LT6502: A 6502-based homebrew laptop

113•classichasclass•1h ago

Comments

vardump•1h ago

I sometimes wonder what the alternate reality where semiconductor advances ended in the eighties would look like.

We might have had to manage with just a few MB of RAM and efficient ARM cores running at maybe 30 MHz or so. Would we still get web browsers? How about the rest of the digital transformation?

One thing I do know for sure. LLMs would have been impossible.

myself248•1h ago

And imagine if telecom had topped out around ISDN somewhere, with perhaps OC-3 (155Mbps) for the bleeding-fastest network core links.

We'd probably get MP3 but not video to any great or compelling degree. Mostly-text web, perhaps more gopher-like. Client-side stuff would have to be very compact, I wonder if NAPLPS would've taken off.

Screen reader software would probably love that timeline.

iberator•29m ago

you are wrong. Windows 3.11 era used CPUs with like 33mhz cpu, and yet we had TONS of graphical applications. Including web browsers, Photoshop, CAD, Excel and instant messangers

Only thing that killed web for old computers is JAVASCRIPT.

cluckindan•22m ago

Not JavaScript. Facebook.

j16sdiz•18m ago

Netscape 2 support javascript on 16-bit Windows 3.1

JdeBP•1h ago

Transputers. Lots and lots and lots of transputers. (-:

intrasight•34m ago

Well, we wouldn't have ads and tracking.

kaashif•30m ago

I don't think there's really a credible alternate reality where Moore's law just stops like that when it was in full swing.

The ones that "could have happened" IMO are the transistor never being invented, or even mechanical computers becoming much more popular much earlier (there's a book about this alternate reality, The Difference Engine).

I don't think transistors being invented was that certain to happen, we could've got better vacuum tubes, or maybe something else.

vardump•20m ago

When MC68030 (1986) was introduced, I remember reading how computers probably won't get much faster, because PCB signal integrity would not allow further improvements.

People that time were not actually sure how long the improvements would go on.

jhbadger•14m ago

As someone has brought up, Transputers (an early parallel architecture) was a thing in the 1980s because people thought CPU speed was reaching a plateau. They were kind of right (which is why modern CPUs are multicore) but were a decade or so too early so transputers failed in the market.

PetahNZ•20m ago

We did have web browsers, I had Internet Explorer on Windows 3.1, 33mhz 8mb RAM.

bluGill•20m ago

I remember using the web on 25mhz computers. It ran about as fast as it does today with a couple ghz. Our internet was a lot slower than as well.

peterfirefly•2m ago

It crashed a lot more, the fonts (and screens) were uglier, and Javascript was a lot slower. The good thing was that there was very little Javascript.

analog8374•1h ago

It's commodore 64 ish. I like it

ekaryotic•1h ago

neat. not something i´d hanker for. i saw a 16 core z80 laptop years ago and i often think about it because it can multitask. https://hackaday.com/2019/12/10/laptop-like-its-1979-with-a-...

nine_k•4m ago

I implemented "multitasking" (well, two-tasking) between a BASIC program and native code on a Z80, using a "supervisor" driven by hardware interrupts. There's just so much you can pack in a 4MHz CPU with a 4-bit ALU (yes, not 8-bit). It worked for soft-realtime tasks, but would be a rather weak desktop.

kayo_20211030•1h ago

Complete madness! But, I love it.

drkrab•1h ago

Way cool! When can I buy one?

detay•56m ago

this post made me smile. why not!!! 6502 my first processor. <3

einpoklum•46m ago

And it mostly runs Microsoft software, too... Basic from 1977 :-P

marcodiego•33m ago

Maybe this can achieve RYF certification.

What I really would love: modern (continously built) modern (less than 10 years old tech) devices ryf-cetified.

rustyhancock•18m ago

Stunning work! Astounding progress since its under 3 months old from PCB to this result.

Funnily enough I've been musing this past month would I better separate work if I had a limited Amiga A1200 PC for anything other than work! This would nicely fit.

Please do submit to HackaDay I'm sure they'd salivate over this and it's amazing when you have the creator in the comments. Even if just to explain no a 555 wouldn't quite achieve the same result. No not even a 556...

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