibit, but I'm already having ideas for the next one! I'd love to find a Zilog Z8000, but don't imagine period correct Z8000s are so easy to come by. We have a Z8000 machine in the warehouse, but one of the big rules for this product is that no vintage computers will be harmed to make it happen. RCA 1802 should be on the short list, too. AVR is good suggestion, especially since it is a Harvard Architecture.. nice to see that represented. Thanks for all the ides! On 2/9/2020 12:46 PM, David Gesswein via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On Sun, Feb 09, 2020 at 11:45:37AM -0500, Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Hi Everyone,
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.
Some more 8 bits 1802, F8, TMS 1000, 8048/8051, PIC, 8x300.
greater than 8 bit: 68000 family, TMS 9900, 6100 (PDP-8 on a chip)
Interested in bit slice such as AM2901?
More to choose from
https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/teaching/2006/CompArch/documents/all/trends/cpu_his...
What should we have if we have more space? 80x86, 680x0, Sparc, MIPS, Power, Alpha, ARM, Itanium...?
Modern CPUs (to some degree) aren't out of the question, either, as we're hoping to show the progression of Moore's Law from the 4004 (2,300 transistors) to present day maybe, for example, a AMD Ryzen 9 3900X (at 9,890,000,000 transistors).
AVR since popular with hobbiest and continuation of old microcontroller.
Thoughts? I'm sure I'm forgetting plenty of important CPUs.
On 2/9/20 2:02 PM, Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Ooo.. how could I forget Fairchild? Thanks! The AMD bit slice is new to me. Am I understanding correctly that it is not a discrete CPU but rather parts of a CPU that could be used together? Probably not a candidate for this exhibit, but I'm already having ideas for the next one!
Bit-slice is great stuff. There are many bit-slice chips, but the Am2901 essentially owned the market. It is a four-bit unit. Basically it's a processor building block used to construct a micromachine. You stack them up to whatever bit width you want, and program them with microcode to implement whatever macro-architecture you want. There are companion chips, like the Am2910 sequencer, etc. These are not required but come in handy. The sequencer can implement constructs like a microprogram counter, branches and jumps, etc. A few examples you've heard of: The VAX-11/730 uses a row of eight Am2901s to implement a 32-bit VAX processor, and the DECsystem-2020 uses a row of nine to implement a 36-bit PDP-10 processor. Both use RAM-based control stores, so when they power up they don't speak the VAX/PDP-10 instruction sets until after the microcode is loaded. This is generally the smallest/cheapest approach to build a large processor. The VAX-11/730 and DECsystem-2020 are very small, very low-end members of their respective families. But the bit-slice chips themselves are quite fast for their day, being big hot-running 1970s bipolar chips. It's also possible to use Am2901s (or other bit-slice chips) as processors in their own right. For example, many, many third-party disk controllers for DEC machines use a pair or a quad of Am2901s to implement their functionality. In this application they typically aren't running microcode, but are used as more of a microcontroller with firmware. The distinction is largely semantic, though, of course. It's great stuff. If you want to learn more about how all of this works, I recommend picking up a copy of "Bit-Slice Microprocessor Design" by John Mick and James Brick. This book is/was known in the industry as "Mick & Brick".
I'd love to find a Zilog Z8000, but don't imagine period correct Z8000s are so easy to come by. We have a Z8000 machine in the warehouse, but one of the big rules for this product is that no vintage computers will be harmed to make it happen.
Are you talking about just a Z8000 chip? I can provide that for the exhibit. It will need ESD protection, of course. -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On 2/9/2020 2:24 PM, Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Bit-slice is great stuff. There are many bit-slice chips, but the Am2901 essentially owned the market. It is a four-bit unit.
Basically it's a processor building block used to construct a micromachine. You stack them up to whatever bit width you want, and program them with microcode to implement whatever macro-architecture you want. There are companion chips, like the Am2910 sequencer, etc. These are not required but come in handy. The sequencer can implement constructs like a microprogram counter, branches and jumps, etc.
A few examples you've heard of: The VAX-11/730 uses a row of eight Am2901s to implement a 32-bit VAX processor, and the DECsystem-2020 uses a row of nine to implement a 36-bit PDP-10 processor. Both use RAM-based control stores, so when they power up they don't speak the VAX/PDP-10 instruction sets until after the microcode is loaded.
This is generally the smallest/cheapest approach to build a large processor. The VAX-11/730 and DECsystem-2020 are very small, very low-end members of their respective families. But the bit-slice chips themselves are quite fast for their day, being big hot-running 1970s bipolar chips.
It's also possible to use Am2901s (or other bit-slice chips) as processors in their own right. For example, many, many third-party disk controllers for DEC machines use a pair or a quad of Am2901s to implement their functionality. In this application they typically aren't running microcode, but are used as more of a microcontroller with firmware. The distinction is largely semantic, though, of course.
It's great stuff. If you want to learn more about how all of this works, I recommend picking up a copy of "Bit-Slice Microprocessor Design" by John Mick and James Brick. This book is/was known in the industry as "Mick & Brick".
That fills a huge hole in my understanding of architecture history. It certainly makes sense that there would be separate ICs that eventually merged into one discrete CPU. I just assumed it was done by the minicomputer manufacturers themselves. I had no idea it was AMD! Thanks!
I'd love to find a Zilog Z8000, but don't imagine period correct Z8000s are so easy to come by. We have a Z8000 machine in the warehouse, but one of the big rules for this product is that no vintage computers will be harmed to make it happen. Are you talking about just a Z8000 chip? I can provide that for the exhibit. It will need ESD protection, of course.
Cool, we'll talk. And not only ESD protection, but non degradable ESD protection is being planned.
On 2/9/20 2:58 PM, Adam Michlin wrote:
That fills a huge hole in my understanding of architecture history. It certainly makes sense that there would be separate ICs that eventually merged into one discrete CPU. I just assumed it was done by the minicomputer manufacturers themselves. I had no idea it was AMD! Thanks!
Well bit-slice chips were made by many manufacturers. Keep in mind the minicomputer manufacturers were the chip companies' bread & butter for a long time. Even Intel; they made the 3000 series of bit-slice parts. But it wasn't really separate ICs that eventually merged to form microprocessors. The Am2901 was introduced in 1975, well after there were a few microprocessors on the market. These chips, and their applications, coexisted with monolithic VLSI microprocessors for a long time. Bit-slice design was commonplace clear up until at least 1990. It was just a different way of doing things that was more scalable and flexible. And at the time of introduction of the VAX-11/730, for example, designing a single VLSI chip that implemented an architecture as complex as VAX wasn't really practical. The first single-chip VLSI implementation of the VAX architecture (the 78032, used in the MicroVAX-II and others) wouldn't tape out for another three years after that.
I'd love to find a Zilog Z8000, but don't imagine period correct Z8000s are so easy to come by. We have a Z8000 machine in the warehouse, but one of the big rules for this product is that no vintage computers will be harmed to make it happen. Are you talking about just a Z8000 chip? I can provide that for the exhibit. It will need ESD protection, of course.
Cool, we'll talk. And not only ESD protection, but non degradable ESD protection is being planned.
Ok. Go ahead and count on it being available and let me know how things progress. -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On Feb 9, 2020, at 3:08 PM, Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On 2/9/20 2:58 PM, Adam Michlin wrote:
That fills a huge hole in my understanding of architecture history. It certainly makes sense that there would be separate ICs that eventually merged into one discrete CPU. I just assumed it was done by the minicomputer manufacturers themselves. I had no idea it was AMD! Thanks!
Well bit-slice chips were made by many manufacturers. Keep in mind the minicomputer manufacturers were the chip companies' bread & butter for a long time. Even Intel; they made the 3000 series of bit-slice parts.
But it wasn't really separate ICs that eventually merged to form microprocessors. The Am2901 was introduced in 1975, well after there were a few microprocessors on the market. These chips, and their applications, coexisted with monolithic VLSI microprocessors for a long time. Bit-slice design was commonplace clear up until at least 1990. It was just a different way of doing things that was more scalable and flexible.
And at the time of introduction of the VAX-11/730, for example, designing a single VLSI chip that implemented an architecture as complex as VAX wasn't really practical. The first single-chip VLSI implementation of the VAX architecture (the 78032, used in the MicroVAX-II and others) wouldn't tape out for another three years after that.
And it was sloooow by comparison to its contemporary VAXen. Its primary benefits were board space, component cost and power savings, at the expense of a fair amount of speed. Fully integrated microprocessors didn't outperform their multi-chip or discrete-part brethren until the era of the NVAX (which was concurrent with the big-ass ECL-based VAX 9000, which it outperformed, much to DEC's chagrin). That was 1989 or so. - Dave
On 2/11/20 11:11 AM, David Riley via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Well bit-slice chips were made by many manufacturers. Keep in mind the minicomputer manufacturers were the chip companies' bread & butter for a long time. Even Intel; they made the 3000 series of bit-slice parts.
But it wasn't really separate ICs that eventually merged to form microprocessors. The Am2901 was introduced in 1975, well after there were a few microprocessors on the market. These chips, and their applications, coexisted with monolithic VLSI microprocessors for a long time. Bit-slice design was commonplace clear up until at least 1990. It was just a different way of doing things that was more scalable and flexible.
And at the time of introduction of the VAX-11/730, for example, designing a single VLSI chip that implemented an architecture as complex as VAX wasn't really practical. The first single-chip VLSI implementation of the VAX architecture (the 78032, used in the MicroVAX-II and others) wouldn't tape out for another three years after that.
And it was sloooow by comparison to its contemporary VAXen. Its primary benefits were board space, component cost and power savings, at the expense of a fair amount of speed. Fully integrated microprocessors didn't outperform their multi-chip or discrete-part brethren until the era of the NVAX (which was concurrent with the big-ass ECL-based VAX 9000, which it outperformed, much to DEC's chagrin). That was 1989 or so.
The 78032? Oh heck yes it was slower than the "big boys". But it got an entire VAX processor, with FPU and 1MB of RAM, on a single board for a fraction of the price of any of the "big boys". It enabled the deskside and desktop VAXen, etc. Remember, there's more to life than just speed! ;) -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On Feb 11, 2020, at 2:35 PM, Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
The 78032? Oh heck yes it was slower than the "big boys". But it got an entire VAX processor, with FPU and 1MB of RAM, on a single board for a fraction of the price of any of the "big boys". It enabled the deskside and desktop VAXen, etc. Remember, there's more to life than just speed! ;)
I didn't say it was bad! Everything in engineering is a tradeoff, and that was a very wise one, because they sold a LOT of them (and made quite a few dedicated customers). - Dave
On 2/11/20 3:56 PM, David Riley wrote:
The 78032? Oh heck yes it was slower than the "big boys". But it got an entire VAX processor, with FPU and 1MB of RAM, on a single board for a fraction of the price of any of the "big boys". It enabled the deskside and desktop VAXen, etc. Remember, there's more to life than just speed! ;)
I didn't say it was bad! Everything in engineering is a tradeoff, and that was a very wise one, because they sold a LOT of them (and made quite a few dedicated customers).
That's very true. And achieving stable operation at 5MHz in 1985 for such a complex architecture was quite a feat, keeping in mind that "stable" for a VAX has a different meaning than "stable" for a PC. Different design requirements! -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On Tue, Feb 11, 2020 at 2:35 PM Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
The first single-chip VLSI implementation of the VAX architecture (the 78032, used in the MicroVAX-II and others)
And it was sloooow by comparison to its contemporary VAXen. Its primary benefits were board space, component cost and power savings, at the expense of a fair amount of speed.
The 78032? Oh heck yes it was slower than the "big boys". But it got an entire VAX processor, with FPU and 1MB of RAM, on a single board for a fraction of the price of any of the "big boys". It enabled the deskside and desktop VAXen, etc. Remember, there's more to life than just speed! ;)
Packing a full VAX into a box the size of suitcase for ~$20,000 was an amazing feat in 1985. We were definitely on the small end of DEC's customers then - we ordered an 11/750 the week they were announced (S/N BT0000354) because the price point was enough below the 11/780 that we could manage it. We also got one of the early 11/730s because, again, the low price point made it affordable for a second VAX in the company. Similarly for the uVAX-I, more because we needed a Qbus VAX for our new Qbus product, but right after we bought a second one (for code development), the uVAX-II came out and we paid the full upgrade price ($17K?) to replace the CPU, disk controller, disk and RAM (and software license!) Totally worth the cost for our needs - we now had a machine that was the fastest number cruncher in the building, and for 1-3 users, it was way faster then our 11/750, for 20% the cost! Yes, the uVAX-II was slower than the full-sized lineup of the day, but at a hell of a price-performance point. I have a bare CVAX die in an acrylic block I got at DECUS - "Without Ultrix, it's just a paperweight!" But outside of the DEC world, nobody really noticed. -ethan
On 2/11/20 4:05 PM, Ethan Dicks via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Packing a full VAX into a box the size of suitcase for ~$20,000 was an amazing feat in 1985. We were definitely on the small end of DEC's customers then - we ordered an 11/750 the week they were announced (S/N BT0000354) because the price point was enough below the 11/780 that we could manage it. We also got one of the early 11/730s because, again, the low price point made it affordable for a second VAX in the company. Similarly for the uVAX-I, more because we needed a Qbus VAX for our new Qbus product, but right after we bought a second one (for code development), the uVAX-II came out and we paid the full upgrade price ($17K?) to replace the CPU, disk controller, disk and RAM (and software license!) Totally worth the cost for our needs - we now had a machine that was the fastest number cruncher in the building, and for 1-3 users, it was way faster then our 11/750, for 20% the cost!
Yes, the uVAX-II was slower than the full-sized lineup of the day, but at a hell of a price-performance point.
I have a bare CVAX die in an acrylic block I got at DECUS - "Without Ultrix, it's just a paperweight!"
Nice! Is that actually a CVAX (78034, MicroVAX-3) or a 78032 (MicroVAX-II, -2000, etc)? I've never seen a 78032 paperweight, if that's what it is I'd love to see a picture of it. -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
What I think is funny about this topic is that my whole collection is based around the processes used to form the technology. The logic is all consistent and more or less solved but the implementation into ever smaller/more widely accesible forms is what I find interesting.
On Feb 9, 2020, at 2:58 PM, Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On 2/9/2020 2:24 PM, Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Bit-slice is great stuff. There are many bit-slice chips, but the Am2901 essentially owned the market. It is a four-bit unit.
Basically it's a processor building block used to construct a micromachine. You stack them up to whatever bit width you want, and program them with microcode to implement whatever macro-architecture you want. There are companion chips, like the Am2910 sequencer, etc. These are not required but come in handy. The sequencer can implement constructs like a microprogram counter, branches and jumps, etc.
A few examples you've heard of: The VAX-11/730 uses a row of eight Am2901s to implement a 32-bit VAX processor, and the DECsystem-2020 uses a row of nine to implement a 36-bit PDP-10 processor. Both use RAM-based control stores, so when they power up they don't speak the VAX/PDP-10 instruction sets until after the microcode is loaded.
This is generally the smallest/cheapest approach to build a large processor. The VAX-11/730 and DECsystem-2020 are very small, very low-end members of their respective families. But the bit-slice chips themselves are quite fast for their day, being big hot-running 1970s bipolar chips.
It's also possible to use Am2901s (or other bit-slice chips) as processors in their own right. For example, many, many third-party disk controllers for DEC machines use a pair or a quad of Am2901s to implement their functionality. In this application they typically aren't running microcode, but are used as more of a microcontroller with firmware. The distinction is largely semantic, though, of course.
It's great stuff. If you want to learn more about how all of this works, I recommend picking up a copy of "Bit-Slice Microprocessor Design" by John Mick and James Brick. This book is/was known in the industry as "Mick & Brick".
That fills a huge hole in my understanding of architecture history. It certainly makes sense that there would be separate ICs that eventually merged into one discrete CPU. I just assumed it was done by the minicomputer manufacturers themselves. I had no idea it was AMD! Thanks!
This is the area where I think the Autonetics created a series of artifacts that really tells a good story about the process moving through discrete components to mos to mos-lsi. The Autonetics D17B was a pre-lithographic process real time computer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-17B Each board looked sort of like this https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B0YG4TcsmGWIVSf;DFF168ED-4C1C-49B5-B3E0-... Then as far as I can tell Autonetics developed the process to use a photo-lithographicly re-produce the previous generation technology. the block on the top of the picture was a lucite desk ornament showing the number of discrete parts fit in it’s new chips https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B0YG4TcsmGWIVSf;7CB945E4-B92A-487B-B3D9-... This picture shows the back of the block which has diagram of circuit that was used in the 1962 board. The sales notes are on the back of the sample kit which is opened in this photo https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B0YG4TcsmGWIVSf;8547D1B2-A2EE-403D-B927-... For me when the topic of microprocessors comes up I always marvel at the trial and error/ out of the box thinking which uses the same logic in smalller forms. There are many ways to slice this onion, Ben
I'd love to find a Zilog Z8000, but don't imagine period correct Z8000s are so easy to come by. We have a Z8000 machine in the warehouse, but one of the big rules for this product is that no vintage computers will be harmed to make it happen. Are you talking about just a Z8000 chip? I can provide that for the exhibit. It will need ESD protection, of course.
Cool, we'll talk. And not only ESD protection, but non degradable ESD protection is being planned.
Speaking of bit slice, has anyone ever seen the 74888 in the wild? For those not familiar with it, the 74888 was an 8-bit wide slice (they called it byte-slice) introduced by TI in the mid '80s. After getting a copy of the databook, I never really heard from it again. I always had the feeling it was the last gasp of bit slice chipsets. BLS
On Feb 9, 2020, at 14:25, Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On 2/9/20 2:02 PM, Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Ooo.. how could I forget Fairchild? Thanks! The AMD bit slice is new to me. Am I understanding correctly that it is not a discrete CPU but rather parts of a CPU that could be used together? Probably not a candidate for this exhibit, but I'm already having ideas for the next one!
Bit-slice is great stuff. There are many bit-slice chips, but the Am2901 essentially owned the market. It is a four-bit unit.
Yes, the Am2900 family is the quintessential bit slice series. It’s 4 bits wide and comprises an ALU, sixteen registers and carry-lookahead generation inside, and it’s FAST for the time. Coupled with a carry generator and some fast bipolar PROM or SRAM for the control store, you could make a whole 16-bit processor running at 16 MHz (maybe 20 if you pushed it) in just a handful of chips. You don’t need the 2910, either, it’s mostly just a convenience chip. Learn how to build a processor with Am2900 logic, some PROM and some registers, and you’ll forever understand that a CPU is nothing more than a fancy state machine. - Dave
On Sun, 9 Feb 2020, David Gesswein via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On Sun, Feb 09, 2020 at 11:45:37AM -0500, Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Hi Everyone,
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.
Some more 8 bits 1802, F8, TMS 1000, 8048/8051, PIC, 8x300.
greater than 8 bit: 68000 family, TMS 9900, 6100 (PDP-8 on a chip)
I have an AMI S9900 ceramic DIP64, if that would help. It was used in a terminal for the USAF AN/FYQ-93 air defense computer system. Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
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
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
On 2/9/20 11:45 AM, Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Hi Everyone,
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...?
What should we have if we have more space? 80x86, 680x0, Sparc, MIPS, Power, Alpha, ARM, Itanium...?
Modern CPUs (to some degree) aren't out of the question, either, as we're hoping to show the progression of Moore's Law from the 4004 (2,300 transistors) to present day maybe, for example, a AMD Ryzen 9 3900X (at 9,890,000,000 transistors).
Thoughts? I'm sure I'm forgetting plenty of important CPUs.
8088/8086 fall under the same family code wise (8 vs 16 bit) I would think the 8085 would be in there are I think most CP/M machines are 8085 and Z80 (there was CP/M for 6802, 68K and 8088/86 also). The original ARM 1 (?) would be interesting but I think they're hard to come by. On the micontroller side things get intereesting as there are lots of processors. Motorola 68xx (not those listed above), Intel 804x/805x, Z8, GI PICs (later Microchip). I don't think we see the AVR until the 90's. I'm more than certain I've missed a few. I never paid much attention to the 1 bit processors. I know Japan has a family of processor that I've never heard of yet were the most popular microcontroller ever produced. -- Linux Home Automation Neil Cherry ncherry@linuxha.com http://www.linuxha.com/ Main site http://linuxha.blogspot.com/ My HA Blog Author of: Linux Smart Homes For Dummies
I have my own opinions but I figured I would look at what others think and get some ideas. https://spectrum.ieee.org/static/chip-hall-of-fame Acorn Computers ARM1 Processor Reading this on the smartphone? Then you’re using a direct descendant of this processor right now Atmel ATmega8 The chip at the heart of the original Arduino was created by two annoyed students Computer Cowboys Sh-Boom Processor You’ve never heard of it. But this processor’s high-speed architecture has been duplicated in every modern computer Intel 8088 Microprocessor The “castrated” processor that birthed the IBM PC Microchip Technology PIC 16C84 Microcontroller Adding easily reprogrammable onboard memory to store software revolutionized microcontrollers MOS Technology 6502 Microprocessor
From the heroic age of 8-bit CPUs, this processor powered the Apple II, Commodore 64, BBC Micro, and more
Motorola MC68000 Microprocessor The processor that powered the original Macintosh, as well as the beloved Amiga computers Sun Microsystems SPARC Processor Using an unproven new architecture, this processor put Sun Microsystems on the map Texas Instruments TMS32010 Digital Signal Processor This chip put digital signal —specialists in handling the messy world outside the computer—on the map Texas Instruments TMS9900 An ambitious failure, this processor powered the first 16-bit home computer Transmeta Corp. Crusoe Processor Ahead of its time, this chip heralded the mobile era when energy use, not processing power, would become the most important spec Zilog Z80 Microprocessor Another legend from the 8-bit era, this processor powered the first portable computer as well as the beloved “Trash”-80 Intel 4004 Microprocessor The first CPU-on-a-chip was a shoe-string crash project RCA CDP 1802 Despite bad management, the first CMOS microprocessor went all the way to Jupiter Nvidia NV20 The first configurable graphics processor opened the door to a machine-learning revolution
The 6809 is my favorite 8-bit CPU, and it had some significant machines, but I’d still probably have to admit that it’s just an extended 6800, if you’re worried about space. Similarly, the 8088 is just an 8086 with an 8-bit external bus. If you’re looking to include that era, though, I think you definitely need to include the 68000. - Dave
On Feb 9, 2020, at 11:46, Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Hi Everyone,
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...?
What should we have if we have more space? 80x86, 680x0, Sparc, MIPS, Power, Alpha, ARM, Itanium...?
Modern CPUs (to some degree) aren't out of the question, either, as we're hoping to show the progression of Moore's Law from the 4004 (2,300 transistors) to present day maybe, for example, a AMD Ryzen 9 3900X (at 9,890,000,000 transistors).
Thoughts? I'm sure I'm forgetting plenty of important CPUs.
-Adam
On 2/9/20 8:13 PM, David Riley via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
The 6809 is my favorite 8-bit CPU, and it had some significant machines, but I’d still probably have to admit that it’s just an extended 6800, if you’re worried about space.
I think you'll find that they are as different as the 8085 vs the 8088. Keeping it short, the 6809 is a much nicer processor. -- Linux Home Automation Neil Cherry ncherry@linuxha.com http://www.linuxha.com/ Main site http://linuxha.blogspot.com/ My HA Blog Author of: Linux Smart Homes For Dummies
On 2/9/20 8:41 PM, Neil Cherry via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
The 6809 is my favorite 8-bit CPU, and it had some significant machines, but I’d still probably have to admit that it’s just an extended 6800, if you’re worried about space.
I think you'll find that they are as different as the 8085 vs the 8088.
Keeping it short, the 6809 is a much nicer processor.
emacs!! -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On 2/9/20 8:47 PM, Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On 2/9/20 8:41 PM, Neil Cherry via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
The 6809 is my favorite 8-bit CPU, and it had some significant machines, but I’d still probably have to admit that it’s just an extended 6800, if you’re worried about space.
I think you'll find that they are as different as the 8085 vs the 8088.
Keeping it short, the 6809 is a much nicer processor.
emacs!!
And yes emacs is a better ... er, editor ... ;-) The comparison for the 6809 was between the 6800 and the 6809. The addition of extra instructions and registers made it easier for the 6809 to run multiple processes. The 6809 and the 6800 were not binary compatible. -- Linux Home Automation Neil Cherry ncherry@linuxha.com http://www.linuxha.com/ Main site http://linuxha.blogspot.com/ My HA Blog Author of: Linux Smart Homes For Dummies
Bringing the battlestation (UNIVAC) quite literally to /r/retrobattestations, VCF won the award for Most Absolute Unit in the Not x86 Contest. More information here: https://www.reddit.com/r/retrobattlestations/comments/eqhcf5/contest_not_x86... So the easy part is done. Now the hard part is here. We have to pick only three stickers from: https://imgur.com/a/iAS5T This may present a problem. Suggestions are most welcome, but please refrain from physical violence. ;) -Adam
On Sun, Feb 9, 2020 at 10:26 PM Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Bringing the battlestation (UNIVAC) quite literally to /r/retrobattestations, VCF won the award for Most Absolute Unit in the
That's awesome!
Not x86 Contest. More information here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/retrobattlestations/comments/eqhcf5/contest_not_x86...
So the easy part is done. Now the hard part is here. We have to pick only three stickers from:
This may present a problem.
Suggestions are most welcome, but please refrain from physical violence. ;)
I suggest these: 003 - Retro BattleStations 012 - Thinking about teletypes 019 - Team Lift OR THESE: 005 - Apple II 008 - Atari 024 - Commodore
-Adam
-- ========================================= Jeff Brace Vice President & Board Member, VCF East Showrunner Vintage Computer Federation http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org
And we get to stick them on the Univac so choose wisely!!! ;-) Sent from my iPhone
On Feb 9, 2020, at 10:35 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sun, Feb 9, 2020 at 10:26 PM Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Bringing the battlestation (UNIVAC) quite literally to /r/retrobattestations, VCF won the award for Most Absolute Unit in the
That's awesome!
Not x86 Contest. More information here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/retrobattlestations/comments/eqhcf5/contest_not_x86...
So the easy part is done. Now the hard part is here. We have to pick only three stickers from:
This may present a problem.
Suggestions are most welcome, but please refrain from physical violence. ;)
I suggest these:
003 - Retro BattleStations 012 - Thinking about teletypes 019 - Team Lift
OR THESE: 005 - Apple II 008 - Atari 024 - Commodore
-Adam
-- ========================================= Jeff Brace Vice President & Board Member, VCF East Showrunner Vintage Computer Federation http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org
On Sun, Feb 9, 2020 at 11:45 AM Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
VCF is working on a historical exhibit of CPUs (not really support chips at this point). Literally just the CPUs.
Cool.
What should we have at the bare minimum? 4004, 8008, 8088, 8086, 6502, Z80, 6800, 6809...?
1802.
What should we have if we have more space? 80x86, 680x0, Sparc, MIPS, Power, Alpha, ARM, Itanium...?
Depends on your focus, but the 8-bitters above are all 1970s and so is the MC68000. There's also the SC/MP a version of which appeared as the INS8073, a "BASIC on a chip" product (CPU, BASIC in ROM and a few I/O bits for a console, just add RAM) and found in the RB5X robot (among other places).
Thoughts? I'm sure I'm forgetting plenty of important CPUs.
Depends on "important for what". I see plenty of good suggestions in the rest of the thread. -ethan
On 2020-02-11 11:51, Ethan Dicks via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On Sun, Feb 9, 2020 at 11:45 AM Adam Michlin via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
VCF is working on a historical exhibit of CPUs (not really support chips at this point). Literally just the CPUs.
Cool.
What should we have at the bare minimum? 4004, 8008, 8088, 8086, 6502, Z80, 6800, 6809...?
1802.
What should we have if we have more space? 80x86, 680x0, Sparc, MIPS, Power, Alpha, ARM, Itanium...?
Is the exhibit meant to be microprocessors, or CPUs in general? If the latter, I think you need separate "tracks" based maybe on market segment. I second the notion that this is liable to become cluttered if not limited in scope and/or separated into categories. Like, I can donate or loan an early POWER or a VAX 6000 CPU board (they are both awesome looking artifacts) but now you've got large things next to very small things. ;) My $0.02 : If this is going to run alongside the 6502 theme of VCF East, focus on microprocessors including the 6502, ending somewhere around the 80386 or early RISC timeframe, and then fast-forwarding from there to near present day. You can fill it and grow it out later, but with literal exponential growth it's hard to take in the entirety of 50 years in one go. -- Jameel Akari
The current thought is microprocessors only. An early POWER or VAX 6000 CPU board gives me yet another idea for an exhibit in the future. I'll keep the offer in mind! Yes, if we can pull it off, the thought is to store the "All these things on the wall" exhibit for a later return and fill that space with microprocessors. My thought is "All these things..." is just one way to express the effect of Moore's Law on the world and we're going to try to come up with different ways to illustrate the exponential growth over the years. Furthermore, the hope is to bake the history lesson into much of the museum. This allows us to change things up while alwaysl letting us teach one of the most important lessons to the next (and current) generation. Part of it is that we talk endlessly about Z80s, 68000s, 6502s, et. all and computers that use them, but so few people get to see the actual microprocessor. The 1802 and 6502 are now visible on the RCA COSMAC and KIM-1 and what a difference it makes (thanks Corey and Tony). And comparing a 4004 to a modern Intel i7 with some signage of things like clock speed and transistor count would be very educational. On 2/11/2020 12:20 PM, Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Is the exhibit meant to be microprocessors, or CPUs in general? If the latter, I think you need separate "tracks" based maybe on market segment. I second the notion that this is liable to become cluttered if not limited in scope and/or separated into categories.
Like, I can donate or loan an early POWER or a VAX 6000 CPU board (they are both awesome looking artifacts) but now you've got large things next to very small things. ;)
My $0.02 : If this is going to run alongside the 6502 theme of VCF East, focus on microprocessors including the 6502, ending somewhere around the 80386 or early RISC timeframe, and then fast-forwarding from there to near present day. You can fill it and grow it out later, but with literal exponential growth it's hard to take in the entirety of 50 years in one go.
My take on a potential CPU exhibit. Knowing where we would likely put this in the museum, the space available, and more importantly who the bulk of our potential "customers" will be (visitors to the museum) this needs to be fairly straight forward, easily explained in a short amount of time, and illustrative without much or any explanation in order to be of value (available space vs. impact vs. other items that could be displayed in that space) What I envision (and I am but one voice of 5 on the SC and one of many in the group) is to start with the earliest ones, and spread out as different directions were taken. Show a few interesting and historical offshoots. End with modern might, stopping along the way to point out the stalwarts across time. (6502, 8088, Z80, 68k, Pentium, PowerPC, from micros to name a few plus others that have been mentioned in this discussion) One of the easiest things to show people is the economy of scale. "The number of transistors in a 6502 vs. an Intel Xeon" One time I went to the Air & Space museumon the mall in DC oh so many years ago had one thing in particular I still remember. Second floor, the walkway are where you were staring at the X1 hanging from the ceiling...in that area. Embedded in the wall was a tall glass tube (it was a tall rectangle...tube....whatever) filled with transistors. It showed the number (or approximation/portion of) the number of transistors in the Apollo spacecraft if memory serves (lunar module? one of those) Next to it was a coin and a microprocessor of the current era (90s) with a small sign showing that the number of transistors in the tube was in the tens of thousands, the spacecraft in the hundreds of thousands, and the chip the size of a coin in the millions. Simple, basic, to the point, and holy $h1t moment!! We have a great poster in the hallway that has been mentioned on this list already. A simplified version of the processors on that poster would be pretty cool, especially with that poster displayed above/next to the processors themselves. That’s my take on it. Tony
On Feb 11, 2020, at 12:20 PM, Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Like, I can donate or loan an early POWER or a VAX 6000 CPU board (they are both awesome looking artifacts) but now you've got large things next to very small things. ;)
Worth noting that the VAX 6000 isn't a microprocessor, per se; the Mariah chipset, which was also used in a reduced capacity in the uVax 3100-80 (of which I have one), is a multi-chip processor. I think it's actually an interesting illustration of how multi-chip CPU architectures coexisted alongside true (single-chip) microprocessors (e.g. CVAX) for a while while they fought for superiority, but it's probably outside the scope of this exhibit. - Dave
On 2020-02-12 20:50, David Riley wrote:
On Feb 11, 2020, at 12:20 PM, Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Like, I can donate or loan an early POWER or a VAX 6000 CPU board (they are both awesome looking artifacts) but now you've got large things next to very small things. ;)
Worth noting that the VAX 6000 isn't a microprocessor, per se; the Mariah chipset, which was also used in a reduced capacity in the uVax 3100-80 (of which I have one), is a multi-chip processor. I think it's actually an interesting illustration of how multi-chip CPU architectures coexisted alongside true (single-chip) microprocessors (e.g. CVAX) for a while while they fought for superiority, but it's probably outside the scope of this exhibit.
Yup, it's definitely out of the scope as its now been described. I threw those examples out there as "you could end up with things like this if you let the scope get too wide." Then you'd have to try to explain to visitors what you just describe. -- Jameel Akari
Jameel, please don’t think anything is definite yet. We all have our ideas, i mentioned my own take on this, and the hope is between all the different suggestions something far better than any one of us could have imagined will be the result! I’m still busy looking up processors I never heard of before (or did not know were inside a given machine) as a result of this discussion. So much to learn, so little time! Tony Sent from my iPhone
On Feb 13, 2020, at 12:07 PM, Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On 2020-02-12 20:50, David Riley wrote: On Feb 11, 2020, at 12:20 PM, Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Like, I can donate or loan an early POWER or a VAX 6000 CPU board (they are both awesome looking artifacts) but now you've got large things next to very small things. ;) Worth noting that the VAX 6000 isn't a microprocessor, per se; the Mariah chipset, which was also used in a reduced capacity in the uVax 3100-80 (of which I have one), is a multi-chip processor. I think it's actually an interesting illustration of how multi-chip CPU architectures coexisted alongside true (single-chip) microprocessors (e.g. CVAX) for a while while they fought for superiority, but it's probably outside the scope of this exhibit.
Yup, it's definitely out of the scope as its now been described. I threw those examples out there as "you could end up with things like this if you let the scope get too wide." Then you'd have to try to explain to visitors what you just describe.
-- Jameel Akari
On Thu, 13 Feb 2020, Tony Bogan wrote:
Jameel, please don’t think anything is definite yet. We all have our
Nope, I didn't think that at all. Just that you do need to limit scope to get something built for the museum. In this case it can grow over time but you only need to do one sprint at a time.
I’m still busy looking up processors I never heard of before (or did not know were inside a given machine) as a result of this discussion. So much to learn, so little time!
I have tripped and fallen down many, many Wikiholes as a result of this, yes. ;) /jka
On Feb 13, 2020, at 12:07 PM, Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On 2020-02-12 20:50, David Riley wrote: On Feb 11, 2020, at 12:20 PM, Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Like, I can donate or loan an early POWER or a VAX 6000 CPU board (they are both awesome looking artifacts) but now you've got large things next to very small things. ;) Worth noting that the VAX 6000 isn't a microprocessor, per se; the Mariah chipset, which was also used in a reduced capacity in the uVax 3100-80 (of which I have one), is a multi-chip processor. I think it's actually an interesting illustration of how multi-chip CPU architectures coexisted alongside true (single-chip) microprocessors (e.g. CVAX) for a while while they fought for superiority, but it's probably outside the scope of this exhibit.
Yup, it's definitely out of the scope as its now been described. I threw those examples out there as "you could end up with things like this if you let the scope get too wide." Then you'd have to try to explain to visitors what you just describe.
-- Jameel Akari
-- Jameel Akari
On 2020-02-11 10:51, Ethan Dicks via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
There's also the SC/MP a version of which appeared as the INS8073, a "BASIC on a chip" product (CPU, BASIC in ROM and a few I/O bits for a console, just add RAM) and found in the RB5X robot (among other places).
Ah yes, I was wondering if anyone would mention some of National Semi's early micros. I have an early PACE and SC/MP myself along with some National Semi rams designed to be used with the SC/MP. I was going to try and play with them at SOME point but if determined to be good for an exhibit I can loan them for awhile :) <2-cents> This entire topic is VERY open-ended. There are entire (virtual) museums on just keeping track of CPUs! So clearly we can't just fill the museum with every CPU we all own, we might have to move the Univac out to make room! But to keep it mostly on topic I think it would be good to keep to mostly known CPUs aka probably not much need for every National Semi CPU. But off-shoots from companies that did design CPUs would be interesting as a "this didn't catch on" addon to other stuff, like maybe the Z8000? I don't know the full history of that chip so sorry for ignorance if I'm showing any. I also saw a lot of discussion on bitslice which is a very important thing to mention and show an example of, say a Nova 4 CPU board. Very used and very popular. I also saw say the Jaws-11 chipset mentioned. It would be cool to show say a PDP 11/40 boardset, then a PDP 11/44 boardset then a Jaws-11 chip. Showing the progression of integration over one architecture! </2-cents> -Connor K
On Feb 11, 2020, at 2:16 PM, connork--- via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I also saw say the Jaws-11 chipset mentioned. It would be cool to show say a PDP 11/40 boardset, then a PDP 11/44 boardset then a Jaws-11 chip. Showing the progression of integration over one architecture!
This is another really interesting idea, also outside the scope of the "microprocessor" idea. J-11 is an interesting one, because it's a multi-chip package; does it really count as a microprocessor if the control store is external? Single package, multiple die (like Pentium Pro, or early multi-core CPUs later). I think the F-11 is an interesting evolutionary step there as well; it's definitely miniaturized, there are microprocessor-like features, but the control store, MMU and the optional FP and CIS control stores are separate packages. Definitely useful illustrations of the progression of an architecture! - Dave
participants (15)
-
Adam Michlin -
Ben Greenfield -
Brian L. Stuart -
Christian Liendo -
connork＠connorsdomain.com -
Dave McGuire -
David Gesswein -
David Riley -
Dean Notarnicola -
Ethan Dicks -
Jameel Akari -
Jeffrey Brace -
Mike Loewen -
Neil Cherry -
Tony Bogan