+scorpio_ny Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 (edited) By the way, @reifsnyderb, I do not know if you had heard yet. Zilog just issued an EOL for the Z80 processor in DIP form. I am not sure how this will play out in the long term. I just checked DigiKey and the last time to buy is in June. Edited April 20 by scorpio_ny 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 (edited) 1 hour ago, scorpio_ny said: By the way, @reifsnyderb, I do not know if you had heard yet. Zilog just issued an EOL for the Z80 processor in DIP form. I am not sure how this will play out in the long term. I just checked DigiKey and the last time to buy is in June. Perfect f*^&#%$ timing! 🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬 I wasn't going to post anything until I got some utility programs working on it. But it looks like it's rather pointless now. There's really no point if the CPU isn't available. 😞 The picture, below, just happened today. About 3 weeks worth of work down the can..... I guess this project is over. I was just checking out the load.com file to see if the dump was legit. It's probably not worth the time, now. Edited April 20 by reifsnyderb 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DjayBee Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 This was mentioned on the Fujinet Discord yesterday as well. @tschak909 wrote that only the DIP version is discontinued. Perhaps he will be summoned and elaborate here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+scorpio_ny Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 2 hours ago, reifsnyderb said: Perfect f*^&#%$ timing! 🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬 I wasn't going to post anything until I got some utility programs working on it. But it looks like it's rather pointless now. There's really no point if the CPU isn't available. 😞 The picture, below, just happened today. About 3 weeks worth of work down the can..... I guess this project is over. I was just checking out the load.com file to see if the dump was legit. It's probably not worth the time, now. Hi @reifsnyderb, I know this is not good news, but it does not mean the CPU will not be available by other means. Also, the CPU will live in on in a different package form. Also, the CPU is available in another form which means just a re-design. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AtariGeezer Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 (edited) DigiKey has 1800 in 1 type... Edited April 20 by AtariGeezer 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 9 minutes ago, DjayBee said: This was mentioned on the Fujinet Discord yesterday as well. @tschak909 wrote that only the DIP version is discontinued. Perhaps he will be summoned and elaborate here. Yeah. It's an ez80....like that used on the Agon light. It's a 100 pin SMD LQFP package. The entire current board design would have to be scrapped. In addition, all I need is the CPU....not all the other stuff. Lots of features.....but it would set the project back another month or two. This is on top of the time already spent. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_The Doctor__ Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 (edited) 3,791 units at one online source means things are still okay, as other also have inventory, who knows maybe a person can get some direct like we did with the Dallas Real time chips years ago. Edited April 20 by _The Doctor__ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 5 minutes ago, AtariGeezer said: DigiKey has 1800 in 1 type... For now. 😞 I've been trying to build boards that have parts that are generally available. This would be a fail. 😞 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 Just now, _The Doctor__ said: 3,791 units at one online source means were still okay, as other also have inventory, who knows maybe a person can get some direct like we did with the Dallas Real time chips years ago. I wouldn't be surprised if the remaining inventory sells fast. It's hard to say, really. But since they are EOL, some people may stock up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 (edited) Had I known they were going to EOL the Z-80, I wouldn't have wasted the time. 😞 The shame of it is that I am almost finished. Printer support needs added, utility programs need to be added, and a fixed board needs made yet. This would still take a lot of time. Today, I even added the IRQ fix with the change to the M1 line. 😞 So, all the features on the final board revision are now patched in. 😞 Edited April 20 by reifsnyderb Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+scorpio_ny Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 Here is one of many articles on this: https://www.hackster.io/news/zilog-calls-time-on-the-venerable-z80-discontinues-the-standalone-z84c00-cpu-family-723594464754.amp 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_The Doctor__ Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 (edited) How many did we think we would need. Looks like they have them in the warehouse and a final run is coming from the foundry that is closing. Minimum orders will be implemented in time as well as a maximum order cap. Edited April 20 by _The Doctor__ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 2 minutes ago, _The Doctor__ said: How many did we think we would need? No idea. I just know what happened with the chip shortage when I was using the AS6C8008's and they weren't available. 😞 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_The Doctor__ Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 You might as well finish it anyway, people can cannibalize for the chip if need be in the future. Probably could get a good number of them out now while you can. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sup8pdct Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 Wont they be available from 3rd party manufactures? Maybe not be called z80 tho Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+scorpio_ny Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 (edited) 25 minutes ago, reifsnyderb said: For now. 😞 I've been trying to build boards that have parts that are generally available. This would be a fail. 😞 You created the advanced 800XL remake that requires chips that have not been manufactured for over 40 years. And chips are still readily available. The Z80 was still being manufactured until the recent announcement. So there will be inventory available. Edited April 20 by scorpio_ny 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 13 minutes ago, scorpio_ny said: You created the advanced 800XL remake that requires chips that have not been manufactured for over 40 years. And chips are still readily available. The Z80 was still being manufactured until the recent announcement. So there will be inventory available. Well, I didn't have any choice with the 800XL remake. Though, I'd love to see one-to-one replacements for the LSI chips. I also don't want to be in a position to have to scrounge around on ebay to get Z-80 chips. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 31 minutes ago, _The Doctor__ said: You might as well finish it anyway, people can cannibalize for the chip if need be in the future. Probably could get a good number of them out now while you can. I'll think about it. Quite frankly, I don't know how many people would be interested in a Z-80 board. It's somewhat of a pet project in that I started it as a personal challenge to get a working board from a lousy picture. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 17 minutes ago, sup8pdct said: Wont they be available from 3rd party manufactures? Maybe not be called z80 tho Doubtful. I don't think there are that many places that make chips, unfortunately. I did find this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gdode3PfTbs But there isn't much information to go on. It looks like the guy somehow used an ARM processor. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DjayBee Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 4 hours ago, reifsnyderb said: Yeah. It's an ez80....like that used on the Agon light. It's a 100 pin SMD LQFP package. The entire current board design would have to be scrapped. In addition, all I need is the CPU....not all the other stuff. Lots of features.....but it would set the project back another month or two. This is on top of the time already spent. "No more DIP" sounds more like "PLCC and other packaging will be available". This is also how I understood Thom. And then you could go this way - either by incorporating the traces directly on your board or using it piggybacked: 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reifsnyderb Posted April 20 Author Share Posted April 20 PLCC's are discontinued as well. The only thing available is the ez80. It's a 100 pin SMD micro controller. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+kheller2 Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 9 hours ago, reifsnyderb said: I'll think about it. Quite frankly, I don't know how many people would be interested in a Z-80 board. It's somewhat of a pet project in that I started it as a personal challenge to get a working board from a lousy picture. I would be interested. But realistically how many of these do we think people would ever want? 100 (and I think that is a stretch). Z80s are laying all over the place in tons of things. I'll spend $500 to hoard 50 of them if that's what people need to keep this project going. I never even booted up my Indus CPM system! But sure... I'll pitch in to help. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ivop Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 Hi, It's a pity the DIP and PLCC versions are discontinued, but I suppose they won't be hard to get anytime soon. Even NMOS 6502 are plenty available as NOS and refurbished. I see you used a RE'd Z80 source for BDOS and CCP. In theory that's fine, but I would not remove the 6 bytes serial at the beginning of BDOS and move BDOSE to $xx00. Some applications rely on it being $xx06 and the zero page vector ending with $06. IIRC ACK compiled applications have that dependency. If I were you, I'd just stick to DRI vanilla source code. You won't gain a full page of memory savings anyway, and it's advised to have each component page aligned. The cross-platform utilities are here: http://www.cpm.z80.de/download/cpm2-plm.zip . Most include source, too. I don't think you wasted three weeks on this. It's great to see you got to the CCP prompt! Most of the work seems done. Now you "only" need some form of proper terminal emulation and you can run WordStar Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+kheller2 Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 Assuming these are Z80As in the 1090, there are plenty of Sinclair 1000, TRS80s and Colecovisions to contribute 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+scorpio_ny Posted April 20 Share Posted April 20 (edited) 12 hours ago, reifsnyderb said: It's somewhat of a pet project in that I started it as a personal challenge to get a working board from a lousy picture. The challenge is still there in spite of the announcement. 🙂 Finish the project and worry about sourcing chips later for deployment. Edited April 20 by scorpio_ny 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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