[HN Gopher] MCL65 - Fastest Apple II+
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       MCL65 - Fastest Apple II+
        
       Author : rbanffy
       Score  : 40 points
       Date   : 2021-05-02 16:41 UTC (6 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (microcorelabs.wordpress.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (microcorelabs.wordpress.com)
        
       | titzer wrote:
       | > The MCL65+ is a 6502 accelerator card which uses a 600Mhz
       | Arduino Teensy4.1 microcontroller to emulate a 6502
       | microprocessor as well as its bus interface signals. It was
       | designed to be a drop-in replacement for the original 6502
       | processor
       | 
       | Oh man, that is really cool. The possibility for retro computers
       | to be actually usable tools by giving them a little more
       | horsepower and RAM is really neat!
        
         | p1mrx wrote:
         | With all the computation and memory stuffed into a modern
         | microcontroller, is it still a retro computer? At some point,
         | you might as well just emulate the whole thing in software.
        
         | sircastor wrote:
         | As a matter of pedantry (maybe), I'm inclined to point out that
         | a Teensy 4 is not an Arduino, and not a microcontroller in its
         | own right. It's a module that runs an NXP chip.
         | 
         | That said, I agree, this is really cool. Emulating the chip
         | calls onboard is really neat.
        
           | omgtehlion wrote:
           | It is definitely not an "Arduino", and to be more pedantic,
           | the chip is from Freescale (which is now owned by NXP), but
           | not from NXP itself.
        
           | mastax wrote:
           | I was going to say, don't let Arduino LLC catch you calling
           | it that ;)
        
         | rbanffy wrote:
         | They can be useful right now. All you need is a way to allow
         | them to communicate with modern computers.
         | 
         | The biggest issue is that most of the OSs of the time had no
         | concept of a remote or shared disk, or a network. If it has
         | that, it's easier to integrate them.
        
       | mrlonglong wrote:
       | I bet this could be great for accelerating Acorn BBC B
       | microcomputers as well. Elite on a 6502 Tube was out of this
       | world when released during the late 80s.
        
         | laurencerowe wrote:
         | See PiTubeDirect:
         | 
         | https://github.com/hoglet67/PiTubeDirect/wiki
         | 
         | https://magpi.raspberrypi.org/articles/pitubedirect
        
           | jacquesm wrote:
           | Very neat hack!
        
         | tecleandor wrote:
         | I'm not an expert but this looks vaguely similar to what you
         | ask :)
         | 
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8UtnKWmstA
        
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       (page generated 2021-05-02 23:01 UTC)