4 ms·

Resurrecting the 8088 Micoprocessor

68 points by tyrick 12y ago

userbinator 12y ago
I guess he's aiming for something like this: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Breadboard_complex.jpg http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Breadboard_complex.jp... The 8088/8086 were probably the first - and last - "breadboardable" x86 CPUs as everything after that came in square, non-DIP packages. However, there have been hobbyists making their own electronics for x86-based computers up to the 486: http://dubel.org/computer/ http://dubel.org/computer/ Starting with the Pentium, however, things got really hairy...
- kjs3 12y ago
  FWIW...The 80286 came in a 40-pin DIP, and of course lots of non-x86 processors came (still come) in DIP as well. From a hobbyist perspective, PGA packages aren't really alot more difficult to deal with than DIP. Even LCC & PLCC packages have easy through-hole sockets. QFP & PGA are, of course, nightmares. :-) The real problem is it becomes increasingly difficult to breadboard a machine as processor clock goes above 10-20MHz. I've actually been puzzling how slow a PCI bus can run, since prototyping something at 33MHz is really hard.
  - jhallenworld 12y ago
    32-bit ARM Cortex-M0+ CPUs are available in DIPs: 28-pin: http://www.nxp.com/products/microcontrollers/cortex_m0_m0/lpc1100/LPC1114FN28.html http://www.nxp.com/products/microcontrollers/cortex_m0_m0/lp... 4-pin!: http://www.nxp.com/products/microcontrollers/cortex_m0_m0/lpc800/LPC810M021FN8.html http://www.nxp.com/products/microcontrollers/cortex_m0_m0/lp...
    - jacquesm 12y ago
      4? I think you meant 8!
      - jhallenworld 12y ago
        Oops, yes. I've been considering an lpc812 16-pin device for a project but it would need a bunch of '595s for extra output bits. Instead I'm using a 64-pin stm32f030.. the overall price is the same, but the stm32f030 has more flash and RAM. Even so, NXPs development system seems more coherent (even though I'm not an eclipse fan).
  - drmpeg 12y ago
    The 80286 never came in a 40-pin DIP. It's impossible since the 24-bit address bus and 16-bit data bus were not multiplexed and required 40 pins. The PGA, LCC and PLCC versions all had 68 pins.
cesarbs 12y ago
Where can one still buy an 8088? Are they still being produced?
- maximilianburke 12y ago
  I think you can still find them from electronics dealers; Jameco still has them listed in their online catalog, for example: http://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10001_10001_52169_-1 http://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_1000...
- kjs3 12y ago
  I don't know of anyone fabbing a monolithic 8088 these days, but you can license a feature complete 8088 core for use on an ASIC or FPGA from lots of firms. There's still a market.
- aswanson 12y ago
  I got one from ebay, along with an 8086 and z-80.
  - tyrick 12y ago
    That's also how I got mine.
- userbinator 12y ago
  Apart from the usual sources of old/NOS stock, they are still being produced; a new one is rather expensive though: http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/CP80C88-2Z/CP80C88-2Z-ND/3074201 http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/CP80C88-2Z/CP80C88-... http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/IP80C88/IP80C88-ND/1063276 http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/IP80C88/IP80C88-ND/... There's also a military-rated version (this is probably one of the reasons why they're still in production...) which is in the $500+ range and curently not in stock: http://www.intersil.com/en/products/space-and-harsh-environment/-883/microprocessors-and-peripherals/80C88-883.html http://www.intersil.com/en/products/space-and-harsh-environm...
- sliverstorm 12y ago
jpmattia 12y ago
The other news in this article: Jameco is still in business?! Wow. They used to supply geeks throughout the US with their mail order biz; For me, it was late 70s/early 80s.
- mindcrime 12y ago
  Yep, they're around and seem to be doing reasonably well. I buy a lot of electronic components from them, and so do a lot of the other folks at Splatspace (the Durham, NC hackerspace).
- tyrick 12y ago
  Jameco is very much alive! However, My bank recently called to verify some purchases with them. They claimed that my regular transactions with such a company were flagged as suspicious. I suppose the everyday household is not impulse buying this stuff as I do.
guscost 12y ago
Have to mention Code by Charles Petzold which was recommended somewhere around here. It builds up from basic logic gates (with loads of diagrams) to a rough approximation of the 8080 series processors. A great book if you want to know the principles and history of this technology.
mindcrime 12y ago
This is awesome. I've been wanting to get into 8-bit computing and do a "ground up" build of something using an 8088, Z80, or something of that ilk for a while. Since we're on the subject... can anybody recommend any good books / websites / magazine articles / etc., that cover this kind of ground? That is, starting from a raw chip (a simple one, like one of these old 8 bit ones, not a 80386 or something) and building a simple computer from scratch? I'd really like to get my hands dirty doing something like this, to get a better feel for the nuts and volts level stuff.
- Atommota 12y ago
  http://www.amazon.com/8088-Project-Book-Robert-Grossblatt/dp/0830631712 http://www.amazon.com/8088-Project-Book-Robert-Grossblatt/dp...
rasz_pl 12y ago
Author went for USB oscilloscope. Do not follow his recommendation if you like good quality usable tools. Sainsmart dds120: http://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/sainsmart-dds120-usb-oscilloscope-(buudai-bm102)/ http://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/sainsmart-dds120-usb-o... "scope is advertised as 50Ms/s while the ADC runs at 40MHz" 40MHz sampling means its usable for signals up to ~10MHz. Its ok'ish for arduino level of tinkering. If you like this type of old school hardcore hardware hacking check those links: http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com http://www.s100computers.com http://www.s100computers.com Those guys are actively building 20-30 year old computers from scratch. Most modern (and probably the fastest) is 386DX/486DLC board http://www.s100computers.com/My%20System%20Pages/80386%20Board/80386%20CPU%20Board.htm http://www.s100computers.com/My%20System%20Pages/80386%20Boa... On the other end of the spectrum is virtual hardware hacking. MAME project has a less known offshoot branch called MESS. It emulates old computers on a logic level with single clock cycle precision (not instruction, its clock accurate!). To get you idea of what that means imagine sound card emulation. Sane person would map buffers and pump samples to your host sound API. MESS people on the other hand desolder chips from old Sound Blaster 2.0, DECAPSULATE Intel microcontroller responsible for DMA, read its rom content. Emulated sound card runs this rom dump on virtual Intel 8048. Same with Keyboards - they emulate 8048 with its rom content inside keyboard, and 8051 sitting on the motherboard with its individual rom content! :) This is pretty crazy and inefficient (C++), but extremely accurate. Emulated hardware ranges from 6502 (and all of its individual sub models like 6510, 6509 etc) to 486/586 processors and 3DFX cards (again emulating low level functions, no opengl mapping there). http://www.mess.org http://www.mess.org
- tyrick 12y ago
  I edited the post to add "I would not recommend buying this if you can afford otherwise." Thanks.

68 points by tyrick 12y ago

I guess he's aiming for something like this: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Breadboard_complex.jpg http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Breadboard_complex.jp... The 8088/8086 were probably the first - and last - "breadboardable" x86 CPUs as everything after that came in square, non-DIP packages. However, there have been hobbyists making their own electronics for x86-based computers up to the 486: http://dubel.org/computer/ http://dubel.org/computer/ Starting with the Pentium, however, things got really hairy...

kjs3 12y ago
FWIW...The 80286 came in a 40-pin DIP, and of course lots of non-x86 processors came (still come) in DIP as well. From a hobbyist perspective, PGA packages aren't really alot more difficult to deal with than DIP. Even LCC & PLCC packages have easy through-hole sockets. QFP & PGA are, of course, nightmares. :-) The real problem is it becomes increasingly difficult to breadboard a machine as processor clock goes above 10-20MHz. I've actually been puzzling how slow a PCI bus can run, since prototyping something at 33MHz is really hard.
- jhallenworld 12y ago
  32-bit ARM Cortex-M0+ CPUs are available in DIPs: 28-pin: http://www.nxp.com/products/microcontrollers/cortex_m0_m0/lpc1100/LPC1114FN28.html http://www.nxp.com/products/microcontrollers/cortex_m0_m0/lp... 4-pin!: http://www.nxp.com/products/microcontrollers/cortex_m0_m0/lpc800/LPC810M021FN8.html http://www.nxp.com/products/microcontrollers/cortex_m0_m0/lp...
  - jacquesm 12y ago
    4? I think you meant 8!
    - jhallenworld 12y ago
      Oops, yes. I've been considering an lpc812 16-pin device for a project but it would need a bunch of '595s for extra output bits. Instead I'm using a 64-pin stm32f030.. the overall price is the same, but the stm32f030 has more flash and RAM. Even so, NXPs development system seems more coherent (even though I'm not an eclipse fan).
- drmpeg 12y ago
  The 80286 never came in a 40-pin DIP. It's impossible since the 24-bit address bus and 16-bit data bus were not multiplexed and required 40 pins. The PGA, LCC and PLCC versions all had 68 pins.

cesarbs 12y ago

Where can one still buy an 8088? Are they still being produced?

maximilianburke 12y ago
I think you can still find them from electronics dealers; Jameco still has them listed in their online catalog, for example: http://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10001_10001_52169_-1 http://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_1000...
kjs3 12y ago
I don't know of anyone fabbing a monolithic 8088 these days, but you can license a feature complete 8088 core for use on an ASIC or FPGA from lots of firms. There's still a market.
aswanson 12y ago
I got one from ebay, along with an 8086 and z-80.
- tyrick 12y ago
  That's also how I got mine.
userbinator 12y ago
Apart from the usual sources of old/NOS stock, they are still being produced; a new one is rather expensive though: http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/CP80C88-2Z/CP80C88-2Z-ND/3074201 http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/CP80C88-2Z/CP80C88-... http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/IP80C88/IP80C88-ND/1063276 http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/IP80C88/IP80C88-ND/... There's also a military-rated version (this is probably one of the reasons why they're still in production...) which is in the $500+ range and curently not in stock: http://www.intersil.com/en/products/space-and-harsh-environment/-883/microprocessors-and-peripherals/80C88-883.html http://www.intersil.com/en/products/space-and-harsh-environm...
sliverstorm 12y ago

jpmattia 12y ago

The other news in this article: Jameco is still in business?! Wow. They used to supply geeks throughout the US with their mail order biz; For me, it was late 70s/early 80s.

mindcrime 12y ago
Yep, they're around and seem to be doing reasonably well. I buy a lot of electronic components from them, and so do a lot of the other folks at Splatspace (the Durham, NC hackerspace).
tyrick 12y ago
Jameco is very much alive! However, My bank recently called to verify some purchases with them. They claimed that my regular transactions with such a company were flagged as suspicious. I suppose the everyday household is not impulse buying this stuff as I do.

guscost 12y ago

Have to mention Code by Charles Petzold which was recommended somewhere around here. It builds up from basic logic gates (with loads of diagrams) to a rough approximation of the 8080 series processors. A great book if you want to know the principles and history of this technology.

mindcrime 12y ago

This is awesome. I've been wanting to get into 8-bit computing and do a "ground up" build of something using an 8088, Z80, or something of that ilk for a while. Since we're on the subject... can anybody recommend any good books / websites / magazine articles / etc., that cover this kind of ground? That is, starting from a raw chip (a simple one, like one of these old 8 bit ones, not a 80386 or something) and building a simple computer from scratch? I'd really like to get my hands dirty doing something like this, to get a better feel for the nuts and volts level stuff.

Atommota 12y ago
http://www.amazon.com/8088-Project-Book-Robert-Grossblatt/dp/0830631712 http://www.amazon.com/8088-Project-Book-Robert-Grossblatt/dp...

rasz_pl 12y ago

Author went for USB oscilloscope. Do not follow his recommendation if you like good quality usable tools. Sainsmart dds120: http://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/sainsmart-dds120-usb-oscilloscope-(buudai-bm102)/ http://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/sainsmart-dds120-usb-o... "scope is advertised as 50Ms/s while the ADC runs at 40MHz" 40MHz sampling means its usable for signals up to ~10MHz. Its ok'ish for arduino level of tinkering. If you like this type of old school hardcore hardware hacking check those links: http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com http://www.s100computers.com http://www.s100computers.com Those guys are actively building 20-30 year old computers from scratch. Most modern (and probably the fastest) is 386DX/486DLC board http://www.s100computers.com/My%20System%20Pages/80386%20Board/80386%20CPU%20Board.htm http://www.s100computers.com/My%20System%20Pages/80386%20Boa... On the other end of the spectrum is virtual hardware hacking. MAME project has a less known offshoot branch called MESS. It emulates old computers on a logic level with single clock cycle precision (not instruction, its clock accurate!). To get you idea of what that means imagine sound card emulation. Sane person would map buffers and pump samples to your host sound API. MESS people on the other hand desolder chips from old Sound Blaster 2.0, DECAPSULATE Intel microcontroller responsible for DMA, read its rom content. Emulated sound card runs this rom dump on virtual Intel 8048. Same with Keyboards - they emulate 8048 with its rom content inside keyboard, and 8051 sitting on the motherboard with its individual rom content! :) This is pretty crazy and inefficient (C++), but extremely accurate. Emulated hardware ranges from 6502 (and all of its individual sub models like 6510, 6509 etc) to 486/586 processors and 3DFX cards (again emulating low level functions, no opengl mapping there). http://www.mess.org http://www.mess.org

tyrick 12y ago
I edited the post to add "I would not recommend buying this if you can afford otherwise." Thanks.