back to article Zilog reveals very, very distant heir to the Z80 empire

Mostly-forgotten silicon-maker Zilog is alive and has just released a new product that shares a little DNA with the Z80 CPU that powered many of the earliest mass-market microcomputers. The Z80 famously powered Sinclair's iconic ZX 80, ZX 81 and Spectrum computers. The CPU also made it into the Radio Shack TRS-80, the Osborne …

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  1. Paul Cooper

    Obligatory "When I were a lad..."

    When I were a lad (actually in my late 20s/early 30s) I worked on software for a prototype data logger for an ice sounding radar. We used an S100 bus single card computer with a Z80 processor. The development system (using Wordstar, asm and link!) was an Osborne 1. It has left me with an enduring impatience with bloated software (I know what you can do in 2k of EPROM!) and memories of keeping vast amounts of code in my head so I could debug stuff in an environment where reassembling, linking , blowing a new EPROM and then testing the result could take an hour or more!

    I still have the Leventhal Z80 Assembly language Programming manual on my shelf!

    1. Andy The Hat Silver badge

      Re: Obligatory "When I were a lad..."

      ... well ...

      we had a 'big multi-user' system with a rack of Z80 boards running CP/M on each board with a central pair of 8" floppies for boot and storage, lots of terminals with lovely TVI 920 (IIRC) terminals and RS232 interface cables ... what more could proper fanbois need? :-)

      1. Down not across

        Re: Obligatory "When I were a lad..."

        we had a 'big multi-user' system with a rack of Z80 boards running CP/M on each board with a central pair of 8" floppies for boot and storage, lots of terminals with lovely TVI 920 (IIRC) terminals and RS232 interface cables ... what more could proper fanbois need? :-)

        MP/M of course. :-)

    2. Simon Harris

      Re: Obligatory "When I were a lad..."

      "I still have the Leventhal Z80 Assembly language Programming manual on my shelf!"

      I'll see your Leventhal and raise you a Rodney Zaks.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Coffee machine

    Worked at a place some time back, and happened to be in the coffee room when the technician was servicing the machine. It automated the brewing of ground coffee, using a giant toilet roll (well it looked like that) as filters for the grounds. And in the machine's innards was a Z80. I tried to explain to the technician that the fearful quality of the brew was because of the z80, but some people just want rubbery coffee.

    1. hplasm
      Happy

      Re: Coffee machine

      "...the fearful quality of the brew was because of the z80..."

      It was obviously overqualified and bored!

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Coffee/keyboard

    10 REM E£ RND

    Did something if you did RAND USR 16384 in machine code on a ZX81. I forget what.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    In case anyone has time on their hands ...

    You could always pick up a 'soft' Z80 ?

    https://github.com/codesqueak/Z80Processor

  5. Dogbowl
    Thumb Up

    4004! That was my first exposure to micros way back in 1976 I think. Programmed in binary as well on a custom made UV erasable EPROM burner.

    I can also vouch for the TMS9900, always thought it had an elegant architecture and some nifty things like being able to execute an opcode present in a register. Context switching was neat, no push/pop business, same for interrupts. Sigh, those were the days what fun we had making industrial controllers from scratch all the way up to a forge control panel (Sheffield forge masters).

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