Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
thechipletter.substack.com
Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
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Re: Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
#2I have so much moe for the various post-Z80 chips Zilog made that people think failed in the marketplace but are still around and perfectly viable for applications that don't need 32-bit
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zilog_eZ80
But the thing is that you keep getting dragged kicking and screaming to ARM because even if it is boring it is capable, affordable and everywhere.
Re: Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
#3I have so much moe for the various post-Z80 chips Zilog made that people think failed in the marketplace but are still around and perfectly viable for applications that don't need 32-bit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zilog_eZ80 But the thing is that you keep getting dragged kicking and screaming to ARM because even if it is boring it is capable, affordable and everywhere.
The latest round of STM32G0 is about $1 in quoted price before you start haggling. TI is launching a $0.40 (!) ARM micro soon. A modern toolchain, an ALU that doesn't suck, and a ton of ecosystem support are genuine improvements over z80. It's just the new default in the same way that z80 was a default (though less so, I grant).
And I say this as someone who still knows z80 opcodes from high school programming TI calculators. I love the thing but man is 32-bit nice.
Re: Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
#4I have so much moe for the various post-Z80 chips Zilog made that people think failed in the marketplace but are still around and perfectly viable for applications that don't need 32-bit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zilog_eZ80 But the thing is that you keep getting dragged kicking and screaming to ARM because even if it is boring it is capable, affordable and everywhere.
The latest round of STM32G0 is about $1 in quoted price before you start haggling. TI is launching a $0.40 (!) ARM micro soon. A modern toolchain, an ALU that doesn't suck, and a ton of ecosystem support are genuine improvements over z80. It's just the new default in the same way that z80 was a default (though less so, I grant). And I say this as someone who still knows z80 opcodes from high school programming TI cal…
I saw a tweet once that went something like, "Mankind strayed from god when we invented the IC", and some days I feel that. Economies of scale crush everything, including our nerdy fondness for particularly elegant ISAs.
Re: Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
#5From the wiki link of the z8000 there is a curious bit of Commodore history I never knew of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_900
C. had a pretty good deal with zilog, but they pissed it away for maybe not very good reasons....
Had things gone different C900 and the like might've been there instead of the Amiga.
Re: Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
#6Federico Faggin is a hero
Re: Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
#7There was an earlier, and to my way of thinking, much better idea at Zilog than the Z8000. That was the Z280 (later christened the Z800) it was a 16 bit machine akin to the 8086 but with upward compatibility with the Z80 and a much nicer architecture. I believe that Godbout made and S-100 card with this processor at one time. I wanted one so badly and yet the 8088 and the IBM-PC steamrolled the industry because "big blue" and all that. Sigh.
Re: Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
The latest round of STM32G0 is about $1 in quoted price before you start haggling. TI is launching a $0.40 (!) ARM micro soon. A modern toolchain, an ALU that doesn't suck, and a ton of ecosystem support are genuine improvements over z80. It's just the new default in the same way that z80 was a default (though less so, I grant). And I say this as someone who still knows z80 opcodes from high school programming TI cal…
I saw a tweet once that went something like, "Mankind strayed from god when we invented the IC", and some days I feel that. Economies of scale crush everything, including our nerdy fondness for particularly elegant ISAs.
Mankind stole fire when they acquired VLSI. We're paying the price, but the upsides are fantastic. Eagles, Liver and all.
Re: Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
#9Zilog could get a bigger market share.
Still remember those times programming in Z80 machine code. It was much more flexible and convenient versus 8080.
You can find Zilog in embedded systems, they are not dead at all.
Re: Captain Zilog Crushed: The Story of the Z8000
#10I have so much moe for the various post-Z80 chips Zilog made that people think failed in the marketplace but are still around and perfectly viable for applications that don't need 32-bit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zilog_eZ80 But the thing is that you keep getting dragged kicking and screaming to ARM because even if it is boring it is capable, affordable and everywhere.
> I have so much moe
I had to look it up, from urbandictionary.com:
also written as moé. A Japanese slang term (ironically, first employed by otaku) used to refer to the fetish for or sexual attraction to idealized people, usually a fictional perfect young girl.
Since then, moé has come to be used as a general term for a hobby, mania or fetish (non-sexual or otherwise). This is contrasted with otaku, which would be taking the specific hobby, mania or fetish to harmful levels.