Sorry for the overly dramatic/poetic title, but I think it's adequate, considering I came back to this blog after over a month.
The thing is, I was busy. A lot. Girlfriend, university, and now the semester finals. No, they aren't over yet, I am writing this in my break between taking tests and sleeping.
I got a crazy idea 15 minutes ago, about making my own retro computer. Nothing fancy, an Intel 8086 and a Zilog Z80 (not on the same board of course). They'll be pretty basic, a few ROM/RAM chips and a serial connection. Maybe I'll add the VGA output later. But the first part in this "plan" is obtaining the datasheets on paper. I'll scour my city library in the following months for them, but in worst case, I'll shell out and print them.
Also, I started messing with my Stellaris Launchpad. Not much, just did a few exercises from the lab workbook and my first impression: wow. It's so simple to use, after you get used to the "want multiple stuff at once? Bitwise AND them". And I barely scratched into it. My ultimate goal is writing an AVR and a PIC programmer (sure beats buying a programmer for 20+ euros). Of course, the source code will be open and put on github.
I'll have time for all this from the middle of January, when I finish most of my university tests. Also, if all goes according to plan, February will be a working month :)
That's all for now, I'll make a new post later in the afternoon about some old news (where old means a week old).
The thing is, I was busy. A lot. Girlfriend, university, and now the semester finals. No, they aren't over yet, I am writing this in my break between taking tests and sleeping.
I got a crazy idea 15 minutes ago, about making my own retro computer. Nothing fancy, an Intel 8086 and a Zilog Z80 (not on the same board of course). They'll be pretty basic, a few ROM/RAM chips and a serial connection. Maybe I'll add the VGA output later. But the first part in this "plan" is obtaining the datasheets on paper. I'll scour my city library in the following months for them, but in worst case, I'll shell out and print them.
Also, I started messing with my Stellaris Launchpad. Not much, just did a few exercises from the lab workbook and my first impression: wow. It's so simple to use, after you get used to the "want multiple stuff at once? Bitwise AND them". And I barely scratched into it. My ultimate goal is writing an AVR and a PIC programmer (sure beats buying a programmer for 20+ euros). Of course, the source code will be open and put on github.
I'll have time for all this from the middle of January, when I finish most of my university tests. Also, if all goes according to plan, February will be a working month :)
That's all for now, I'll make a new post later in the afternoon about some old news (where old means a week old).
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