3 ms·
I think anything is fair game that was reasonably doable back in 1983. Cartridges have been used from the beginning, at first they were just 16 kB. Games have
by vardump 9y ago
I think anything is fair game that was reasonably doable back in 1983.
Cartridges have been used from the beginning, at first they were just 16 kB. Games have been released in cartridge format from 8 to 512 kB.
It's really impressive to be able to include any type of decompression when total budget per sample is just 21 clock cycles on a system where one instruction takes 2 to 8 clocks.
So I think you're underrating the achievement here.
- DrJokepu 9y agoI don’t think 1mb expansions were available until the late 80s though.
- vardump 9y agoExpansion would have been unrealistic, you're right. But this doesn't need a RAM expansion at all. See these 512 kbit 1983 vintage EPROM chips: https://www.ebay.com/itm/INTEL-D27512-27512-IC-28Pin-DIP-EPROM-VINTAGE-1983-Brand-New-QTY-1-/252446065069 https://www.ebay.com/itm/INTEL-D27512-27512-IC-28Pin-DIP-EPR... 16 of these 512 kbit chips, some address decoding and banking logic. 1 MB cart. Very much doable with off-the-shelf parts even way back then.